Thanks for your comments, @chaboud! I definitely agree that LLMs _can_ be an amazing tool for learning, but as you note, one must be intentional about using them that way. I feel like the messages being pushed down from leadership are NOT of the form "Use AI to learn topics deeply and discover new things." The leadership's perspective is more like "Use all the AI you can to ship as fast as you can."
Your comment about programming historically being 1% judgement and 99% effort is interesting. I'm not sure I agree with those exact percentages, but nonetheless, I think the more consequential part of your comment is that the 99% is being reduced by a couple of orders of magnitude. I think that's what ought to trouble us as software engineers. Expending effort is often how we learn and grow. This is true in the context of physical activity (e.g., going to the gym to strengthen muscles) as well as in the context of intellectual activity (e.g., struggling through a problem set). If I go to the gym with my forklift, I can lift things, but I'm not likely to get stronger. Similarly, if I have Claude write all my code, I'm probably not learning much.
Your comment about programming historically being 1% judgement and 99% effort is interesting. I'm not sure I agree with those exact percentages, but nonetheless, I think the more consequential part of your comment is that the 99% is being reduced by a couple of orders of magnitude. I think that's what ought to trouble us as software engineers. Expending effort is often how we learn and grow. This is true in the context of physical activity (e.g., going to the gym to strengthen muscles) as well as in the context of intellectual activity (e.g., struggling through a problem set). If I go to the gym with my forklift, I can lift things, but I'm not likely to get stronger. Similarly, if I have Claude write all my code, I'm probably not learning much.