OnProgramming

Quora Answer : What do programmers actually do? Is programming worth it to be pursued as a hobby?

Sep 24, 2018

Computers run the world.

But who runs the computers?

Programmers do.

That is what makes it "worth it" to pursue, even as a hobby.

Quora Answer : What will become of software engineers once computers learn to code themselves?

Mar 23, 2014

Computers won't learn to "code themselves" because the whole point of programming is to match what computers do with what humans WANT them to do.

Programmers will always be necessary to make explicit for the computer what the humans want.

Sure, the tools will get better. Languages will get higher level. Programming will get "easier". But it never goes away.

Even today you still can't read with 100% accuracy what the person you live with really wants. Similarly, no computer will ever be able to do that. It's not just about "AI completeness". It's about the fact that there actually isn't such a thing until we decide to explicitly say there's such a thing.

And that's why society will always have a role for someone to make its desires explicit. And those people will be programmers.