There seems to be a tacit premise here, that anything an LLM can do is meaningless as an exercise for a student, but that is simply not true, and if it were, it would likely be the case that we would soon run out of pedagogically-‘meaningful’ (by this standard) tasks (the author has no practical suggestions for how we could avoid this situation.)
The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
61–70 of 101 posts
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#62First of all, the entire post reads like it was written by AI. Secondly, the author / prompter misses the point entirely with this closing paragraph: > The next time a teacher complains about AI cheating, ask: If a machine can do this assignment perfectly, why are you giving it to this student?And then we can replace it with education and work that actually matters. You learn fundamentals because they are necessary f…
I was allowed to use a scientific calculator in all my high school math exams. My parents were shocked by this because it would've been considered cheating when they were in school. Homework, exams, essays, assignments and so on are all tools designed to help students achieve learning outcomes. Those tools are becoming less effective due to the technology to which the students now have access. Making adjustments to t…
> it would've been considered cheating when they were in school.
Doubt. What field of study?
The predominant calculation helper was slide rules, which were allowed in engineering exams in the 60s and 70s.
Besides, in engineering you had to show all of your work and that had a large impact on the grade you got.
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#63First of all, the entire post reads like it was written by AI. Secondly, the author / prompter misses the point entirely with this closing paragraph: > The next time a teacher complains about AI cheating, ask: If a machine can do this assignment perfectly, why are you giving it to this student?And then we can replace it with education and work that actually matters. You learn fundamentals because they are necessary f…
I was allowed to use a scientific calculator in all my high school math exams. My parents were shocked by this because it would've been considered cheating when they were in school. Homework, exams, essays, assignments and so on are all tools designed to help students achieve learning outcomes. Those tools are becoming less effective due to the technology to which the students now have access. Making adjustments to t…
I know this will come across as a trope, but a calculator doesn’t seem to me to be at the same level as AI in most circumstances.
If we’re talking about grade school children who are learning multiplication, then yes, a calculator is unhelpful to their education. If we’re talking about a high school physics exam, it probably doesn’t matter if you can show your work on converting units so much as it does that you knew which formulae to use.
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#64> the system loses legitimacy, defection becomes the dominant strategy. Almost every sentence of this piece is a very powerful reminder that we're not really talking about education vs cheating and it's actually about real work vs optics, appearances vs reality, fake news vs information, and all the rest at the same time. A certain amount of bullshit is and always has been standard, and you see it in all kinds of fol…
I disagree about your final conclusion. To add another aphorism to your collection, "The pendulum always swings back".
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#65It is not a spiral. The connection from "Engagement drops even further" to "AI gets better, harder to detect" doesn't make sense. It's not related.
I agree that AI drags down the education, but it doesn't have to be (and it is not) a spiral. To be credible and prevent false slop smell, please use proper narrative frameworks.
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
The lazy and stupid but rich will out-survive the industrious and smart but poor.
This. Technology tends to increase the value of capital and not the value of labor, at least that has been the pattern for the last 50+ years. Take that trend to its conclusion and merit is crushed under the weight of who your parents are.
I don’t agree. Technology simply amplifies your talents.
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's just that kids are less disciplined, and more prone to attention deficits. I think this puts the blame too much on the kids. Its not their fault we've created a world where they are surrounded by dopamine treadmills. I know you go on to say that we need to change their environment to solve the problem, and I wholeheartedly agree. I just wanted to point out that kids today are the victims in all this mess.
> puts the blame too much on the kids. kinda, but i would say it's more a blame on the parents. They need to be able to control, and discipline their kids - ala, raising them properly.
I have a hard time blaming parents as well to be honest. Think about it this way, if you truly believe parents are disciplining children less, and doing a worse job of controlling their kids on average, why is that?
Is it because people just "aren't as good" now? Obviously not. I think the same environmental factors are at play on the parent's side as on the children's. We can throw our hands up and say "they should know better", but the fact remains that the incentives in our society are changing things for the worse.
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#68> the system loses legitimacy, defection becomes the dominant strategy. Almost every sentence of this piece is a very powerful reminder that we're not really talking about education vs cheating and it's actually about real work vs optics, appearances vs reality, fake news vs information, and all the rest at the same time. A certain amount of bullshit is and always has been standard, and you see it in all kinds of fol…
I disagree about your final conclusion. To add another aphorism to your collection, "The pendulum always swings back".
Or, "the tide goes out, and reveals those who are skinny-dipping".
In this context, the crisis--brown-outs; natural disaster; political instability--will show who retains enough knowledge or hard-copy references and resources to survive.
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#69> the system loses legitimacy, defection becomes the dominant strategy. Almost every sentence of this piece is a very powerful reminder that we're not really talking about education vs cheating and it's actually about real work vs optics, appearances vs reality, fake news vs information, and all the rest at the same time. A certain amount of bullshit is and always has been standard, and you see it in all kinds of fol…
I disagree about your final conclusion. To add another aphorism to your collection, "The pendulum always swings back".
I'd love to hear a good argument for optimism if you've got one. I suppose the pendulum thing works sometimes on certain timescales, but for a physical analogy "shit rolling downhill" might be more accurate. Typically doesn't roll back up and momentum builds. Just as "rich get richer" and inequality accelerates, so "bullshit makes bullshit" and things begin to spiral if truth / earnest effort is not even neutral, but now arguably a disadvantage as mentioned in TFA. Small course-corrections seem pretty rare in history or in nature without revolutions or catastrophe
Re: The AI-Education Death Spiral a.k.a. Let the Kids Cheat
#70My entire (non American) education career was exam based. The exams were tightly supervised, no books etc. Every thing had to be memorised. Cheating was impossible. Funny thing is, memorising something is a big help to understanding it. In that system, AI is a very useful tool. AFAIK, this is how they still do it in many Asian countries. It worked pretty well. Produced a lot of educated people.
... memorising something is a big help to understanding it.
Not if you overfit the training set.