Recently I read a tweet by Andrej Karpathy that hit hard. Not because it was fancy, but because it described exactly what many programmers are silently feeling. Yes, Programming changing fast and its uncombrtable for most sotware engineers.
Even very experienced developers feel behind today.
That alone should tell us something important.
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| Andrej Karpath Tweet on X realated How programming is changing Dec 2025. |
The Job of a Programmer Is Being Refactored
Earlier, being a good programmer meant:
- Writing clean code
- Knowing your language and framework
- Designing systems logically
Today, that is still required. But it is no longer enough.
Now, programmers write less direct code and spend more time:
- Connecting tools
- Configuring systems
- Managing AI behavior
The “code” is slowly becoming a smaller part of the job.
The 10x Feeling Is Real
Karpathy mentions that he could be 10x more powerful if he properly used what became available in the last year.
This is important.
The tools already exist:
- AI agents
- Code assistants
- Workflow automation
- IDE integrations
The problem is not availability.
The problem is learning how to combine them properly.
If you don’t get the speed boost, it feels like a skill gap. And honestly, it is.
A New Layer Has Been Added
Earlier we had layers like:
- Hardware
- OS
- Programming language
- Frameworks
Now there is a new layer on top:
AI systems.
This layer includes things like:
- Agents and sub-agents
- Prompts and context
- Memory and permissions
- Tools, plugins, workflows
You are no longer just writing logic.
You are orchestrating intelligence.
The Hard Part: AI Is Not Deterministic
Traditional code is predictable.
Same input, same output.
AI is not like that.
AI is:
- Probabilistic (not consistent every time)
- Fallible (can be wrong confidently)
- Hard to fully understand
- Constantly changing
And now this unpredictable system is mixed into serious engineering work.
That’s why many engineers feel uneasy.
It Feels Like Alien Technology
It honestly feels like someone handed us a very powerful tool:
- No manual
- No best practices yet
- Everyone experimenting differently
Meanwhile, the industry is shaking hard:
- Roles are changing
- Expectations are shifting
- Old workflows are breaking
This is not a small update. This is a structural change.
The Only Real Advice
There is no shortcut here.
You either:
- Start experimenting
- Build mental models
- Learn where AI helps and where it fails
Or you fall behind, slowly and silently.
This is not about hype.
This is not about tools.
This is about adaptation.
The fundamentals still matter.
But ignoring this new layer is not an option anymore.
Roll up your sleeves.
Not because it’s exciting.
But because this is the job now.
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