How I use LLMs to learn complex topics • Hacker News Board

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#41

Post by cautiouscat » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:17 PM UTC

I’ve written a skill that I basically feed what I’m looking to do, some ideas I had for accomplishing it and any other details like tech stack, etc.

The skill then riffs with me, judging my ideas and suggesting alternatives. We go back and forth until something useful comes out of it. This process isn’t unlike how I do normal development.

However, once agreed it breaks the work into “steps”. It then creates a tutorial for me, for those steps, explaining each line, why each change happens etc. I can then ask questions, muse about an alternative idea etc. Then I do the steps, and I’ve learned and gotten what I wanted to get done.

This has been how I’ve been learning Godot and making a game for the past month or so. I didn’t go in blind, I started with a course from GDQuest so I could feel confident guiding the tutorials. I will say though, having a tutor to bounce ideas off of has been really useful.

I still try to figure it out myself, consult the docs, discord etc. But if I’m stumped I’ll run my tutor skill and have some fun.

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#42

Post by 8bitsout » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:17 PM UTC

f311a wrote: post #21

What’s everyone’s opinion on learning new tech things in this day and age? My opinion swings between positive and depressing vision of the future. I still learn new stuff, but I’m afraid it won’t have any value in a year or so. For example, I’m pretty good at optimizing low level stuff, but right now you can just ask LLMs to do so and they are pretty good at it. They will profile the code and suggest reasonable optio…

I mean, part of the reason the LLM can do that is because you know enough to direct the LLM to do so and verify the results to some degree, right? It's good to learn new things because:

1. It satisfies you curiosity (and curiosity is always valuable)

2. You can better utilize the LLM to expedite something you now have knowledge about

3. You still improve as an engineer/programmer/prompter/whatever

I still think it's very important not to outsource everything to AI because there is a lot of value in learning and doing things yourself which is an important part of life.

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#43

Post by hathym » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:17 PM UTC

Too over engineered, few text paragraphs would suffice to understand the topic.

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#44

Post by SalaevAl » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:19 PM UTC

LLMs can help you understand a language, but they can't replace learning the vocabulary. Words and phrases still need to be learned the old-fashioned way: repetition

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#45

Post by simonw » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:26 PM UTC

f311a wrote: post #21

What’s everyone’s opinion on learning new tech things in this day and age? My opinion swings between positive and depressing vision of the future. I still learn new stuff, but I’m afraid it won’t have any value in a year or so. For example, I’m pretty good at optimizing low level stuff, but right now you can just ask LLMs to do so and they are pretty good at it. They will profile the code and suggest reasonable optio…

There's a big gap between being able to ask questions about something and understanding something.

The more things you understand, the higher the chance you'll spot a situation to use them in the future.

I think the best innovations come from times when someone is uniquely able to combine two of their previous experiences together. The more experiences you have in your back pocket the more combinations you have access to and the more likely you'll have a unique combination when the right problem comes along.

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#46

Post by dozerly » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:28 PM UTC

wxw wrote: post #31

> What you get is a beautiful animation that is 100% accurate and free of hallucinations. I'm not sure I follow how this is actually guaranteed? The fact-checking process mentioned just seems to involve asking AI to review its own work.

All these LLM-as-review hype pieces don’t acknowledge that it’s turtles all the way down

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#47

Post by tuvix » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:29 PM UTC

I don’t think I really agree with the author’s approach here, but I will say LLMs have been a huge help to me as I’ve been reviewing linear algebra and diving into signal processing. Anything in a textbook that I don’t fully grasp or am confused about, I just take a snapshot or copy paste then ask a model to derive it or explain it in different terms.

It reduces friction a ton, but at the end of the day I’m not skipping anything.

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#48

Post by 8bitsout » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:29 PM UTC

I thought LLMs were a great tool for learning new topics - perhaps even complex ones. But overtime, I have had several frustrations with this. First, I get exhausted reading LLM prose. I really don't want to read anything generated by something like Opus 5 at this point. Second, as I dive deeper, I need a way to organize the information in a useful way as I begin to branch out in many different directions. I have tried to use the LLM to fix this by having it generate a web page with diagrams and organized information flow. It's an improvement, but I still run into the issues I described in my first pint - LLM prose is annoyingly dense, and the useful information gets lost in a bunch of noise. You can direct it do something like "use plain English and avoid LLM prose - provide only as much information as necessary to demonstrate the point", but it is once again only a marginal improvement.

And then I begin to think to myself that I should just read a book on the topic written by a trusted source who put a lot of effort into teaching the topic properly and presenting the information in a thoughtful way. So, I am back to books and mostly try to use LLMs to clarify certain questions or ideas I have.

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#49

Post by numpad0 » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:29 PM UTC

f311a wrote: post #21

What’s everyone’s opinion on learning new tech things in this day and age? My opinion swings between positive and depressing vision of the future. I still learn new stuff, but I’m afraid it won’t have any value in a year or so. For example, I’m pretty good at optimizing low level stuff, but right now you can just ask LLMs to do so and they are pretty good at it. They will profile the code and suggest reasonable optio…

So you think building a warp drive is pointless because 99% of work, per your judgement, will be done by AI? Is your contribution meaningless and artifact useless? I wouldn't think so.

Re: How I use LLMs to learn complex topics

#50

Post by AnotherGoodName » Sun, Aug 09, 2026, 8:30 PM UTC

f311a wrote: post #21

What’s everyone’s opinion on learning new tech things in this day and age? My opinion swings between positive and depressing vision of the future. I still learn new stuff, but I’m afraid it won’t have any value in a year or so. For example, I’m pretty good at optimizing low level stuff, but right now you can just ask LLMs to do so and they are pretty good at it. They will profile the code and suggest reasonable optio…

I sometimes get vague ideas for solving maths/science problems. They never pan out but i can talk in detail on group theory and advanced maths and science topics due to investigating such vague ideas over the years. These days the LLM shoots the ideas down instantly and honestly correctly, i know enough to know "yeah that's right, oh well" and move on. Which actually takes away a huge avenue of learning. I'm pretty torn on the outcome of this honestly.

I'm not 'wasting time' but I'm also not really learning.