Everyone told me I needed Python for AI. I didn't listen. Here's what happened. Let me be real with you. Every time I say "I'm building an AI agent," people assume I'm wrist-deep in Python virtual environments, pip dependencies, and a LangChain tutorial from 2023. And when I say "in Java?" — I get the look. You know the one. So I built it anyway. A fully functional AI agent. With tool use. With R
Part 2 of 5 in The New Engineering Contract - what it means to lead engineers when AI is doing more of the coding. Stripe never skipped the boring stuff. They ship 1,300 AI PRs a week. Amazon skipped it. Their storefront went down for six hours. Kent Beck wrote the answer in Extreme Programming Explained in 1999. We read it. Then chose velocity anyway. A friend of mine leads engineering at a funde