context:

That’s the question put to Newell by Saliev: should younger folk looking at this field be learning the technical side, or focusing purely on the best way to use the tools?

“I think it’s both,” says Newell. “I think the more you understand what underlies these current tools the more effective you are at taking advantage of them, but I think we’ll be in this funny situation where people who don’t know how to program who use AI to scaffold their programming abilities will become more effective developers of value than people who’ve been programming, y’know, for a decade.”

Newell goes on to emphasise that this isn’t either/or, and any user should be able to get something helpful from AI. It’s just that, if you really want to get the best out of this technology, you’ll need some understanding of what underlies them.