Computer Science Programs Lose Students as AI Replaces Jobs
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There are absolutely computer science jobs, but in general, a casual distinction would be what side of the research/implement line you fall (though in truth, it's probably more of a 2D graph than a hard line).
Building software is just one application of computer science
It's a bit like the difference between someone who is a psychologist helping people in therapy, and a psychologist who studies psychology in a lab. They require similar educations but they are very different professions
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unsolved_problems_in_c...
Then advances in algorithmic efficacy will be the province of machines, who will act in ways and at speeds that are beyond human.
What room, then, for CS students?
I wonder if biology and theology are picking up students. Those fields, I'd bet, won't be solved within our lifetimes.
The contrast with math and CS couldn't be starker, really. Everything that hinges on formal logic or logical relations is done for.
Given what AI could do with protein folding, I wouldn't bet on biology being a "no" for AI. It might be, but I wouldn't bet on it.
Likewise, if AI can do mathematics so well it solves "just" all of computer science, let alone other branches of mathematics, if this somehow doesn't lead to AI becoming similarly sample-efficient as biological brains, that's very interesting and will say something nice and surprising about the nature of minds and possibly the nature of being alive.
With due respect, your statement reflects a lack of experience building production software. In real-world software systems, code is only one aspect. Automation helps, but "what needs to be built" is a harder problem and remains a human endeavor.
The scientific field doesn't have that many open problems -- whether P=NP is the greatest and most famous -- and they're set to fall like dominoes. A condition where CS is "solved" and has no major open problems is a very real near-term possibility, and probably a medium-term inevitability.
Though software engineering is a fundamentally different discipline, none of this implies that software development isn't in trouble. Human planners and software architects might remain, but very soon LLMs are going to write virtually all code.
It seems to me that such a prediction can only be made based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose and meaning of the field. It's not only about "computers" or "science". And "solving" may not even be the most important aspect of it. Same with mathematics.
It's like saying, we will solve algorithmic thinking, or we will figure out the machine to end all machines. OK, getting closer..
Or that we will make the ultimate tele/microscope that sees everything, the entirety the universe, all 93 billion light-years of it down to the Planck scale. Or that we will fully understand the human mind, all 1.3 kilograms of grey matter. The mystery is not only about the "brain", although it likes to think of itself as the quintessence of existence. And logical thinking may not even be the most important aspect of it. Same with art, biology, music, or theology.
Finally, it's like saying, science will "solve" solving in the next few years. As we get closer, we will find that there will be more and more questions, a seemingly infinite well-spring of answers. Perhaps in the end, the universe will understand itself, and God will awaken from the nightmare of history. What room then, for humanity?