Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

nbcnews.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–68 of 68 posts

Re: ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

#61

Post by gremlinsinc »

richeyryan wrote: post #31
kypro wrote: post #10

I've said it in another thread, but if you have to ban a tool to preserve the value of some course or examination then it's likely they have little to no value in the real world. In most cases the courses are fine, but the examination probably isn't testing anything useful if it can be cheated with tools like ChatGPT. For example any maths test which only tests students on problems which are easily solvable by a calc…

If a student can look up anything on ChatGPT it could very well inhibit their ability to develop critical thinking skills. They could just copy the output of ChatGPT rather than actually engaging with a text like Of Mice and Men, for example, and considering what it's trying to say about the American dream or interpersonal connections. Lots of learning exercises are relatively meaningless in isolation but are a part…

When I was in high school we 'barely' had search engines. I graduated in 98, I'm not even sure google was around then. I've never seen them try to get rid of google which has just as much ability to inhibit critical thinking skills. I mean imagine having to learn and remember code constructs instead of being able to search online. Imagine if all your docs were books, and that's it. Sure you'd need to retain more, but would you be more performant because of it? We're moving to a society where ai-augmentation will be the norm, not the exception and we need to start training on that premise so that we can perform to our best when we have more info at our fingertips.

Re: ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

#62

Post by gremlinsinc »

dumbfounder wrote: post #32
christopherwxyz wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see ChatGPT more akin to Wikipedia and Google than a calculator. We don't consider Wikipedia or Google as much of a tool as they are a knowledge reservoir of truthiness.

Have you used it? It can generate code. It can correct grammar. It can create Haikus (poorly). It can give you ideas. It is NOT just a knowledge base.

Google can generate code.

- Google: How do I ... - visit stack overflow - copy/paste - code generated.

There's more steps, but how is this different? Chat GPT though will go the extra mile and actually EXPLAIN what each bit does usually. It's not always accurate but neither is stackoverflow.

Re: ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

#63

Post by bsaul »

gremlinsinc wrote: post #62
dumbfounder wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you used it? It can generate code. It can correct grammar. It can create Haikus (poorly). It can give you ideas. It is NOT just a knowledge base.

Google can generate code. - Google: How do I ... - visit stack overflow - copy/paste - code generated. There's more steps, but how is this different? Chat GPT though will go the extra mile and actually EXPLAIN what each bit does usually. It's not always accurate but neither is stackoverflow.

It’s different in that the text that’s displayed in a chatgpt response never existed anywhere before you asked the question.

That’s what « generating » means, in that context.

Re: ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

#64

Post by bsaul »

this story made me realize we’re amazed by chatgpt’s ability to answer our questions. But how about chatgpt’s ability to evaluate our answer to its questions ? Never seen prompts of chatgpt acting like a teacher. Wonder how that would look.

Re: ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

#65

Post by kypro »

lolinder wrote: post #24
kypro wrote: post #10

I've said it in another thread, but if you have to ban a tool to preserve the value of some course or examination then it's likely they have little to no value in the real world. In most cases the courses are fine, but the examination probably isn't testing anything useful if it can be cheated with tools like ChatGPT. For example any maths test which only tests students on problems which are easily solvable by a calc…

> For example, I'm not sure if there's much value in learning things like basic SQL queries anymore which was something I had to learn when studying computer science. ChatGPT is great at writing SQL queries if you're able to tell it exactly what you need. Using ChatGPT to generate something that you can't independently verify is a terrible idea. Most of the time it'll be fine, but when it's not you need to be able to…

> Using ChatGPT to generate something that you can't independently verify is a terrible idea

It depends. A calculator can calculate things I'd struggle to independently verify with a pen and paper.

I think I wasn't clear enough and you might be taking what I said to it's extreme. I'm not suggesting there is zero value in knowing SQL, I'm saying the value of learning it is now much lower than when I learnt it. While it might be helpful to have a good understanding of SQL to verify a query yourself (especially where performance is a concern), in most cases this likely isn't necessary. For your average select query with a couple of joins and a where clause ChatGPT can generate that and you can verify it at least works by running it.

But maybe SQL isn't the best example. It just came to my mind because I was writing a spatial query for MariaDb recently and I couldn't get the results I wanted after a few Google searches, but ChatGPT got it right first time. It seems to me that query languages have a lot of properties which make ChatGPT very good at writing them, but there are probably other skills which ChatGPT more clearly erodes the value of.

Re: ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

#66

Post by marniewebb »

richeyryan wrote: post #31
kypro wrote: post #10

I've said it in another thread, but if you have to ban a tool to preserve the value of some course or examination then it's likely they have little to no value in the real world. In most cases the courses are fine, but the examination probably isn't testing anything useful if it can be cheated with tools like ChatGPT. For example any maths test which only tests students on problems which are easily solvable by a calc…

If a student can look up anything on ChatGPT it could very well inhibit their ability to develop critical thinking skills. They could just copy the output of ChatGPT rather than actually engaging with a text like Of Mice and Men, for example, and considering what it's trying to say about the American dream or interpersonal connections. Lots of learning exercises are relatively meaningless in isolation but are a part…

This feels like it could be solved partly, and more effectively, by a step wise show your work process. So if it’s Of Mice and Men, it could be a reading journal, then important points, then an outline, then an essay.

If they successfully use ChatGTP to do this, they likely have engaged with the text.

Re: ChatGPT banned from New York City public schools’ devices and networks

#67

Post by chrismcb »

kypro wrote: post #10

I've said it in another thread, but if you have to ban a tool to preserve the value of some course or examination then it's likely they have little to no value in the real world. In most cases the courses are fine, but the examination probably isn't testing anything useful if it can be cheated with tools like ChatGPT. For example any maths test which only tests students on problems which are easily solvable by a calc…

When you first learn it is generally important to learn the basics without tools. In your example knowing the times takes, at least for single digits is important... But can be fine with a calculator. When you first learn SQL knowing sums simple queries is important. Maybe they'll pick it up after asking chatgpt, stack overflow, or Google, but one shouldn't have to do a search everytime they need to do a basic thing
Post reply on HN