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Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

bera-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

131–140 of 308 posts

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have accounts from the ancient Greeks of the old-school's attitude towards writing. In the deep past, they maintained an oral tradition, and scholars were expected to memorize everything. They saw writing/reading as a crutch that was ruining the youth's memory. We stand now at the edge of a new epoch, reading now being replaced by AI retrieval. There is concern that AI is a crutch, the youth will be weakened. My o…

Am I the only one to expect a S curve regarding progress and not an eternal exponential ? People moving away from prideful principle to leverage new tech in the past doesn't guarantee that the same idea in the current context will pan out. But as you say.. we'll see.

> Am I the only one to expect a S curve regarding progress and not an eternal exponential ?

To LLMs specifically as they're now? Sure.

To LLMs in general, or generative AI in general? Eventually, in some distant future, yes.

Sure, progress can't ride the exponent forever - observable universe is finite, as far as we can tell right now, we're fundamentally limited by the size of our light cone. And while in any field narrow enough, progress too follows an S-curve, new discoveries spin off new avenues with their own S-curves. If you zoom out a little those S-curves neatly add up to an exponential function.

So no, for the time being, I don't expect LLMs or generative AIs to slow down - there's plenty of tangential improvements that people are barely beginning to explore. There's more than enough to sustain exponential advancement for some time.

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#132

So humans are supposed to review all of the code that GenAI creates. We’re supposed to ensure that it doesn’t generate (obvious?) errors and that it’s building the “right thing” in a manner prescribed by our requirements. The anecdotes from practitioners using GenAI in this way suggest it’s a good tool for experienced developers because they know what to look out for. Now we admit folks who don’t know what they’re do…

> Do they know when the GenAI is bullshitting them? Anecdote from a friend who teaches CS: this year a large number of students started adding unnecessary `break` instructions to their C code, like so: while (condition) { do_stuff(); if (!condition) { break; } } They asked around and realized that the common thread was ChatGPT - everyone who asked how loops work got a variation of "use break() to exit the loop", so t…

You take a few points from the students that posted inane code by following the LLM, and those students will learn to never blindly follow an LLM again.

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#133

This technology is arguably as ubiquitous as a calculator. So long as I can understand that generative AI is a tool and not a solution is it bad to treat it like a bit of a calculator? Does this metacognitive laziness apply to those who depend on calculators? I understand it is a bit apples to oranges, but I'm curious peoples take.

I am definitely lazier today in regards to doing math in my head compared to when I was young.

I think a comparison with calculators is possible, but the degree to which calculators are capable of assisting us is so incomparably smaller that the comparison would be meaningless.

Smart phones changed society a lot more than calculators did and now AI is starting to do the same, albeit in a more subtle manner.

Treating AI like it's just a calulator seems naïve/optimistic. We're still reeling from the smart phone revolution and have not solved many of the issues it brought upon its arrival.

I have a feeling the world has become a bit cynical and less motivated to debate how to approach these major technological changes. It's been too many of them in too short of a time and now everyone has a whatever attitude towards the problems these adcancements introduce.

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are in a minority, you WANT to learn.

probably, or should I say, I don't want to rot.. It's true that I love the feeling of learning mostly on my own, but i can be lazy too, it's just that I see a parallel with abusing chatgpt and never doing any physical activity.

[deleted]

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#136
My observation is that I learn more than ever using LLMs.

I tend to learn asking questions, I did this using Anki cards for years (What is this or that?) and find the answer on the back of the index card. Questions activate my thinking more than anything, and of course my attempt at answering the question in my own terms.

My motto is: Seek first to understand, then to be understood (Covey). And I do this in engaging with people or a topic—-by asking questions.

Now I do this with LLMs. I have been exploring ideas I would never have explored hadn’t there been LLMs, because I would not have had the to research material for learning, read it, create material in a Q&A session for me.

I even use LLMs to convert an article into Anki cards using Obsidian, Python, LLMs, and the Anki app.

Crazy times we are in.

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#137

My observation is that I learn more than ever using LLMs. I tend to learn asking questions, I did this using Anki cards for years (What is this or that?) and find the answer on the back of the index card. Questions activate my thinking more than anything, and of course my attempt at answering the question in my own terms. My motto is: Seek first to understand, then to be understood (Covey). And I do this in engaging…

What does your workflow look like?

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#138
post #137

My observation is that I learn more than ever using LLMs. I tend to learn asking questions, I did this using Anki cards for years (What is this or that?) and find the answer on the back of the index card. Questions activate my thinking more than anything, and of course my attempt at answering the question in my own terms. My motto is: Seek first to understand, then to be understood (Covey). And I do this in engaging…

What does your workflow look like?

I use functions in openai and a template that forces the LLM to generate questions and answers from a text in a format that can be synced into the Anki app. Very straightforward workflow.

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#139
post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A well made buggy whip was probably beautiful too. But if economic forces incentivize something else, the skill goes away

Woe be to us all if the skill of thinking goes away.

We’re racing to the dopamine drip feed pod people life

Re: Metacognitive laziness: Effects of generative AI on learning motivation

#140

My observation is that I learn more than ever using LLMs. I tend to learn asking questions, I did this using Anki cards for years (What is this or that?) and find the answer on the back of the index card. Questions activate my thinking more than anything, and of course my attempt at answering the question in my own terms. My motto is: Seek first to understand, then to be understood (Covey). And I do this in engaging…

Yeah I've found the same. I might have some surface understanding of some topic and I like just asking "am I right in thinking this and this about this?" Or "Tell me why I'm wrong about this".
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