Will ChatGPT replace programmers?

[gregory]

Will ChatGPT replace programmers?
I’m a programmer and I added ChatGPT to my tool set.

Like with every new tool, I tried it, was initially impressed, pushed it to its limits, and then I realized it was not going to become the shiny new thing that would replace everything else.

For example I was working on a bug where a certain value in our software wasn’t correct. I copied the whole class, and told it where exactly the problem happened, but it couldn’t understand it, there was no way for it to understand. The thing is, the entities involved were defined in a different package, and linked to certain DTOs, and went through many processes, schedulers, methods etc.

To solve this, you would need to have a good understanding of the software and what it’s supposed to do; and this software is built on hundreds of thousands of lines of code.

But ChatGPT can only handle around 4000 characters. This will increase eventually, but only so much, since the cost of training/running this AI increases along with it.

So ChatGPT is perfect to handle small scripts and methods, but cannot handle an entire software platform. Nor can it summarize a book, it’s too long. There are workarounds, but it’s not quite there yet.

One thing we’re still better at than these AIs, is parsing through an enormous amount of information, and only registering what matters.

// Edit following several commentators who might have misinterpreted my answer:

I use it everyday (GPT4-turbo); it’s like having an assistant that codes fast and precisely as long as you describe the problem well and give good directives.

It’s nowhere near being able to "replace" programmers though. You still need to know what to prompt, how to interpret and integrate the output, and mostly, just to know what you’re doing, which it doesn’t, nor would any non-technical person.

I wouldn’t rule out it being able to replace many underperformers in general. One good programmer plus a good model is worth a lot more than 10 mediocre programmers.

The point that it won’t "replace all programmers" still stands. The day it does, it would have to be an AGI, and then it could replace most jobs (or make them irrelevant), and all hell will break loose.