Re:Ask HN: AI Depression
by AnimalMuppet on Friday February 13, 2026 @09:46AM
(#47003305)
I disagree. Compilers were deterministic. Complicated, but deterministic. You could be sure that it was going to emit something sensible.
AI? Not so much. Not deterministic. Sure, the probability of something bizarre may go down. But with AI, as currently constituted, you will always need to review what it does.
I think the comparison is slightly off. The compiler was never the author — it was the verifier.
The real comparison is: 1. Human writes code (non-deterministic, buggy) → compiler catches errors
2. AI writes code (non-deterministic, buggy) → compiler catches errors
In both cases, the author is non-deterministic. We never trusted human-written code without review and compilation either (and + lots of tests). The question isn't whether AI output needs verification — of course it does. The question is whether AI + human review produces better results faster than human alone.
The compiler isn't so much a verifier than that it is a translator. The verification step wasn't the initial focus but over time it became more and more important.
The compiler catches certain classes of errors. And AI can spit out unmaintainable code or code with incorrect logic or giant security holes a lot faster than humans can review it.
Re:Ask HN: AI Depression
by james_marks on Friday February 13, 2026 @07:18PM
(#47009751)
My impression is that if you are reviewing the edits, that is not “vibe coding”, it’s AI-assisted programming.
That said, I have a hunch we're heading toward a world where we stop reading AI-generated code the same way we stopped reading assembly. Not today, not tomorrow, but the direction feels clear.
Until then — yes, we need to understand every bit of what the AI writes.