Variable Width Fonts

I know very little, way less than I should, about the new variable typography stuff that’s been gaining traction and was discussed in css-tricks’ most recent shop talk episode. 

However, I’m having serious skepticism about how they can replace entire font families. There’s a lot of the discerning human eye in creating various weights (and especially italic versions) of fonts. I just can’t picture how some math algorithm can make that go away.