AI Psychosis or Delirium: Shall we finally embrace the AI and start programming in English?

UJuwMLAx

UJuwMLAx

I stumbled upon a very long interview of David Heinemeier Hansson (DHH) who is famous for the Omarchy Linux distro. (The youtube video description has timestamps of the topics discussed. The Omarchy distro is controversial, partly because of DHH refusing to play the woke politics game of other distros, and partly because Omarchy is almost entirely AI-coded.)

I think I have recently suffered a mild form of what they call an "AI psychosis" -- angst that AI will take nearly all our jobs away. Being a programmer, I'm realizing that it is impossible to continue my current job (hand-writing code) anywhere. All is now about "AI first programming". And I guess I will have to embrace this. DHH, on the other hand, is experiencing what he calls "AI delirium". He is very excited about what current AIs can do. And here I mean current (Fable 5 Max, Grok 4.6, GPT 5.6 Sol, ...), not the ones we had until 2026Q2. His excitement is contagious. My my jaw dropped and my psychosis worsened when I saw this demo of the Grok Bot on X. What these AI bots can do now just makes you rethink everything you learned.

Anyway, that interview helped me a lot to see the bright side of things and embrace AI as it is. And I'm thinking what would it be like if the AI models were trained on BSD code base as much as on the Linux kernel code base and BSD had their own kind of Omarchy flavor.

Another interesting thought discussed in the interview is that English has now become the programming language. So I guess that kind of sums it up for me and helps me to move on best. The interview is very thought-provoking and I am coming to realize that now, when you want to be a hobby programmer, you will need deep pockets to pay for all the tokens. That's making me sad. From a business perspective, it's a steal to pay $500 for tokens to get a product which a senior programmer would deliver for his 9 months salary, but to pay the same amount of money out of your own pocket if you want to write your own little pet project just does not make me feel happy.
 
I'm actually quite tired of all the AI focused threads on the bsd forums. Intelligent people understand the dangers, yet intelligence and business interests never seem to co-exist well...and at the rate we are going, shortly there wont be any highly skilled software engineers anymore, but instead, cheap assembly line labor who can't "debug" what the AI comes up with, so it will go out the door with dangerous flaws. AI should only ever be used to look for corner cases AFTER humans have developed and thoroughly tested a system.
 
DHH is not a kernel engineer. You're parading nonsense from a mere Ruby developer about what a prestigious project like FreeBSD should do. AI coded or not; a Linux distro is a Linux distro - it's nothing special. Interview fluff doesn't change this either.

Talk to actual kernel engineers - and see what they have to say.

I don't think you have "AI psychosis". Just go outside. Spending more time outside with real people and real circumstances should bring you out of this trance. AI is just a series of indices - that's literally it. The software world is a lot bigger than what lies within your typical client/server stack.

Now If (and a BIG if) AI ever manages to self-architect it's own kernel space from scratch on a system - we should probably rethink what we're doing.
 
UJuwMLAx said:
Another interesting thought discussed in the interview is that English has now become the programming language.
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That is scary given how imprecise the English language is. The word wound: are you talking about getting hurt or what you do with copper wire to create a stator?
Bow: are we talking about archery or the thing that makes a gift look pretty?

kent_dorfman766 said:
AI should only ever be used to look for corner cases AFTER humans have developed and thoroughly tested a system.
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Use it as tool, not as a "god".
 
UJuwMLAx said:
And I'm thinking what would it be like if the AI models were trained on BSD code base as much as on the Linux kernel code base and BSD had their own kind of Omarchy flavor.
Click to expand...
What's so unexpected, exactly? For example, we saw news that a drone or unmanned aerial vehicle powered by AI can now, when approaching a target location, make a decision to select and destroy it without a human operator. Example: if a cleaning lady is walking down the street with a backpack containing a mop, a broom, and a regular laundry tub, the AI can identify this object as a potential threat and destroy the target. This isn't fun, and it's not like distributions... The AI identifies the mop as a machine gun, the broom as a radar, and the tub as an object in the forehead, etc. But what if it's a teenager wearing a helmet on a motorcycle with a backpack and fishing rods? The AI could mistake this object for anything...

I might be freaking out: your legendary German tanks, costing $10,000,000 each, are now camouflaged in forests because tanks lose wars even to the most expensive and powerful $20,000 AI-powered drones. Such a drone destroys a tank. The profit? French "CAESAR" howitzers are no longer needed either. They're burned like matchsticks. Air power + AI + satellites + StarLink—that's what modern warfare needs today.
 
UJuwMLAx said:
when you want to be a hobby programmer, you will need deep pockets to pay for all the tokens.
Click to expand...
No.

At work, you're paid to do what your boss tells you, whether you like it or not, period.

If you choose a hobby, it's only because you like doing it. If you choose programming as a hobby, it's because you like programming, and the last thing on Earth you want is an AI doing it for you, stripping you off the only reason to do it. So as a hobbyist, you don't need tokens at all, it's 100% free!

In fact, if you use AI as a hobbyist, it's because you like AI and don't like programming, except as a pretext to use AI. And if you like AI, having a dedicated budget for it is not a problem. Those who have music or golf as hobbies have a budget for it, for instance, and they don't complain about it.

Finally, hobbies are entirely optional, they aren't vital needs, so it's normal to only choose hobbies you can afford. If you can't afford the token budget, just choose another hobby, there are countless other options. For instance, I can't afford collecting Bentley cars, so I chose to play the flute instead, at least I can afford it.
 
UJuwMLAx said:
I stumbled upon a very long interview of David Heinemeier Hansson (DHH) who is famous for the Omarchy Linux distro. (The youtube video description has timestamps of the topics discussed. The Omarchy distro is controversial, partly because of DHH refusing to play the woke politics game of other distros, and partly because Omarchy is almost entirely AI-coded.)

I think I have recently suffered a mild form of what they call an "AI psychosis" -- angst that AI will take nearly all our jobs away. Being a programmer, I'm realizing that it is impossible to continue my current job (hand-writing code) anywhere. All is now about "AI first programming". And I guess I will have to embrace this. DHH, on the other hand, is experiencing what he calls "AI delirium". He is very excited about what current AIs can do. And here I mean current (Fable 5 Max, Grok 4.6, GPT 5.6 Sol, ...), not the ones we had until 2026Q2. His excitement is contagious. My my jaw dropped and my psychosis worsened when I saw this demo of the Grok Bot on X. What these AI bots can do now just makes you rethink everything you learned.

Anyway, that interview helped me a lot to see the bright side of things and embrace AI as it is. And I'm thinking what would it be like if the AI models were trained on BSD code base as much as on the Linux kernel code base and BSD had their own kind of Omarchy flavor.

Another interesting thought discussed in the interview is that English has now become the programming language. So I guess that kind of sums it up for me and helps me to move on best. The interview is very thought-provoking and I am coming to realize that now, when you want to be a hobby programmer, you will need deep pockets to pay for all the tokens. That's making me sad. From a business perspective, it's a steal to pay $500 for tokens to get a product which a senior programmer would deliver for his 9 months salary, but to pay the same amount of money out of your own pocket if you want to write your own little pet project just does not make me feel happy.
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Well said.
Omarchy reminds me of CrunchBang Linux (ready to go Openbox Debian distro). Ideal for novice users to familiarize themselves with not so beginner friendly Desktop Environment.
DHH is not controversial in let's say Eastern Europe where the woke virus did not take hold (yet).
Ai makes the tedious work of managing config files a breeze. Ricing (making desktop nice looking and tailored to your needs) hyperland can take weeks.

Even the free tier chatbots can give you excellent outputs in seconds.
Just yesterday I needed to do an automation for my Home Assistant. I would need to study ton of pages on YAML and documentation of what is possible and proper syntax (for the device and Hass itself), then come up with the logic and splice something together. Hours and hours of sifting through information I would forget in a week.
It gave me well structured and documented, ready to paste, code.

FreeBSD would be ideal for Ai:
> Open Source and Free
> POSIX compliant
> no distribution hell
> well documented
> pf and jails can sandbox agents rather nicely

I have only a few worries re Ai:
>Complex code will grow fast and wide thanks to it. If Ai is not available (technical and/or monopolized reasons) there won't be enough people left - able to repair it.
- there is not enough people now and many more will atrophy as they did with calculators

Coders and sysadmins will be replaced ASAP. There are a few of us (insignificant political force), envied by other professions and we are relatively expensive compared to office pencil pushers (which should have been replaced by computers ages ago but won't because they are many and vote - also there seems to be "a plan" to keep young women from having children).
Having said that. Humans should know how to program a computer. But they don't have to make living out of it. They should know other things too.
“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”
― Robert A. Heinlein
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The more you spend learning and applying arbitrary syntax, the less time you have for other things. Like to learn yourself how to Agape and/or how to develop Ataraxia.

My current conundrum is:
> should I invest cca 6K USD in to local Ai machine (plus electricity) or use it on cloud Ai - not private but much more capable???
- Both will get more expensive probably. But local can save me if cloud gets prohibitively expensive.
 
Well said. Who will repair the robots that repair the robots that repair everything?

And now, if I see one more posting generated by some AI, I'll frown upon it mightily.

Get it? Got it! Good.*


*bonus points for the one knowing the movie this comes from
 
DanielBowman said:
Well said.
Omarchy reminds me of CrunchBang Linux (ready to go Openbox Debian distro). Ideal for novice users to familiarize themselves with not so beginner friendly Desktop Environment.
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Indeed; there is quite a similarity. Its a weird hype distro. It will be gone in less than a year.
CrunchBang was the previous generation hype distro but things like Bazzite, Omarchy are in the same genre.
Its funny how nothing changes. Pre 2010 does anyone remember Yoper? Perhaps the first hype distro.

Linux users are so full of youthful exuberance ;)
 
Not sure what you mean by woke. Are you racist, a misogynist or homophobe? That's the type who usually uses woke as a bad thing, at least here in the US. If you are then, by all means continue to use the word. On the other hand, what people in the US call woke is often basic human decency. Don't know about other countries, but here, our anti-wokeness means cutting funds for science because morons consider it too woke.
 
@drhowardfine, I think that's why we remain forum friends. We don't get into political arguments, (which, I should add, the forum moderators are very good about aiding to discourage such things).
 
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