I disagree it's a cop-out, but I agree it's hard to get good at writing prompts and takes a lot of effort. But so is programming. We're trading one skill set for another and getting a bigger return on it.

I started as a skeptic and have similarly drank the kool-aid. The reality is AI can read code faster than I can, including following code paths. It can build and keep more context than I can, and do it faster as well. And it can write code faster than I can type. So the effort to learn how to tell it what to do is worthwhile.