It feels like the negative impact AI will have on young people is far greater than what social media has already done in the past 15 years.
The big tech companies of today may be regarded in generations to come like the factories a hundred years ago that had kids working in dangerous conditions. Except this time the kids aren’t making a product, they are the product.
freedomben · 5h ago
Maybe, but at the very least, this time we seem to be a lot more aware of it, and lots of schools are grappling with how to adapt in this age. We definitely have a lot to figure out still, and there will unfortunately be a lot of broken eggs in this omelette, but at least it's not something everybody is just sleeping on (this time around).
I also think it's a little too easy to throw the baby out with the bathwater. For students that are genuinely curious, AI can be a major facilitator to learning. I've seen several students make massive gains in subjects when they can converse with AI and test their knowledge. The key difference is motivation/incentive. If a student just wants to check the homework box and be done, AI is a major net negative. It doesn't have to be though (hallucination problems aside)
antithesizer · 2h ago
yeah man, children being permanently maimed in 19th factories during 20 hour shifts, children using chat bots and subsequently (and therefore causally) getting bad grades... who can even begin to tell the difference??
unnamed76ri · 4m ago
Yeah, bad grades will be the only consequence. Of course that’s what I meant.
0x6c6f6c · 1h ago
A hypothetical scenario, but what if the consequences are a severe drop in overall intelligence? There is a conflated sense of "knowing" that comes from these tools.
AI that teaches you? Cool, it is great you learned. But generative AI giving you full essays you can hand in without even learning a topic? It's not difficult to see how this could have negative impacts.
unnamed76ri · 8m ago
Right. People who rely on AI to do everything, quite literally don’t know what they don’t know.
cactacea · 5h ago
I would be shocked if oral exams didn't make a comeback across all levels of education soon.
philipallstar · 5h ago
Exams are just a good idea. We sacrifice a huge amount in the name of "some people get overly stressed about exams", when really we just need to accept that some people can't cope with very much stress and will probably get a fairly stress-free job, like burger-flipper or project coordinator or VP of HR.
pseudocomposer · 1h ago
Why not pencil-and-paper? Oral is vastly less efficient, and also problematic for ESL and many other types of students.
freedomben · 5h ago
The school I work with is considering a return to handwritten papers, and the more I dove into the topic, the more I think it makes sense
verdverm · 1h ago
What's so hard about hand copying to paper the essay the AI wrote?
theideaofcoffee · 36m ago
Presumably this would also be joined with in-person proctoring, with a blue book, or its equivalent, and a writing utensil. Not much room to copy down an AI-hallucinated answer when all you have on your person is pen and paper.
enjeyw · 4h ago
I made a text editor that detects whether something has been AI generated by analyzing the keystrokes and edit history: www.collie.ink
Haven’t really told anyone about it so no one is using it, but I think it’s a good idea!
theideaofcoffee · 33m ago
Very interesting! I can see how useful it would be, though I’m hoping the adversarial “AI learns how a specific individual types” and just dumps its output in there doesn’t become a thing.
mbrumlow · 5h ago
Can’t I just do it on a computer and then copy it over ?
freedomben · 5h ago
Yes for homework papers you could, though you'll still be learning (and often retaining) a lot in the process of handwriting a copy :-D
There's also classroom time being given to students for their writing, with no computers available (or with just monitored access with much AI stuff blocked)
malshe · 4h ago
I am all for in-person written and/or oral exams. We still do it for PhD classes. But we don't have people to conduct oral exams for large classes like in undergrad or even some masters level courses. In my university, even getting a TA is challenging for many faculty due to cost cutting.
The big tech companies of today may be regarded in generations to come like the factories a hundred years ago that had kids working in dangerous conditions. Except this time the kids aren’t making a product, they are the product.
I also think it's a little too easy to throw the baby out with the bathwater. For students that are genuinely curious, AI can be a major facilitator to learning. I've seen several students make massive gains in subjects when they can converse with AI and test their knowledge. The key difference is motivation/incentive. If a student just wants to check the homework box and be done, AI is a major net negative. It doesn't have to be though (hallucination problems aside)
AI that teaches you? Cool, it is great you learned. But generative AI giving you full essays you can hand in without even learning a topic? It's not difficult to see how this could have negative impacts.
Haven’t really told anyone about it so no one is using it, but I think it’s a good idea!
There's also classroom time being given to students for their writing, with no computers available (or with just monitored access with much AI stuff blocked)