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Comment by snackernews | Hacker News Reader

Can you learn a lot? Or do you get instant answers to every question without learning anything, as OP suggests?

You can learn an incredible amount. I do quite a bit of research as a core part of my job, and LLMs are amazing at helping me find relevant research to help me explore ideas. Something like "I'm thinking of X. Does this make sense and do you know of any similar research?" I also mentor some students whose educational journey has been fundamentally changed by them.

Like any other tool, it's more a question of how they're used. For example, I've seen incredible results for students who use ChatGPT to interrogate ideas as they synthesize them. So, for example, "I'm reading this passage PASSAGE and I'm confused about phrase X. The core idea seems similar to Y, which I am familiar with. if I had to explain X, I'd put it like this ATTEMPT Can you help me understand what I'm missing?"

The results are very impressive. I'd encourage you to try it out if you haven't.

I've used it these past few months to better understand the PDF format, Nix, and a few other technical concepts.

I try to use AI to automate things I already know and force myself to learn things I don't know.

It takes discipline/curiosity but it can be a net positive.

Thank you, and the previous commenter. I am tired of trying to convince people that LLM can be a really good tool for learning. :/

They should just simply try it. Start with something you actually know to see how useful it might be to you with your prompts.

You can learn a lot, if you want to. I can ask it a question with regarding to pharmacodynamics of some medication, and I can ask more and more questions, and learn. Similarly, I could pick up a book on pharmacology, but LLMs can definitely make learning easier.

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