The models are trained primarily on copyrighted material and code written by the very professionals who now must "upskill" to remain relevant. This raises complex questions about compensation and ownership that didn't exist with traditional tools. Even if current laws permit it, the ethical implications are different from Photoshop-like tools.
Previous innovations created new mediums and opportunities. Photoshop didn't replace artists, because it enabled new art forms. Film reduced theater jobs but created an entirely new industry where skills could mostly transfer. Manufacturing automation made products like cars accessible to everyone.
AI is fundamentally different. It's designed to produce identical output to human workers, just more cheaply and/or faster. Instead of creating new possibilities, it's primarily focused on substitution. Say AI could eliminate 20% of coding jobs and reduce wages by 30%:
* Unlike previous innovations, this won't make software more accessible
* Software already scales essentially for free (build once, used by many)
* Most consumer software is already free (ad-supported)
This isn't an argument against progress, but we should be clear-eyed about how this transition differs from historical parallels, and why it might not repeat the same historical outcomes. I'm not claiming this will be the case, but that you can see some pretty significant differences for why you might be skeptical that the same creation of new jobs, or improvement to human lifestyle/capabilities will emerge as with say Film or Photoshop.
AI can also be used to achieve things we could not do without, that's the good use of AI, things like Cancer detection, self-driving cars, and so on. I'm speaking specifically of the use of AI to automate and reduce the cost/speed of white collar work like software development.