If AI Is Already Writing Code, Will Programmers Lose Their Jobs?

Artificial intelligence is coming to take people’s jobs.

According to one Oxford study, 47% of all jobs in the USA is likely to be automated by 2030. Even programmers — the people who actually build intelligent algorithms — can be replaced by the very technology they created. If AI can generate music, create art, and play chess, what stops it from writing code as well?

In fact, it’s already doing that.

What AI applications can write code?

Bayou is an AI application that uses deep learning to generate code by itself. It has been trained on open source Java code from Github. In a similar to Google search way, Bayou uses a few keywords to predict what program a software developer is writing and suggests the specific steps needed to complete it. The project is funded by Google and DARPA.

DeepCoder is another project in this area. Developed by Microsoft and Cambridge University researches, this AI app searches through a large code database to help programmers solve simple coding problems. For now, though, it can only build programs that consist of a few lines of code.

Ubisoft, a French game development company has also built a system that simplifies developers’ work. It’s called Commit Assistant and it’s an AI tool that helps programmers prevent mistakes in their code. It uses a huge software library to learn where in code mistakes have historically been made and how they were corrected. And then it detects a potential bug even before a developer makes it. According to Ubisoft, the effort that goes into fixing bugs in the process of game development takes up to 70% of project costs. Commit Assistant can save all that money that goes into fixing software errors.

Software development is expensive. And if technology can make it cheaper and faster there is no reason why the AI code shouldn’t happen.

Well, there is one.

Evans Data Corporation conducted a survey of 550 programmers and found out that being replaced by artificial intelligence is the most worrisome thing in the software programmer’s career.