Is AI Just the Next Layer of Abstraction?

2026-10-16

I have seen several comment threads where code written by AI agents is described as "just the next layer of abstraction". That does not quite capture what is happening these years.

Yes, we have been through steadily increasing degrees of abstraction, with all the languages and tools we have had access to as programmers until now. So far, the statement holds.

I wrote my first programs on a Commodore 64, where (often German) computer magazines printed endless rows of data that were incomprehensible to most people. The level of abstraction was low - real machine code that was typed in by hand - and if you got one number wrong, the program/game simply didn't work. No help finding the error.

I went through BASIC, COMAL80, Turbo Pascal, several object-oriented languages such as C++. Then we got "managed code" in the form of the Java and .NET platforms. That gave us garbage collection, exceptions, better debugging and much more. Design patterns also arrived, as a shared "language" between developers on top of the object-oriented layer.

All of it layer upon layer, in a stack of steadily increasing levels of abstraction.

Agentic code - the final abstraction?

With AI agents writing the code for us, we move completely away from writing code in a programming language. It all happens in natural language.

You can even get code written by copying and pasting images or drawings of what you want made, directly into your agent.

That is surely the ultimate abstraction over all earlier programming languages.

And this is a change with far greater significance than the earlier shifts.

It is a bit like the carpenter or bricklayer on the construction site being replaced by a robot that does the craft. And then all carpenters and bricklayers would have to be retrained as building designers or architects - if they still want to be part of building something.

From developer to maker

In other words, we are moving from being developers to being makers.

This is going to challenge much of what we as developers have learned over the last 30-40 years. For example: if I no longer write the code myself, does it not matter how it looks? Does it matter which language I choose for the code to be written in? Do principles such as DRY, SOLID, KISS, DDD, CQRS, etc. still matter?

Just as it matters how a house is built, the principles still matter a great deal for how good the result is and how much maintenance it requires.

The code is still there, even though we don't look at it.

So we still need to know what a good result looks like and what users actually need. We still need to be quality-conscious.

We need to know what to ask for.

From building systems to producing solutions

Perhaps we will get even better opportunities to deliver solutions that actually produce better results. Because we can focus more on the desired outcomes, rather than on pleasing a compiler or writing code that the next developer will also find neat.

Critical future skills

These are some of the most critical skills I think we will need, going forward:

  • The ability to read and understand code that an agent has written. Precisely in order to keep quality on track. And to know where a change needs to be made.
  • Communication. Focus on building the right thing becomes decisive. That requires good communication skills and the ability to build relationships. Not something you learn from a traditional IT education.
  • Integrations and connections. When individual solutions become easy, the focus shifts to connections between systems and data. That requires overview, domain knowledge and decisions.
  • Keeping focus and concentrating. Not exactly abilities that in these years are highlighted as things we are getting better at; quite the opposite. (See e.g. the article about film students who can no longer hold their focus long enough to watch a full-length film).
    It can also be surprisingly demanding to sit through a whole day keeping a "conversation" going with your AI agent. A new way of working, which we probably have not yet fully gotten used to, or seen the full consequences of.
  • The joy of building - as opposed to the joy of writing the code itself. Those have previously been one and the same thing - but agent-written code changes that radically.

Wrap-up

So systems written by AI agents are not just "the next layer of abstraction". It is a new way of working, in which the principles we have learned earlier are shaken, and new personal and professional qualities are becoming valuable going forward.

If you became a developer because you really loved writing code, you are going to be challenged.

It becomes essential to find the joy in delivering more solutions, faster. Hopefully solutions that improve the workday for others, or products that they simply love to use (games, webshops etc). That in itself can become a powerful future driving force for us, even though we do not write the code ourselves.