Just under a third of software developers are living in fear of artificial intelligence systems, which they believe may one day push them out of a job.

That was the highlight of a new survey from Evans Data Corp., which quizzed some 550 software developers and asked them what was the most worrisome thing in their career. No less than 29 percent stated that their biggest worry was that: “I and my development efforts are replaced by artificial intelligence.”

The threat of AI was deemed to be an even bigger concern than worries that the platform the developer uses will become obsolete, cited by 23 percent, or worries that their platform just doesn’t catch on, cited by 14 percent.

Developer’s concerns are not entirely unfounded. A recent study conducted by Oxford University researchers also found that software engineers are at a high risk of being replaced by artificial intelligence. That study found that advances in machine learning could one day soon allow for design choices to be optimized by algorithms instead of humans. In addition, such systems can also discover bugs “with a reliability that humans are unlikely to match,” the Oxford study found.

Michael Osborne, of Oxford’s Department of Engineering Science, and Carl Benedikt Frey, an economics researcher at the university, who co-authored that study, also warned of the eventual prospect of algorithms that are capable of writing software programs which can “satisfy specifications provided by a human,”

However, Michael Rasalan, director of research at Evans Data, told Computerworld that developers shouldn’t worry too much about advances in AI, but should instead focus on staying abreast of the latest developments in their particular niche.

“Developers worrying that A.I. would be advanced enough to replace them is very similar to worrying that the technology trends have outpaced their own skills and abilities,” Rasalan told Computerworld.

Evans Data’s survey also looked at the wider impact that developers expect AI to have on mankind. Perhaps not surprisingly, some 80 percent of developers thought AI would have a positive impact and enhance people’s lives, but at the same time, almost 60 percent of respondents said they agreed with the statement that “robotics and AI will be disasters in the making.”

Rasalan said the survey results should serve as a reminder that while AI can bring about many positive benefits for humans, the possibility remains that things “could spiral out of control.”

Image credit: ColiNOOB via pixabay