Henri Petroski's central thesis is the most important counterargument we have against the commoditization of our craft: Engineering is not a calculation. It is a deeply human act of desire, hypothesis, and revision
Prompting an LLM until the code compiles isn’t engineering, it’s just hoping your digital bridge doesn't collapse in the next windstorm.If you cannot explain the trade-offs in the generated code, you haven’t engineered a solution; you have merely successfully guessed.
You can read the full article here: To Code is Human: Why AI Can’t Automate the Soul of Engineering - By Suvankar Mazumder.
I’d love to hear from my fellow engineering leaders: How are you keeping the critical thinking alive in your teams as AI coding tools become the norm? Let’s debate in the comments.
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