@harisont @tseitr @papageier @reading_recluse Perhaps the difference is that my job is not, and never has been, 'professional software developer'.

My current job involves trying to help people to be more organised. As part of that, it's very helpful if I can write computer programs and websites. In that aspect of my business, I find Claude Code very useful.

It provides much the same utility as does my accountant. As a business owner I must file taxes. But it's not what I do. It's not the function I serve.

My job, arguably, is much closer to that of a writer. The _ideas_ that I present are mine, from my human brain. So I value the act of creation.

I can see how a software developer might think differently. But for that person to deny me the utility of an LLM is like me telling my accountant that they can't use Xero and that they have to enter everything by hand in a double-entry ledger.

@tseitr @papageier @reading_recluse I genuinely fail to see the distinction between this view and being Amish.

There's nothing wrong with being Amish. I long for a life in the country with nothing but Lucy and chickens for company. But if your line of 'essential' is 'clothes so I don't freeze to death', I must wonder what you're doing here, on the Internet, that you're using via some computer, none of which is essential for life.

@tseitr @papageier @reading_recluse My problem with this framing is: who gets to decide?

Define 'essential'. Is a new generation of MacBooks 'essential'? Not really. The ones we have are amazing. But nobody's boycotting the progress being made in chip design.

But the anti-LLM crowd seem to have decided: not having LLMs is 'enough'. Having them is superfluous. They're not 'needed'.

I get the pushback. I'll never use one to write prose, because prose comes from my human heart.

But to deny their utility in the world of code generation is to be dogmatic. The vast, vast majority of code generation isn't art: it's the rote stitching together of existing pieces to make a new thing.

Claude is _much_ better at that than I am. If properly controlled by me the result is better and more secure.

So, I use Claude. Just like I use an IDE and a higher-level language and just like I deploy to an edge network run by someone else vs. standing up my own. Because doing that is better than not doing that.