> And there are going to be problems that come from using vast quantities of AI on a code base, especially of the form "created so much code my AI couldn't handle it anymore and neither could any of the humans involved". There's going to need to be a discussion on techniques on how to handle this. There's going to be characteristic problems and solutions.
That's essentially the thing we are calling "cognitive debt".
Yeah, it's hard to even get started until we can go three months without a significant improvement in the AIs. Today's characteristic failures may not be 2027's characteristic failures. Example: Today I'm complaining that the AIs tend not to abstract as often as I'd like, but it's not hard to imagine it flipping until they're all architecture astronauts instead.
That's essentially the thing we are calling "cognitive debt".
I have a chapter with one small thing to help address that here - https://simonwillison.net/guides/agentic-engineering-pattern... - but it's a much bigger topic and will require extensive exploration by the whole industry to figure out.