“Learn to Code!” This imperative to program seems to be everywhere these days. Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg recently donated ten million dollars to Code.org, a non-profit that believes that “every student in every school should have the opportunity to learn computer programming,” and that “computer science should be a part of the core curriculum.” So-called “developer boot camps” are popping up everywhere. For second graders, recent college graduates, and people looking for a new career alike, the implication seems to be: Take an intensive course to learn to code and forget about everything else.

In the May 29th issue of Newsweek, the tech columnist Kevin Maney argued that all this coding reeducation might soon be unnecessary. “Computers are about to get more brainlike and [soon] will understand us on our terms, not theirs,” he wrote. When that happens, “the very nature of programming will shift.” He projects that by 2030 we won’t program at all; we’ll simply tell our machines what we want them to do. Computer programming will be as essential as cursive handwriting.