I’ve been asking myself a lot of questions recently, about the state of the software ‘engineering’ industry, the ethics of AI in software development, and my own personal morals in regards to AI use.
While I’ve been writing software in a professional capacity for a good while now, I am at heart a recreational programmer – I got into writing computer programs at age 9 because I loved how I could use my creativity in a scientific way to make computers do cool things. I was of course very young with way too much free time, and the realities of life had not really hit me yet.
After highschool when I went to university at the Delft University of Technology, I met plenty of great people, and being at the elite Dutch university, these people were incredibly impressive1 and got me even more into this hobby I was already so passionate about. At some point this ended though. I dropped out, I moved to Växjö, Sweden, and while I am still in the academic system, I met (for lack of a better term) normal people that have a life outside of computers. For the first time in my life I was consistently going outside into nature and hanging out with friends that want to play sports and do activities instead of just coding and/or discussing code.
At this point my life has also changed so much compared to when I was still in school. I have now worked as a software developer full-time for nearly 4 years – including a stint working 2 full-time jobs at the same time – I have a much larger social network thanks to my now more developed social skills, and sports and fitness2 have become a huge part of my life. All of this has really changed my perspective towards computers and technology as a whole: I no longer have the will or the drive to sit behind a screen for upwards of 12 hours a day anymore – it’s exhausting – and I already spend so much time behind my screen for work. When I do have more of a will such as on the weekends, I then spend time doing things like playing sports or hanging out with friends, which I’ve found gives me much more fulfillment than programming does, where I work for months on end on projects whose outcomes I cannot be sure of.
AI Changes Everything
I am going to start this off by saying that I really don’t like AI. It’s horrendous for the environment, it’s driven the cost of basic computer components up to the moon, it’s destroyed jobs by replacing real programmers with high-output slop generators, and is actively destroying an entire generation’s ability to develop critical thinking skills.
All of that said, I cannot avoid it. Despite all my resistence, my job has forced AI workflows into the development team, and every alternative job I’ve seeked out seems to be moving towards an AI-first direction, if it isn’t there already. I’ve come to the conclusion that the only way I can avoid it is through entrepreneurship – which is something I want to do anyways as I’m quite passionate about money – but in the meanwhile I do need to work a job so that I have an income I can actually survive on.
But what about recreationally? Surely I can avoid AI there right? Well yes I can, but this is where my moral dilemma comes from.
The Joy of Programming
Different people get their joy from programming from different things. Some people enjoy the act of programming. Some people enjoy seeing the final result. Some people like the mental effort that goes into the design. Some people like a mix of all of it.
Personally for myself, it’s always been a mix of everything. I love having something that works (especially when someone else uses and finds value in it), and I love designing software – especially software for power-users, but I also love coding software. I love writing the code, formatting the code, and dealing with all the small issues that come up when writing software, because it never goes as smoothly as you pictured in your head. There is one thing that is required if you want to write software though, and that thing is time.
I do not have time. As previously stated, I have a thriving social life, I do sports and exercise, I travel and have hobbies outside of computers, and I also work. I work a lot. As a result, software as a hobby has all but disappeared from my life: or has it? Through my job I get access to Claude Code. I obviously am expected to use it at work, but I am also free to use it in my free time for my own recreational activities3. So here is my question: do I get around my lack of time, by vibe-coding everything? I can still design the software, and I can still run and share the software, but my software is now written by a slop machine that actually often does produce good output, but which can also produce absolute nonsense while simultaneously destroying the planet and contributing to the societal problems created by AI.
This is not a problem I’ve really found a solution for yet, and is a moral dilemma that I’ve been wrestling with for quite a while. Maybe at some point I’ll figure out where I stand, and then I may write another post with my conclusions.