Can layered AI tools approximate the rigor of a thoughtful human developer? I've been exploring this question while building UnaMentis, an open source voice AI tutoring platform. After 30+ years in tech, I have deep respect for what a skilled developer brings to code review, architecture decisions, and quality assurance. No single AI tool replicates that. But here's what I'm finding: when six or seven AI-driven systems work together, each with overlapping review and complementary perspectives, something interesting happens. Pre-commit hooks catch formatting issues. Automated dependency management handles updates. AI code review flags concurrency problems. Security scanners find vulnerabilities. DORA metrics track engineering health. None of these replaces human judgment. Together, they might begin to approximate it. I wrote about this experiment in detail, including the specific tools, the 5-phase approach, and what we've learned so far. No claims of perfection, just an honest look at what becomes possible when experience guides AI-assisted development.