alt Hacker NewsThis article is not about whether programming is fun, elegant, creative, or personally fulfilling.
It is about business value.
Programming exists, at scale, because it produces economic value. That value translates into revenue, leverage, competitive advantage, and ultimately money. For decades, a large portion of that value could only be produced by human labor. Now, increasingly, it cannot be assumed that this will remain true.
Because programming is a direct generator of business value, it has also become the backbone of many people’s livelihoods. Mortgages, families, social status, and long term security are tied to it. When a skill reliably converts into income, it stops being just a skill. It becomes a profession. And professions tend to become identities.
People do not merely say “I write code.” They say “I am a software engineer,” in the same way someone says “I am a pilot” or “I am a police officer.” The identity is not accidental. Programming is culturally associated with intelligence, problem solving, and exclusivity. It has historically rewarded those who mastered it with both money and prestige. That combination makes identity attachment not just likely but inevitable.
Once identity is involved, objectivity collapses.
The core of the anti AI movement is not technical skepticism. It is not concern about correctness, safety, or limitations. Those arguments are surface rationalizations. The real driver is identity threat.
LLMs are not merely automating tasks. They are encroaching on the very thing many people have used to define their worth. A machine that can write code, reason about systems, and generate solutions challenges the implicit belief that “this thing makes me special, irreplaceable, and valuable.” That is an existential threat, not a technical one.
When identity is threatened, people do not reason. They defend. They minimize. They selectively focus on flaws. They move goalposts. They cling to outdated benchmarks and demand perfection where none was previously required. This is not unique to programmers. It is a universal human response to displacement.
The loudest opponents of AI are not the weakest programmers. They are often the ones most deeply invested in the idea of being a programmer. The ones whose self concept, status, and narrative of personal merit are tightly coupled to the belief that what they do cannot be replicated by a machine.
That is why the discourse feels so dishonest. It is not actually about whether LLMs are good at programming today. It is about resisting a trend line that points toward a future where the economic value of programming is increasingly detached from human identity.
This is not a moral failing. It is a psychological one. But pretending it is something else only delays adaptation.
AI is not attacking programming. It is attacking the assumption that a lucrative skill entitles its holder to permanence. The resistance is not to the technology itself, but to the loss of a story people tell themselves about who they are and why they matter.
That is the real conflict. HN is littered with people facing this conflict.
Replies
Sure; I absolutely agree and more to the point SWE's and their ideologies compared to other professions have meant they are the first on the chopping block. But what do you tell those people; that they no longer matter? Do they still matter? How will they matter? They are no different than practitioners of any other craft - humans in general derive value partly from the value they can give to their fellow man.
If the local unskilled job matters more than a SWE now these people have gone from being worth something to society to being less of worth than someone unskilled with a job. At that point following from your logic I can assume their long term value is one of an unemployed person which to some people is negative. That isn't just an identity crash; its a crash potentially on their whole lives and livelihood. Even smart people can be in situations where it is hard to pivot (as you say mortgages, families, lives, etc).
I'm sure many of the SWE's here (myself included) are asking the same questions; and the answers are too pessimistic to admit public ally and even privately. Myself the joy of coding is taken away with AI in general, in that there is no joy doing something that a machine will be able to do better soon for me at least.
Excellent comment (even "mini essay"). I'm unsure if you've written it with AI-assistance, but even if that's the case, I'll tolerate it.
I have two things to add.
> This is not a moral failing. It is a psychological one.
(1) I disagree: it's not a failing at all. Resisting displacement, resisting that your identity, existence, meaning found in work, be taken away from you, is not a failing.
Such resistance might be futile, yes; but that doesn't make it a failing. If said resistance won, then nobody would call it a failing.
The new technology might just win, and not adapting to that reality, refusing that reality, could perhaps be called a failing. But it's also a choice.
For example, if software engineering becomes a role to review AI slop all day, then it simply devolves, for me, into just another job that may be lucrative but has zero interest for me.
(2) You emphasize identity. I propose a different angle: meaning, and intrinsic motivation. You mention:
> economic value of programming is increasingly detached from human identity
I want to rephrase it: what has been meaningful to me thus far remains meaningful, but it no longer allows me to make ends meet, because my tribe no longer appreciates when I act out said activity that is so meaningful to me.
THAT is the real tragedy. Not the loss of identity -- which you seem to derive from the combination of money and prestige (BTW, I don't fully dismiss that idea). Those are extrinsic motivations. It's the sudden unsustainability of a core, defining activity that remains meaningful.
The whole point of all these AI-apologist articles is that "it has happened in the past, time and again; humanity has always adapted, and we're now better off for it". Never mind those generations that got walked over and fell victim to the revolution of the day.
In other words, the AI-apologists say, "don't worry, you'll either starve (which is fine, it has happened time and agani), or just lose a large chunk of meaning in your life".
Not resisting that is what would be a failing.
Why do you say this subjective thing so confidently? Does believing what you just wrote make you feel better?
Have you considered that there are people who actually just enjoy programming by themselves?
Very good comment!
I wrote something similar earlier:
This is because they have entrenched themselves in a comfortable position that they don’t want to give up.
Most won’t admit this to be the actual reason. Think about it: you are a normal hands on self thought software developer. You grew up tinkering with Linux and a bit of hardware. You realise there’s good money to be made in a software career. You do it for 20-30 years; mostly the same stuff over and over again. Some Linux, c#, networking. Your life and hobby revolves around these technologies. And most importantly you have a comfortable and stable income that entrenches your class and status. Anything that can disrupt this state is obviously not desireable. Never mind that disrupting others careers is why you have a career in the first place.