I think you underestimate just how much stuff is moving towards being GPU-run instead of CPU-run.

I think you underestimate how good the default GPU is getting. It's normally more than adequate for those sorts of tasks.

If you're doing specialized work you may need a specialized system, but you're an exception to the rule.

Most developers are stuck in Sublime or Visual Studio all day.

I think you just ignored my entire comment just to try to repeat about half of my words back at me. Care to try again?

Game dev, video rendering, machine learning, statistical analysis, CAD/3D work, graphics design, a little cryptocurrency mining on the side, etc, etc. GPUs are used for a lot more than games.

Right. "The GPU is irrelevant to my day to day work," is actually saying that exploiting large amounts of embarrassingly parallel processing is irrelevant. It's more likely in the medium to long-term, that the relevance just hasn't been discovered yet.

I was responding to: "If you're a game dev obviously this is different, but most people aren't." A GPU may not be relevant to you specifically, but it's relevant to far more people than just game devs.

Just to clarify: I'm agreeing with you, not disagreeing.

For the workflow of most people it's completely irrelevant.

Where it is relevant you can run tasks server-side where you have absurd amounts of GPU, none of which would fit in a dinky notebook.

Edge cases, all of them. Most devs do not need high-end GPUs. Those that do often steer towards specialized workstations.