People forget that software engineers are already speculated to come in 10x and 100x variants, so the impact that one smart dedicated person could make is almost certainly not the problem and not changed at all by AI.
The fact is you could be one is the most insanely valuable and productive engineers in the planet might only write a few lines of code most days, but you'll be writing them in a programming language, OS, or kernel. Value is created by understanding direction and by theory-building, and LLMs do neither.
I built a genuinely new product by working hard as a single human while all my competitors tried to be really productive with LLMs. I'm sure their metrics are great, but at the end of the day I, a human working with my hands and brain and sharpening my OWN intelligence have created what productivity metrics cannot buy: real innovation
Imagine the problem is picking a path against an unexplored desolate desert wasteland. One guide says that he's the fastest. Runs not walks, at a fork in the way always picks a path within 5 seconds. They promise you that they are the fastest guide out there by a factor of two.
You decide on a second opinion, and find an old wizened guide who says they always walk not run, never picks a path more quickly than 5 minutes, and promises you that no matter what sales pitch the other guide gives they can get you across the desert in half the time and half the risk to your life.
The fact is you could be one is the most insanely valuable and productive engineers in the planet might only write a few lines of code most days, but you'll be writing them in a programming language, OS, or kernel. Value is created by understanding direction and by theory-building, and LLMs do neither.
I built a genuinely new product by working hard as a single human while all my competitors tried to be really productive with LLMs. I'm sure their metrics are great, but at the end of the day I, a human working with my hands and brain and sharpening my OWN intelligence have created what productivity metrics cannot buy: real innovation