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Programming as Theory Building: Why Senior Developers Are More Valuable
Peter Naur's 1985 theory of programming explains why experience matters more in the age of AI-generated code
In 1985, computer scientist Peter Naur wrote a prescient essay called “Programming as Theory Building” that feels more relevant today than ever. They cannot understand business context, make thoughtful trade-offs, or maintain the conceptual integrity that separates good software from mere working code. The most successful teams will be those that recognize this fundamental distinction: LLMs might be useful for truly mechanical tasks (generating boilerplate, writing basic tests, creating those twenty-something nearly-identical factories), but the core work of programming—the theory building that transforms business requirements into coherent software models—must remain a deeply human activity.
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