I think the reasoning behind the “don’t use AI when you’re learning” comment is that there is a risk that people simply use code that they are given without thinking about it, and therefore don’t build a mental model of what is going on, don’t learn, and hence are unable to spot mistakes by the AI or build more advanced things.
In a sense, I think it’s best to think of AI coding assistance as a more advanced version of “look it up on StackOverflow”. We have all come across plenty of people who have done all their coding by copy-pasting snippets from StackOverflow without fully understanding them – as well as people who have laid the groundwork by learning what they are doing first, and *then* looked things up to much better effect. I think this is especially important for a first language – when one is learning programming as well as a particular syntax. That’s my 2p; clearly “don’t use AI” is not enforceable and won’t be adhered to by many, but it’s important that we explain the reason that that advice is given (and maybe consider moderating it to “limit use of AI” or similar) so that hopefully most learners will bear it in mind. -- Dr Simon Waldman / simon.wald...@hw.ac.uk<mailto:simon.wald...@hw.ac.uk> Assistant Professor of Energy Technologies, Heriot-Watt University Programme lead for MSc Renewable & Sustainable Energy Transition From: Paola Di Maio <paola.dim...@gmail.com> Sent: 16 March 2025 22:46 To: discuss <discuss@lists.carpentries.org> Subject: Re: [cp-discuss] Re: Feedback Request: Lesson Updates on Generative AI **************************************************************** Caution: This email originated from a sender outside Heriot-Watt University. Do not follow links or open attachments if you doubt the authenticity of the sender or the content. **************************************************************** Thank you Toby and all for the discussion it is an important one, at many levels I have always detested coding, comparing it to unnecessary bricklaying vs me being interested in information architectures When AI generated code became available I felt relief, the finally humanity has found a way of avoiding coding by hand My question is: is the AI generated code as good as, better or worse than humanly written code? Having the code written up already means learners must learn how to implement it and run it correctly can it be used to learn/teach about coding more productively - ie engaging learners to Implement debug, test, maniupate, evaluate the ai generated output and how to correct it and improve it, rather than putting their effort into writing AI generated code could allow learners to move straight into the next level of coding, that is implementation Thorough understanding of how the syntax and logic of the program should still be required, but the human intelligence so rare and precious can be spared the tedious task of actually writing it On Mon, Mar 17, 2025 at 6:21 AM Paul Harrison via discuss <discuss@lists.carpentries.org<mailto:discuss@lists.carpentries.org>> wrote: Hi Toby, I'm following this ongoing discussion with interest. Great to see this being added to Carpentries material. We recommend that you avoid getting help from generative AI while you learn to code I was a bit surprised by this negative conclusion. My feeling would be that it isn't reasonable to expect people not to use these tools while learning, and therefore they need to know how to use them safely. And they do seem quite good at explaining code or suggesting different approaches. Here's a slide I used in a recent workshop, although I'm far from 100% happy with it. https://monashdatafluency.github.io/r-progtidy/slides/introduction.html#11 This list is for the purpose of general discussion about The Carpentries including community activities, upcoming events, and announcements. Some other lists you may also be interested in include discuss-hpc, discuss-r, and our local groups. Visit https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/ to learn more. 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Visit https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/ to learn more. All activity on this and other Carpentries spaces should abide by The Carpentries Code of Conduct found here: https://docs.carpentries.org/topic_folders/policies/code-of-conduct.html The Carpentries: discuss Permalink: https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/discuss/Tcd00cc2e2d640548-M8b3f5305f1aea430e788ca7e Delivery options: https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/discuss/subscription
