> I do not use AI for engineering work and never will
> Once someone outsources their brain they are unlikely to keep learning or evolving from that point
It doesn't piss me off, it makes me feel sorry for you. Sorry that you're incapable of imagining those with curiosity who use AI to do exactly what you're claiming they don't - learning. The uncurious were uncurious before AI and remain so. They never asked why, they still don't. Similarly, the curious still ask why as much as ever. Rather than Google though, they now have a more reliable source to ask things to, that explains things much better and more quickly.
I hear you grunt! Reliable? Hah! It's a stochastic parrot hallucinating half the time!
Note that I said more reliable than Google, which was the status quo. Google is unreliable. Yes, even when consulting three separate sources. Not that one has the time for that, not in reality.
You've got it the wrong way around. LLMs do the exact opposite - they increase the gap between the curious and the nots. It accelerates the learning rate gap between them. The nots.. they're in for a tough time. LLMs are so convenient, they'll cruise through life copypasting their answers, until they are asked to demonstrate competence in a setting where none are available and everything falls apart.
If you still find this hard to imagine, here's how it goes. In your mind LLM usage by definition goes like this - and for the uncurious, this is indeed how it would go.
User: Question. LLM: Answer. End of conversation.
By the curious, it's used like this.
User: Question. LLM: Answer. User: Why A? Why B? LLM: Answer. User: But C. What's the tradeoff? LLM: Answer. User: Couldn't also X? LLM: Answer. User: I'm not familiar with Y, explain.