@clacke my fear with junior developers is that you "don't know what you don't know" and that is why more bugs get through and it can be actally dangerous. I don't know if the payoff is there.

Now, I do use the AI to experiment. I think it's a bad idea though to copy-paste that code in most cases. What you do is you experiment around in a sandbox and then copy over the parts by hand.

Another way I use it is, when I completely don't know where to start. I can often get it to give me a very small "this is how you even get it started" example. I may have over 30 years of experience but I don't know anything about ${NEW_LANGUAGE} at all.

So one last thing I'll say is, I have very gradually moved from internet searching for answers to problems to, just asking the AI first. It saves time because a bunch of guides really really suck. And I don't just mean the ChatGPT-generated garbage, which is increasing rapidly. I mean even official docs and legitimate blogs trying to help. Examples often omit setup or boilerplate to make the code work. When you ask Claude it straight up tells you what you need to do beforehand, and if you don't understand a part you ask for clarification and it gives you one! I have found that code examples that Claude give me are more comprehensive than guides from websites. Also it JUST gives me the technical stuff, it doesn't wrap it up in a SEO "story of my life before I get to the recipe", or a pile of ads. Oh also, Claude gives you references to where it got its answers from.

It works INCREDIBLY and I am losing patience with the "stochastic parrots" people. I understand that term came from a credentialed AI professional working at google but it's now like a "technically true" thing you say that obscures understanding instead of illuminating it. Like calling a man a "featherless biped".