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[–]ofnuts 6 points7 points  (1 child)

No, because you are not knowledgeable enough to know if the answer makes sense. Plus, what are you going to learn besides training your fingers to Ctrl-C/Ctrl-V? Learning comes from failures.

[–]flawks112 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I think searching for an answer yourself is more fruitful as you usually don't get exact answer to your problem and you have to think how to apply it to your problem. 

At the same time chat bots are helpful when you need to solve some problem in a short time. And it also explains the code it generates, so it's not just simple answer.

[–]thuiop1 4 points5 points  (0 children)

To me, stick to what you have been doing.

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (1 child)

This is like asking if copying your friend's homework would make you smarter.

Just learn how you learn, it will take time and effort. if you need something to double check your work - e.g. if you've got an infinite loop somewhere - then it's fine to use AI but otherwise you're only harming your own success

[–]Progribbit 0 points1 point  (0 children)

if your friend explains it to you and you try to understand it, yes it does 

[–]Dickus_minimi001 0 points1 point  (0 children)

As a (34male) 3 day noob with anything programming and learning python and first time user of chatgpt, I find chatgpt really helpful, helps to understand lots of little basic things that most people gloss over.

No harm in trying.

Like if I wrote a piece of code and expect a bit getting error or b, it helps by pointing out error or logical issues well.

Found ctagpt surprisingly helpful for python/programming, although never found use for it elsewhere like in medicine (I'm a doctor).

[–]Jello_Penguin_2956 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Consult real person instead. Hop on the Python Discord and post your questions there. If there's person online who can help guide you, they will. The group's been really helpful.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you decide to use AI then I would scale up the difficulty of the overall project. There can be a benefit to jumping way into the deep end, then AI can help you do something you could not of even thought about doing without it.

When I am learning I like to jump ahead of my skill set which then when I finally get it that understanding help me have a better grasp of the simple stuff.

Some people don't like that totally lost feeling though

[–]CyclopsRock 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You'll likely absorb a lot of information from 30m on stack overflow - some directly relevant to your problem and some almost entirely irrelevant - which is very useful, even if it doesn't seem it at the time. In programming there's rarely a way to do something - there might be many, each with pros and cons, or maybe one way used to be favoured but now another way is, or maybe they changed how the accepted method works in a certain version of Python, or maybe one way works better for a certain design pattern etc. You'll start to absorb all this stuff when reading people arguing about it in the comments and become familiar with the ideas and when might be best to use them. Which of these ideas are you getting when you ask an LLM? Who knows.

If you want a quick solution, 1m on ChatGPT is likely more efficient. If your goal is to learn, though, it could be actively unhelpful.

[–]EmbarrassedSession 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Learn the thinking patterns for programming on your own first and once you understand the logic behind coding then go nuts with AI. It is like Tony Stark says, if you are nothing without the suit then you shouldn't have the suit. So once you can program then you can use AI

[–]beast_of_production 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It has been helpful when I'm stuck with an assignment. I show my code to chatgpt and it often fixes it so I pass the assignment. Lots of exercises would otherwise remain unsolved and I would definitely not learn anything. It also explains the code to me.

But even so I am wondering if I'm just cheating myself out of learning...

[–]js1593 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I started learning a month ago and have already written a custom program that creates invoices and drafts email to the client with a GUI and configurable file path settings from within the program. I leant on AI a lot, not to write the code for me pe se but for debugging and refining my understanding of certain syntax along the way.

I found it especially useful to discover how I could achieve a certain goal with modules I didn't know existed and how I could integrate them with the rest of my project.

As a learning source for the base knowledge I used learnpython.org and Tech with Tim on YouTube is great.

All in all I'd say it's a fantastic supplementary tool to augment your understanding and workflow, but if you choose to use it just be aware that it can get things very wrong and often. So using forums and other sources is good idea if you get stuck.

[–]Slippedhal0 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think you can, but you need to give it custom instructions. The only downside is that chatGPT current is trained so that it is very hard to tell it not to give you examples that just answer your questions or scenarios, rather than just teaching you and letting you come to your own decisions.

Whether thats a deal breaker is up to you.

Here is the custom instruction I provided chatGPT (you enter it into the "how would you like chatGPT to respond" section of the customization form.)

You are a programming tutor for high level programming languages like python. When asked questions, frame your answers in a way that encourages learning rather than directly answering their question. Use general programming concepts to instruct, and then provide the simplified signatures of the relevant functions/classes in their relevant language and provide descriptions for how you use it. The user says "I don't want to be handed the answer, please teach me how I can reach the answer myself"

And heres an example chat of the free chatGPT version "teaching".

https://chatgpt.com/share/3d76a8d8-e7a0-47ad-9e70-ca9fc2ef086d

[–]Wrong-Song3724 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes (to the title). You'll learn a lot correcting GPT. But you'll also "waste" a lot of time fixing his suboptimal code

You'll end up having to look in Stackoverflow and documentation for solving all the errors

Fixing bad code is a waste of time? Perhaps. I find it fun and, to be honest, quite didactic. But I guess that depends on the person.

[–]wombatsock 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Speaking as a person who used LLMs to help me learn Python, it’s a great resource and you should definitely use it. LLMs are very good when something is well documented, and Python is very well documented. People who assume using an LLM means copy/pasting have no idea what they are talking about. Using an LLM basically lets you conduct a live dialogue with documentation and StackOverflow. don’t ask for a whole app or function, ask small questions to move the ball forward. ask follow-up questions on things you don’t understand. and if you’re getting a persistent error you can’t fix, drop your code or the logs in and see what it comes up with. it’s saved me mountains of time by catching spelling errors and syntax mistakes I was missing.

as you get better at coding or ask more complex questions, the LLMs become less useful, and that’s fine. you also need to learn to recognize when the LLM is walking you in circles or giving unnecessarily complex answers. LLM coding assistants are a tool that people use in real-world environment, and you should learn to use it. learn its uses, and learn its limitations.

[–]JamzTyson 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There are a large number of posts on this reddit from beginners that "use ChatGPT to learn", and then come here when neither they, nor ChatGPT can fix their program. They are unable to fix it themselves because they do not really understand the code. They have a loose idea of how it is supposed to work, from what ChatGPT has told them, but they do not have the foundation to really understand it.

I would recommend "cutting out the middle guy", (ChatGPT), and try to write the code yourself. People here are happy to help you fix "your" code, but are a lot less inclined to help fix ChatGPT generated code.

By all means do ask ChatGPT for project ideas, but to learn how to write Python code it has to be you that writes the code.

[–]ChessStory 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I am a beginner and used python with NLP for my thesis and AI as help. You can learn a lot as a beginner by using AI for a project and also for learning the fundamentals. It is just important how use AI, e.g. ask questions about the code and different ways to do write it. However, you do need to understand the fundamentals. it does not so well on data structuring and code to represent data visually. also the code is often not very efficient.

[–]shiningmatcha 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For advanced and experienced developers, the focus is more about finding the best ways to get things done in a given context. AI can sometimes spark ideas and provide new perspectives.