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Unpopular take: Prompt engineering is the new programming
Nicolas Cava
Edited onEdited on Sep 19, 2025
Reading timeReading time: 1 minute
Unpopular take: Prompt engineering is the new programming.
We keep moving higher in the stack. From assembly to C. From C to C++. From JavaScript to TypeScript.
Now? Prompts.
It's just a natural language layer to engineer software. Anyone who express intent in plain language command machines to execute complex tasks.
Iteration just got redefined: what took days now takes hours.
Prompts have become the new UI between human intent and machine. Just like high-level languages and graphical interfaces once rewrote the rules of engineering, prompts are doing it again.
Suddenly, engineers are free to focus on systems design.
š Stop making it a big deal. You spend 20% of your time coding anyway.
The mistake? Thinking prompt engineering is not real engineering. That's what people said about higher-level languages too.
Reality check: The engineer ignoring prompts will get replaced by the ones with agents.
Stop getting attached to tools. You're not a JavaScript writer. You're a software engineer.
And the job of an engineer is to adapt.
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