"Keep paving forward" can sometimes be fruitful, and at other times be an absolutely massive waste of time.
I'm not sold on LLMs being a replacement, but post-secondary was certainly enriched by having other people to ask questions to, people to bounce ideas off of, people that can say "that was done 15 years ago, check out X", etc.
There were times where I thought I had a great idea, but it was based on an incorrect conclusion that I had come to. It was helpful for that to be pointed out to me. I could have spent many months "paving forward", to no benefit, but instead someone saved me from banging my head on a wall.
In college sometimes asking the right question in class or in a discussion section led by a graduate student or in a study group would help me understand something. Sometimes comments from a grader on a paper would point out something I had missed. While having the diligence to keep at it until you understand is valuable, the advantage of college over just a pile of textbooks is in part that there are other resources that can help you learn.
The main difference in college was that there were office hours
Imagine you're in college, have to learn calculus, and you can't afford a textbook (nor can find a free one), and the professor has a thick accent and makes many mistakes.
Sure, you could pave forward, but realistically, you'll get much farther with either a good textbook or a good teacher, or both.
I find it odd that someone who has been to college would see this as a _bad_ way to learn something.