Sure it is, as long as those engineers apply and honest effort and learn from their mistakes. Even if they don't do things faster then you initially, at least they learned something.

Unfortunately that logic does not apply to models.

Then I’m lost. I thought this was about the laziness of outsourcing thinking. Why would the outsourcee’s ability to learn impact whether it’s lazy or not?

LLM are plenty useful, don't get me wrong, but:

If your interaction with the junior dev is not much different than interacting with an LLM, something is off.

Training a junior dev will make you a better dev. Teaching is learning. And a junior dev will ask questions that challenge your assumptions.

It's the opposite of "outsourcing."