The End of Determinism: What’s Left for Engineers When AI Writes the Code
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A Wix engineer reflects on shipping code written in a language they don't fully understand, using AI tools, and argues this represents a fundamental shift in what engineering means. The post identifies three core shifts: coding has moved from monologue to dialogue (requiring Socratic engagement with AI), authorship is now distributed but ownership remains with the engineer, and taste and judgment have become the primary differentiators. Drawing on Barthes, Socrates, Paul Graham, and Uncle Bob Martin, the argument is that AI removes syntactic busywork and elevates the harder questions of architecture, tradeoffs, and design judgment — skills that were always central to engineering but obscured by typing.
