AI is already rendering many new software engineering and computer science grads unemployable in their field of study!

[MarathonMike]

This is particularly painful for me to find out. I had a long career in software engineering and it was just a few years ago that degree was a golden ticket to a solid job.

I didn't realize the negative impacts of AI were already here. Well, it's here and it is taking over much of the basic coding and testing functions that new hires in software would be doing. We're not talking about degrees in Liberal Arts here. Wow this is shocking.

“Everyone is so panicked”: Entry-level tech workers describe the AI-fueled jobpocalypse

Engineering graduates face shrinking opportunities and rising pressure to upskill beyond their curriculum.

restofworld.org

 

[TroglocratsRdumb]

This is particularly painful for me to find out. I had a long career in software engineering and it was just a few years ago that degree was a golden ticket to a solid job.

I didn't realize the negative impacts of AI were already here. Well, it's here and it is taking over much of the basic coding and testing functions that new hires in software would be doing. We're not talking about degrees in Liberal Arts here. Wow this is shocking.

“Everyone is so panicked”: Entry-level tech workers describe the AI-fueled jobpocalypse

Engineering graduates face shrinking opportunities and rising pressure to upskill beyond their curriculum.

restofworld.org

I wonder what AI will do to passwords.

 

[Thinker101]

This is particularly painful for me to find out. I had a long career in software engineering and it was just a few years ago that degree was a golden ticket to a solid job.

I didn't realize the negative impacts of AI were already here. Well, it's here and it is taking over much of the basic coding and testing functions that new hires in software would be doing. We're not talking about degrees in Liberal Arts here. Wow this is shocking.

“Everyone is so panicked”: Entry-level tech workers describe the AI-fueled jobpocalypse

Engineering graduates face shrinking opportunities and rising pressure to upskill beyond their curriculum.

restofworld.org

Yup, I recall those days. Then management got a home PC and became experts overnight. I'm sure it would be great if AI could design and develop an application, I'm just not sure those doing the requesting are capable of defining the tasks.

 

[odanny]

I think its terrible. All customer service will soon start with a chat bot. As far as searching for information, It makes information so easily accessible that no one has to dig for anything, digging for information always opens up new opportunities for learning something new, completely unexpected, often by accident. Now it's plug and play, no effort required.

 

[MarathonMike]

I'm sure it would be great if AI could design and develop an application

D & D is probably still at least a junior level or above task. But hey, if the requirements or algorithms are defined clearly enough, maybe AI could generate code for it. Yikes this is scary.

 

[scruffy]

This is particularly painful for me to find out. I had a long career in software engineering and it was just a few years ago that degree was a golden ticket to a solid job.

I didn't realize the negative impacts of AI were already here. Well, it's here and it is taking over much of the basic coding and testing functions that new hires in software would be doing. We're not talking about degrees in Liberal Arts here. Wow this is shocking.

“Everyone is so panicked”: Entry-level tech workers describe the AI-fueled jobpocalypse

Engineering graduates face shrinking opportunities and rising pressure to upskill beyond their curriculum.

restofworld.org

Yes. The music business is the same way, AI is killing it.

All you really have to do is learn about AI. You can use online resources like Coursera or MIT Open Courseware.

 

[scruffy]

D & D is probably still at least a junior level or above task. But hey, if the requirements or algorithms are defined clearly enough, maybe AI could generate code for it. Yikes this is scary.

Actually here is a very nice introductory course from Geoffrey Hinton, the recent Nobel Prize winner. This is the first of 30 or so short lectures, to get to the rest click "From the Series" in the YouTube window, or Google "colin mcdonnell lecture".



The other course I can highly recommend is CS 229/230 from Stanford University. It's on YouTube too, it's more advanced but it's thorough.

For programmers, AI is like having a cluster of processors, where each processor is really stupid, it's like an Arduino or something, noisy, slow, somewhat unreliable. It only does maybe half a dozen things. So the trick is programming the cluster, not just the individual processors. In a real computer cluster you'd have IP between the processors, and you could actually architect a message passing system that way. But wires are expensive so mostly they do it in software, the processors are virtualized and the calculations are handled by GPU's.

I'm on the data science side, it's not "exactly" programming although it involves some Python and R language, but we use a lot of the same techniques as AI when we're looking at data. Things like regression, principal component analysis - in fact PCA is a great example of something a cluster can go a lot faster than a single processor, because the calculations can be parallelized.

 

[toobfreak]

AI is already rendering many new software engineering and computer science grads unemployable in their field of study!​

No surprise there. I've said from Day One that AI is going to wreck this country for a lot of people. AI will take away jobs for many good paying white collar jobs. What will be left are low level low paying management jobs and bagging french fries and stuff (at least until AI can do that too), with a lot of unemployed college grads going around now accepting menial work still expecting to be paid well.

Essentially, it is all about the money, and they are trying hard to make us a cashless society with few people actually working with machines talking to machines doing everyone's job.

Just wait until you see the customer service AI gives you! If you think customer service is bad now, just wait until all there is are machines running your life.

The dehumanization of humanity begins.

Oh eventually, in another generation, things will ameliorate a bit but I pity kids growing up today going out looking for work.

 

[scruffy]

No surprise there. I've said from Day One that AI is going to wreck this country for a lot of people. AI will take away jobs for many good paying white collar jobs. What will be left are low level low paying management jobs and bagging french fries and stuff (at least until AI can do that too), with a lot of unemployed college grads going around now accepting menial work still expecting to be paid well.

Essentially, it is all about the money, and they are trying hard to make us a cashless society with few people actually working with machines talking to machines doing everyone's job.

Just wait until you see the customer service AI gives you! If you think customer service is bad now, just wait until all there is are machines running your life.

The dehumanization of humanity begins.

Oh eventually, in another generation, things will ameliorate a bit but I pity kids growing up today going out looking for work.

Same as it ever was. You learn the skills that will get you a job.

In AI the skill is "prompt engineering", if you know how to do that you can get a job almost anywhere.

The AI is very smart, you just need to know how to tell it to give you exactly what you want. It could be code, it could be research, it could be detecting anomalies in today's financial transactions.

To be good at it, you have to know a bit about how the AI works. No programming, just conceptual. You can learn it in 6 months and be good in another 6.

 

[toobfreak]

Same as it ever was. You learn the skills that will get you a job.

In AI the skill is "prompt engineering", if you know how to do that you can get a job almost anywhere.

The AI is very smart, you just need to know how to tell it to give you exactly what you want. It could be code, it could be research, it could be detecting anomalies in today's financial transactions.

To be good at it, you have to know a bit about how the AI works. No programming, just conceptual. You can learn it in 6 months and be good in another 6.

That wasn't my point, but you are kind of making my point for me in your last statement. I know just what AI is and can do and my concern is not for all of the good that AI can and will do for us but in how unscrupulous, devious, and avaricious people will certainly try to use it as a weapon against mankind both militarily, economically, and socially. The potential for harm from and abuse of AI in exploiting its potential for evil and personal gain makes the H bomb pail in comparison. I do not believe mankind is ready for and can be trusted with such technology and I definitely know that society in general is not ready to understand it. But the tiny fraction of people who DO understand it are too dazzled by their attraction to its potential to accept the real danger in AI enslaving or destroying mankind.

I say this in all sincerity that AI may be our answer to both how a civilization can destroy itself when its technology far outpaces its biological evolution, and so why when we listen to the universe for other people out there, all we hear back is static.

 

[Votto]

This is particularly painful for me to find out. I had a long career in software engineering and it was just a few years ago that degree was a golden ticket to a solid job.

I didn't realize the negative impacts of AI were already here. Well, it's here and it is taking over much of the basic coding and testing functions that new hires in software would be doing. We're not talking about degrees in Liberal Arts here. Wow this is shocking.

“Everyone is so panicked”: Entry-level tech workers describe the AI-fueled jobpocalypse

Engineering graduates face shrinking opportunities and rising pressure to upskill beyond their curriculum.

restofworld.org

Their goal is 100% unemployment and universal income

Wakey, wakey.

 

[1srelluc]

They should have learned to "pipeline".

 

[evenflow1969]

This is particularly painful for me to find out. I had a long career in software engineering and it was just a few years ago that degree was a golden ticket to a solid job.

I didn't realize the negative impacts of AI were already here. Well, it's here and it is taking over much of the basic coding and testing functions that new hires in software would be doing. We're not talking about degrees in Liberal Arts here. Wow this is shocking.

“Everyone is so panicked”: Entry-level tech workers describe the AI-fueled jobpocalypse

Engineering graduates face shrinking opportunities and rising pressure to upskill beyond their curriculum.

restofworld.org

Yep, we be f Ed. Oh well we had a good run.

 

[Thinker101]

D & D is probably still at least a junior level or above task. But hey, if the requirements or algorithms are defined clearly enough, maybe AI could generate code for it. Yikes this is scary.

We both know that's a huge IF.

 

[MarathonMike]

We both know that's a huge IF.

I would never have thought AI would already be taking over entry level software engineering positions. I'm not sure how huge of an 'if' it is for AI to move upstream and and take over junior level software engineering functions.

 

[Thinker101]

I would never have thought AI would already be taking over entry level software engineering positions. I'm not sure how huge of an 'if' it is for AI to move upstream and and take over junior level software engineering functions.

I was referring to if requirements could be defined clearly enough. Reminds me of the outsourcing to India. Management would request a house, developers came back with a house with no doors or windows. Oops that wasn't defined in the requirements.

 

[d0gbreath]

I would never have thought AI would already be taking over entry level software engineering positions. I'm not sure how huge of an 'if' it is for AI to move upstream and and take over junior level software engineering functions.

It's going to take much more time before AI can code error checking, and create images of hands properly.

 

[MarathonMike]

It's going to take much more time before AI can code error checking, and create images of hands properly.

AI code error checking and security vulnerability checking is already in place and part of the takeover of entry level software positions. I have no idea what creating images of hands means in this context.

 

[d0gbreath]

AI code error checking and security vulnerability checking is already in place and part of the takeover of entry level software positions. I have no idea what creating images of hands means in this context.

I'll take your word for it. I have a Certificate of C Language Proficiency, but never wanted to do that full time. Hardware is much less stressful. I've been linked to a couple of AI generated fake crypto trading platforms. All I had to do was click on something that I wasn't supposed to.

The fact like AI likes to produce 6 fingered hands is just another flaw in the ointment.

 

[MarathonMike]

I'll take your word for it. I have a Certificate of C Language Proficiency, but never wanted to do that full time. Hardware is much less stressful. I've been linked to a couple of AI generated fake crypto trading platforms. All I had to do was click on something that I wasn't supposed to.

The fact like AI likes to produce 6 fingered hands is just another flaw in the ointment.

I spent most of my career coding in "C" and assembly language since my job functions were primarily hardware/software integration. The point is, AI is no longer a "boogeyman" looming in the future. It is here and it is significantly affecting jobs that until very recently were a virtual certainty of job and career security. And if it's already affecting THOSE types of jobs, it is definitely affecting lower skilled jobs.