Right. A computer can make more code than a human can review. So, forget about the universe where you ever review code. You have to shift to almost a QA person and ignore all code and just validate the output. When it is suggested that you as a programmer will disappear, this is what they mean.
>You have to shift to almost a QA person and ignore all code and just validate the output.
The obvious answer to this is that it is not feasible to retry each past validation for each new change, which is why we have testing in the first place. Then you’re back at square one because your test writing ability limits your output.
Unless you plan on also vivecoding the tests and treating the whole job as a black box, in which case we might as well just head for the bunkers.
Yes, that is exactly what I mean. You ask the Wizard of Oz for something, and you hear some sounds behind the curtain, and you get something back. Validate that, and if necessary, ask Oz to try again.
"The obvious answer to this is that it is not feasible to retry each past validation for each new change"
It is reasonably feasible because the job of Production Development and QA has existed, developers just sat in the middle. Now we remove the developer, and move them over to the role of combined Product + QA, and all Product + QA was ever able to even validate was developer output (which, as far as they were ever concerned, was an actual black box since they don't know how to program).
The developer disappears when they are made to disappear or decide to disappear. If the developer begins articulating ideas in language like a product developer, and then validates like a QA engineer, then the developer has "decided" to disappear. Other developers will be told to disappear.
The existential threat to the developer is not when the company mandate comes down that you are to be a "Prompt Engineer" now, it is when the mandate comes down that you need to be a Product Designer now (as in, you mandated not to write a single. line. of. code.) . In which case vast swaths of developers will not cut it on a pure talent level.
