Will AI Put Us Out of Jobs: Web Developer Specific

This blog is purely opinion. Most of this will be subjective thoughts but my hope is that much of it is based off of objective realities.

If you are wanting to simply read what the title of this article says it’s about, scroll to where it says ‘Finally to the Article’, or click here It all ties together but ultimately I think you can just start there and be ok if you don’t want to read life details

First, some reflection that may seem irrelevant but it is how I think and I am writing this soooooooo…

The year 2021 started off with everyone saying things like, ‘Man, I am glad 2020 is gone.’ The year 2020 ended with everyone looking forward to the end of the year and then the start of 2021 began with everyone being ‘thankful’ for the end of 2020.

I am going to be a little controversial. Good things did happen in 2020 👀🤓🤦‍♂️😡🤯 < This is what I see everyone’s reactions being.

Why would I ever say something like that? There are subjective realities at play. Such as, it was my wife and I’s first year of marriage. Could we have seen Coronavirus coming? No, but my wife is brilliant enough to see that it was worse than anyone claimed it was early in 2020 and then prepare for the crazy months of March - June. Our marriage grew during 2020 because, as we said at various points in 2020, it was like an incubator for our marriage. My work was completely remote, her work was cut down to a few days a week. So we had a lot more time to spend together which was a precious thing and an incredible hard thing at times. We believe that God was using that time for very specific reasons, even if we found ourselves saying often that we were not sure what he was doing. We grew in our faith and trust in God and we grew with one another. That’s pretty good I’d say, not pleasant at the moment, but good.

I also finished one job, learned Software Engineering, got part-time and contract work a month after completing my software immersive and then at the beginning of 2021 I got my first full-time job. I absolutely love Software Engineering. I am blown away that I get to do this everyday as my job.

I know that not everyone has gotten a job yet and that more people than I know were hurt, affected, and challenged in ways that I cannot imagine. But there is good if we will look for it. Again, opinion

There were incredibly hard things that forced us to see things we do not like to see. For instance, Racial tension in the United States. There is an impossible amount of things to address with this but at minimum we saw that things are not the way they ought to be. For more resources on understanding one another, I would point you toward (The Witness: A Black Christian Collective.)[https://thewitnessbcc.com]

Ok, so what does all of this have to do with the title of this article? Well…

Finally, To The Article

My simple aim in all that came above this was to get to this point: Life.

What? What do you mean Ben? Life? Well, let me explain.

One of the greatest things in life is creating, cultivating, contributing, etc to it. We will always have personal experiences. 2020 was an off year for so many people but there were good things that happened. Being awakened to realities and truths that things are not the way they ought to be shines an uncomfortable light on us as individuals but it is always better to see those realities that go on being blind to them (choosing to remain blind is another thing which I am not addressing here).

As web developers and software engineers we get to create! It is freaking awesome! I wake up every day and get to do something I absolutely love which is a gift.

So here is my list of thoughts and reasons why I do not think that AI will replace us, specifically as developers but I think these things can be applied to creator’s/cultivators.

This list is not in any specific order

1. Creativity - I do not think AI can or will ever be able to ‘create’. I don’t pull my life and theology from Marvel but it is interesting to me that Ultron, the closest Tony Stark came to achieving AI, tried to basically create an indestructible human, who had the worst time in Avengers: Infinity War.

   • I think this point can be teased out a lot. Suffice it to say, AI and Machine Learning(ML) pick up on patterns. They solve crazy problems and some that we didn’t even know we had until they solved them and now they are problems.
   • If AI/ML becomes ‘creative’ it is because someone made it creative.

2. Personal Branding - AI can expedite many processes but personal branding requires you to be creative about who you/your business are and how you are portrayed. AI cannot brand you.

I want to stop here because I am realizing as I am writing this that all of the things I want to say can be summed up.

HUMANITY

In my opinion, the goal of AI seems to simply be humanity. At its best it strives to make humanity better. I do not think AI will replace all jobs, there will be a good portion that are replaced. Anything that can be automated seems like it could be replaced. But from a human standpoint that might not be the worst thing because then we are free to ‘create’ other jobs that involve more creativity.

As humans we create. Creativity will never go away and as longs as there are ideas, there will be creativity and as long as there is creativity there will be jobs.

There is also the group of people who want things that are ‘local’. The primary idea behind this is supporting those near you. Communities like this benefit from some of the AI/automated things, but they mostly benefit from taking care of each other through services. In many ways this comes back to personal branding but this also is found in most places you visit. Tourist cities may have a lot of technology, but most people travel and want to experience history or something unique about that place. This, I believe, will keep the world in check from becoming nothing but a landscape of tech. Tech is a tool to be used not mastered by.

So, for now software development seems to be pretty secure.