— I thought about this and found there are options A, B, and C of doing X, I like A more but C is the fastest; what do you think?

— Ask Claude.

I’m assuming this person did ask in the second way, it’s hard to imagine someone working through a problem that has already tried a bunch of stuff just going in cold and not providing any context and saying “How do I do X?”

Good advice obviously if it’s not being followed already but also likely over-simplifying the problem. Also a normal person on the receiving end would probe a bit about what has already been tried. Which to be fair makes the whole thing a bit weird and does sound more like she’s being brushed off.

Yes, the importance of asking a question to demonstrate you've invested effort cannot be overstated.

Without knowing what/how they asked, it's difficult but I would be tempted to suspect this was actually a way to say "please stop asking me questions"

I lost track how many times I heard or read "I asked Claude to do X. It seems to work".

Agreed, you can also preface the question. I've checked A, B, and C with AI, curious to get your opinion/thoughts?

I don't think anyone in any industry regardless of seniority would redirect you back to AI assuming you're having a genuine conversation.

It's highly unlikely that the conversation actually happened as reported. At the very least, something was said after "Ask Claude".

Anyone who recommends to ask an LLM in the first situation will do so in the second because they're a shit engineer.

"Ask the LLM" is not at all a valid answer in a professional context where part of your job is to educate the less experienced, no matter how little effort is put in the question.

LMGTFY for you was infuriating because it was 100% of the top Google responses to specific searches.