Can We Trust AI-Written Code? Why Executable Specs Are the Future of Software ft. Gabriela Moreira

In this episode, we sit down with Gabriela Moreira, CEO of Quint company and a passionate advocate for formal methods in software development. Gabriela shares her journey from compiler research and teaching formal methods at university in Brazil to building Quint — a language that makes formal specification accessible to everyday developers. She explains how Quint was born inside Informal Systems to solve a real problem: TLA+ was powerful but too hard for most engineers to read and adopt.The conversation dives into how AI is changing the economics of formal verification. Writing specs used to require learning a new language and investing significant time upfront, but with LLMs, developers can now generate Quint specifications in hours instead of weeks. At the same time, as AI writes more and more of our code, the need for confidence and correctness has never been higher — making executable specifications more relevant than ever.Gabriela also walks through real-world use cases, including AWS's use of TLA+, Circle's Arc L1 blockchain built on Quint-verified consensus, and work with Monad's BFT protocol. Whether you're building smart contracts, distributed systems, or any software where bugs can cost real money, this episode will change how you think about the gap between "it works on my machine" and "I know it's correct."⌛ Timestamps:00:00:00 Episode trailer00:00:36 Show & guest introduction00:02:04 From compilers and type systems to TLA+ and formal methods 00:06:23 Gabriela's first encounter with AI and data science 00:08:32 Gabriela’s hobbies00:09:54 The origin story of Quint and Informal Systems 00:13:29 Deep dive into Quint and formal specs00:19:20 Real-world use cases: Malachite, Circle's Arc, Monad BFT00:27:42 Biggest misconceptions engineers have about formal specs00:33:35 Bugs that traditional testing misses but Quint catches00:38:22 Formal verification for smart contracts and Web3 security00:41:02 Where to follow Gabriela and Quint 00:42:02 Episode outro and next episode previewFollow Quint Co & Gabriela Moreira:Gabriela's Twitter/X: https://x.com/bugarelaQuint Twitter/X: https://x.com/quint_lang Quint Github: https://github.com/informalsystems/Gabriela's LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/bugarela?originalSubdomain=brGabriela's Github: https://github.com/bugarelaOur social media: Crypto card guide: cryptocardguide.comTwitter/X: x.com/ColorsofWeb3podLinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/colors-of-web3-entrepreneurshipIf you enjoy this episode, please subscribe to stay updated on our upcoming episodes with industry experts and innovators in the Web3 and Entrepreneurship spaces. Thank you for listening!