What does an average AI prof know that a physics graduate who can code doesn't know? I'm struggling to name even one thing. If you set the two of them to code AI for some competition like controlling a robot, I doubt that there would be much advantage to the AI guy.

So people with no experience programming robots but who know the equations governing them would just be able to, on the spot, come up with comparable code to AI profs? What do they teach in AI courses, if not the kind of thing that would make you better at this?