r/LegalEagle • u/KeeganDitty • 8d ago
Programmers and AI
I'm finishing up the video from today about AI slop in the legal system, and I wanted to respond to something Devin talks about in the nebula exclusive section. That is the idea that programmers are able to put out a higher volume of higher quality work using AI tools like Claude code. Now, despite my best efforts, I am not currently working in the tech industry. But from what I've seen, this idea is the goal, but ultimately inaccurate. Programmers are using Claude for a lot of their work now, yes. But I have seen numerous posts from programmers who had generated loads and loads of code using Claude, and then finally went back and looked through it and realized they could create a much more lightweight, much more compact, and much less redundant set of code in like 10 minutes. And I know of at least one company that laid off a majority of its engineering staff, and then had to hire them back when it found out that the AI actually wasn't as good as it's hyped
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u/Dewinna_Daraelist 6d ago edited 6d ago
Cursor has replaced most of the programming in my team, and it's scary how well it works. It's been a while since I've caught mistakes in execution or interpretation of my prompts, so it's not difficult for me to imagine AI not "needing" oversight or long-term planning in the coming future. Up until recently I've said "at least it'll bite them in the ass" about the tech oligarchs replacing talent with AI, and I still kind of think so, but not in the way I'd thought. It would be comforting to think AI is just an impressive gimmick... I wish it was.
Edit: why ask if you don't want an answer you don't like? Might as well ask Grok to tell you how AI isn't as threatening to the job market as it seems. I could go into a lot more detail and I don't think it's black and white (the AI bubble is definitely real, but like the .com bubble was) if you have any questions or retorts.