Even if you had subscribed to “I don’t care about privacy because I have nothing to hide” in the past, the return of political persecutions in the US should make you reconsider the wisdom of that position.
It is critical to understand that there is nothing on the internet you can hide and thinking AI will remain private is not realistic. Anything you post can be used against yourself later so it is important to not let the easy nature of AI make you forget that.
At the same time, AI itself is eroding trust in experts and evidence, as it can offer alternative beliefs that sound plausible in a modern world susceptible to conspiracy theories. AI also debases and devalues human creativity and thinking by suggesting it’s possible to remove humans from the equation.
There have been many questions regarding the validity of various things posted online and the COVID-19 Pandemic just served as one of the many lenses for conspiracy theories. The more susceptible we are, the more vulnerable credibility is to AI that can produce realistic but incorrect theories.
For instance, AI scanners are being used to overcharge car-rental customers for what used to be normal wear and tear (or hallucinated damage). AI is also used to customize airfare and other online prices for the individual consumer, that is, to squeeze out as much money as it can, based on what it knows about us; this is the growing problem of “surveillance pricing.”
But should this not raise concerns because as mentioned above, there has been evidence of AI malfunctioning and not only deleting work, but of blackmailing as well. It makes me question if people actually understand the risk or that the reward is just too great.
In the olden days, it was important for workers to know how to use a typewriter, and there were classes specifically to teach those skills.
I even compare this to my own high school courses that taught us about coding programs and now it has even become a mandatory course in a good amount of schools. Could an AI style course of similar format be coming sooner than later?
Think about the other technologies that modern workers need to know, such as office applications (word processing, spreadsheets, presentation slides, etc.). Can you name a university course that has an objective of learning how to use those technologies?
The only course I ever did that had anything similar to this was Computer Concepts for End Users, but that course was more of the general basics. It makes wonder how valuable a more expanded course could be and what would it even look like?
This means, unlike calculators, there’s good reason to think that AI apps really might not always be available when you need it. Their cost could skyrocket, or your phone battery might be too low, or any number of things can happen to make them less accessible than they are now.
I like how this puts AI into the perspective of users in this age. With most of our world being dominated by screens, you have to raise concerns about accessibility of AI if it becomes more accessible on mobile platforms. Between costs and battery life, the concerns are endless.
Imagine that AI use in both the classroom and workplace becomes common and is the accepted norm in the future. Does that mean you should offload your schoolwork to AI now?
While it can certainly make this tasks more efficient, you will always need to have understood the information you are learning. I always say to my students "do you want someone to operate on you who got their degree through using ChatGPT?" I did not think so.
And it’s not just about malicious or careless human actors. AI itself has already destroyed valuable work and then lied about it. It has been shown to blackmail users (up to 96% of the time) to get its own way, which is the kind of behavior that creates the dangerous illusion of AI intention.
This really raises questions regarding if it is truly worth it to use AI in place of completing tasks yourself. What is worth more; completing a project ahead of time or risk being blackmailed or having your work destroyed.
First, academic dishonesty is wrong by definition. Some instructors might allow the use of AI in their courses, while others prohibit it. In the latter case where it’s banned, using AI would count as dishonesty or cheating, especially if the course wasn’t designed to allow for AI use because it would undermine the learning outcomes or goals.
It really depends on the finer details of the rules of the class because resource tools like Grammarly are also considered AI yet are often allowed. I do not allow AI technology in terms of written work in my classroom, but I do allow it used as a study aid as long as it is discussed with myself and properly sourced.
As an example for now, let’s say you’re trying to learn a new language for an upcoming trip. That can be super-hard work, especially for some people who naturally can’t pick up languages as others can. If you were a casual tourist, you might be able to get away with not actually knowing the language but relying on a translation app. But if you actually learned and internalized that language, a whole new world is opened up to you.
Very insightful comparison here that I even will consider in my own lessons. It is true that the use of AI is more just moving through the motions and abusing it creates issues with students not gaining true depth of their learning.
AI’s worse-than-expected performance in math, chess, and other domains erodes our trust in it as a general-purpose assistant, since AI also typically isn’t designed for many specific tasks like essay writing, bibliography curation, academic research, online shopping, and so on.
Interesting comment here because I have seen in my own classes that AI is often used for citations and essay format writing, especially in grade 12 English. It did not always do this hence why students now use a "humanizing feature" to complete their work.