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"the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

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Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#21

Post by eddythompson80 »

Chance-Device wrote: post #16
haritha-j wrote: post #14

The largest output of a PhD has always been the training to the student, not the thesis itself, hence why we're called 'students'. Anyone claiming that a thesis can be generated by AI is missing the point. AI can also do everything an undergrad can do, we don't claim that undergrad education has been blown to bits. At best, we say we need better modes of evaluation, and perhaps that's true for PhDs as well. I submitt…

You’re sort of saying that’s because your thesis had no value to begin with, because it’s mainly a teaching exercise. I’m not saying that it doesn’t have value by the way, I’m sure it was good, that’s just my read of your post. It’s an interesting subject. Makes me want to vibe code a PhD generator just like in the tweet. Maybe I will.

They are saying that the value of most PhDs was in the learning the student got in the process, not in the PhD itself. Groundbreaking PhDs exist, but they are far, far, from the norm or expectation. Exceptional people doing exceptional work will always exist.

> your thesis had no value to begin with, because it’s mainly a teaching exercise

And that’s the problem in your understanding. Thinking that a teaching exercise has no value while OP was saying that IS the value. It’s missing the forest for the trees. The point of homework isn’t to solve the problems. I bet you the teacher assigning the homework already knows the answers. Just like the point of a marathon isn’t to travel 26 miles because you could just take a bus.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#23

Post by Chance-Device »

hamburgererror wrote: post #17

I've seen a student using ChatGPT for almost everything in his PhD (in engineering). You have some data but you don't know what kind of statistical analysis tool to use? Ask ChatGPT. Code for the analysis? ChatGPT. How do you interpret the results? ChatGPT. And so on. I could bet that some of his scientific questions where generated, and that's no surprise to me, it's just SO easy this way and if the PhD advisor just…

Maybe it wasn’t garbage, maybe it’s just gotten significantly easier because the hard parts have gotten less hard. Search is solved, prose is solved, reasoning is… assisted at least. What he wasn’t being rude about was bursting his colleague’s bubble about AI generated work in general.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#24

Post by goatlover »

Chance-Device wrote: post #9

We’re at the point of learning that some things that used to matter no longer do, and some things we used to think mattered never did. It’s a going to be a shock to everyone, and this same phenomenon is happening everywhere, not just academia or software engineering. My bet: a lot of the things we used to do were habit, ceremony and gatekeeping much more than being necessities.

When these things no longer matter, who will that benefit and who will be disadvantaged? What will the costs or net benefits to society be? Disruption can be good or bad, or often a mix. It's hard to say now whether social media was a net benefit, but it has definitely been disruptive.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#25

Post by tajd »

Chance-Device wrote: post #16
haritha-j wrote: post #14

The largest output of a PhD has always been the training to the student, not the thesis itself, hence why we're called 'students'. Anyone claiming that a thesis can be generated by AI is missing the point. AI can also do everything an undergrad can do, we don't claim that undergrad education has been blown to bits. At best, we say we need better modes of evaluation, and perhaps that's true for PhDs as well. I submitt…

You’re sort of saying that’s because your thesis had no value to begin with, because it’s mainly a teaching exercise. I’m not saying that it doesn’t have value by the way, I’m sure it was good, that’s just my read of your post. It’s an interesting subject. Makes me want to vibe code a PhD generator just like in the tweet. Maybe I will.

I think they were saying the "largest" output was the training, which I agree with. But it's also the case that they nudge forwards thinking in various areas through the outputs of the research process, whether that's papers, talks or the thesis itself.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#26

Post by thom »

Chance-Device wrote: post #9

We’re at the point of learning that some things that used to matter no longer do, and some things we used to think mattered never did. It’s a going to be a shock to everyone, and this same phenomenon is happening everywhere, not just academia or software engineering. My bet: a lot of the things we used to do were habit, ceremony and gatekeeping much more than being necessities.

You’re probably right, but I’d also bet some things that we’re about to sweep aside will turn out to have been necessities and we’ll find it very difficult to bring them back.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#27

Post by tempfile »

this_user wrote: post #5

I am not sure what point the author is even trying to make here. On the one hand, he seems to complain about how AI has virtually made the traditionally PhD thesis obsolete, but on the other hand, he also states: > Consider that most PhD theses were never good. How often do you rush to read a PhD thesis? The vast majority of them are painful to read. You learn little if anything. So, it sounds like nothing of much va…

> So, it sounds like nothing of much value has been lost.

Do you actually mean this? To me this sounds like someone said "you never learn anything by reading a high school essay", and you reply "so stop writing them". The point is not the product, you obviously train people by making the product.

> AI is starting to show that the emperor called academia has no clothes.

Seriously, what are you talking about. Academia in the last century has been the most successful engine of knowledge and technology in human history. Lots of papers are junk, like lots of businesses are junk, lots of books are junk. But I don't know how any serious person can say academia has no clothes.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#28

Post by Chance-Device »

eddythompson80 wrote: post #21
Chance-Device wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re sort of saying that’s because your thesis had no value to begin with, because it’s mainly a teaching exercise. I’m not saying that it doesn’t have value by the way, I’m sure it was good, that’s just my read of your post. It’s an interesting subject. Makes me want to vibe code a PhD generator just like in the tweet. Maybe I will.

They are saying that the value of most PhDs was in the learning the student got in the process, not in the PhD itself. Groundbreaking PhDs exist, but they are far, far , from the norm or expectation. Exceptional people doing exceptional work will always exist. > your thesis had no value to begin with, because it’s mainly a teaching exercise And that’s the problem in your understanding. Thinking that a teaching exerci…

Well no, it’s a problem in your understanding of what I’ve written. The thesis and what’s learned along the way are separate objects with separate value, and you’ve decided to misread me in order to have something to be indignant about. However, to expand on a point I didn’t originally raise: learning itself is likely also reduced with AI assistance. That’s a fairly natural consequence of having to do less work yourself, we don’t retain information we don’t need to retain.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#29

Post by ilumanty »

Chance-Device wrote: post #9

We’re at the point of learning that some things that used to matter no longer do, and some things we used to think mattered never did. It’s a going to be a shock to everyone, and this same phenomenon is happening everywhere, not just academia or software engineering. My bet: a lot of the things we used to do were habit, ceremony and gatekeeping much more than being necessities.

Really depends on how the resource wars pan out. If inference continues to get monopolized and the monopolists do a rug pull in terms of availability of AI tools, the old ways will still matter.

Re: "the very foundation of modern academia has been blown to bits"

#30

Post by eddythompson80 »

gcatalfamo wrote: post #18

I have a PhD and I completely support AI disrupting the field. If AI disrupts your field, the culprit is most likely not AI.

“If algorithmic targeting disrupts your society, the culprit is most likely not algorithmic targeting”

Or replace AI/algorithmic targeting with tech in general and the disruption target with whatever it targets and you’d realize the problem with the sentence.

Technological advances have disrupted plenty of fields. That doesn’t mean those fields were fundamentally flawed. Every arena has a certain degree of dysfunction. AI has its own massive share of issues already. But that doesn’t negate the whole field.

Take the classic example of the Travel Agent. They are all but extinct because of technology. Yet they did serve a legitimate purpose before. Yes, plenty of them were middlemen who didn’t care, but also plenty were passionate about organizing travel plans and helping people arrange their travels and vacations. Plenty of people using AI today are also middlemen between you and Claude who also don’t care

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