The hard bit of software engineering has always been “deeply understanding a problem well enough to implement a useful solution to it”.

The scary bit of people trying to AI away the programming part is that most rely on writing the software to understand the problem domain — remove that part and you truly do have YOLO driven development with badly thought out questions “generating” bad and kinda broken software.

—@endocrimes

Early morning hot take: when you develop software, you should consider how it can be used for evil, and consider if the negative consequences outweigh the positive ones. If you’re a good person, you include externalized consequences in the equation.

In other words, don’t make something that will hurt other people, even if it benefits you.

—@liw

Every article about AI this week is like “Today, there’s not yet a human who has eaten hot wings so hot that they spontaneously burst into flame. But, as we develop hotter and hotter sauces, we must confront the fact that one day — and that day may come very soon — one of the guests on Hot Ones will become The Inhuman Torch from Marvel Comics and annihilate the eastern seaboard in an all-consuming flame. We must prepare for that inevitable future.”

—@glyph

In an un-Mastodonly move I think I posted this first behind a pay wall, now hopefully removed. A Jewish friend, with whom I’ve sung many a sea song, casually suggested I write a Red Sea shanty. An invitation to quirkiness and whimsy is seldom lost on me. Therefore, I offer this unorthodox retelling of the parting of the Red Sea. Spoiler alert, it involves an irreverent Phoenician sea captain and a flying ship. #HappyPassover! https://www.patreon.com/posts/red-sea-shanty-55271545

—@ChristineMalec