Software engineering is about managing complexity

Software engineering fundamentally differs from code writing—while AI excels at the latter, the former requires managing complex architectural decisions around tradeoffs, constraints, business requirements, and system evolution. The "difficult part" isn't typing code but choosing the right architecture given specific contexts like team size, scale, budget, and risk tolerance, where multiple correct solutions often exist. As AI adoption increases, engineers must retain ownership of these high-level tradeoffs rather than delegating them to AI-generated solutions.