Context Rot
Every AI-generated artifact starts decaying the moment it is created. The reasoning that produced it is ephemeral. The context window closes. The decision logic evaporates. What remains is output without origin.
An AI generates a solution. The developer accepts it. The code works. The PR merges. Everyone moves on.
Six months later, someone needs to modify that code. They open the file. They see what it does. They cannot see why it does it. The reasoning, the context, the trade-offs, the alternatives considered, are gone. The AI’s context window closed the moment the session ended.
This is context rot: the decay of decision rationale in AI-assisted work.
Every manually written line of code carries implicit reasoning. Every AI-generated line carries none. The output is identical. The knowledge archaeology is not.
The solution is not to stop using AI. It is to capture the reasoning chain alongside the output. Document the why, not just the what.