september 15 mit
There was an article in the Times today about a recent M.I.T. report about AI.
Here's a bit from the Times article:
The committee at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology studying A.I. use released a number of alarming findings, including that the technology has caused “major shifts in campus culture,” isolating students who are skipping office hours and ditching communal studying. Getting answers from a bot can create “the illusion of learning” for students who reach for A.I. “at the first hint of struggle,” the M.I.T. committee wrote in its August report.
Here's a bit from the Introduction of the M.I.T. report:
This report is a call to action.
Through five intense months of meetings, research, and outreach across the MIT community, the Ad Hoc Committee on AI Use in Teaching, Learning, and Research Training sought to understand the role of generative AI in the life and educational mission of the Institute and recommend how to navigate its challenges and opportunities.
And, later:
However, what we learned as a group quickly convinced us that the Institute community, particularly the faculty, must tackle a set of deeper questions about the structure, meaning, and value of an MIT education in an era in which AI is one of several factors complicating the Institute’s mission.
Both the Times article and the M.I.T. report used the term "cognitive surrender." The term made me feel ill, and then sad. It's such a powerful thing to say, to communicate, to process. The ability to think is at the heart of what it is to be human. Descartes equated thinking with being, and I think we can all agree that the Frenchman cooked with that one. The notion of "cognitive surrender" is so incredibly distasteful to me because it means that people are, for various reasons, literally choosing to be less human. I know they don't see it like that, but that's what it is.
🌲 gonna nolite
🌼 go te
🌱 touch bastardes
🌳 grass carborundorum
🌷 now baybee
Be good to yourself.
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