All the chatter about Artificial Intelligence making new breakthroughs culminated for me when I listened to a funny but revealing podcast from “The Daily” on December 16th 2022. I came away convinced that A.I. could transform the landscape of learning at the college level and beyond. In some areas it can already answer challenging questions and produce short stories and essays that one can well believe were written by a not unintelligent human being. The website ChatGPT.com has gone viral. Young people in particular are flocking to it.
Already one can foresee students submitting essays and term papers written by A.I. Their origin will be hard to detect. Will essay writing move into “flipped classrooms,” while lectures and discussions move on line?
More important, I believe, is the Big Question, “What is the difference between an essay produced by A.I. and one by a human? What are we looking for in such essays: Mastery of facts and bibliography? Logical reasoning? Or something more - , something to do with personal values and insights?
“Don’t Deplore. Explore,” I told myself so I logged on to ChatGBT.com (It’s easy and a one week trial costs only $1.00.) I decided I’d test its limits by asking it some hard questions. “I need an essay on riddles in Icelandic Sagas” I typed in. Sorry, the answer came in less than a a minute. That’s beyond our current range, the response told me.. But we may be able to help you in the future.
Maybe, I thought,, the site could d better with comparative politics. So I asked it to draft a newsletter on comparisons between ancient Greek politics and contemporary American politics. (If I got a good answer I thought I might have some fun sending the result to my Then and Now Newsletter readers, asking them at the end if they noticed anything unusual about it. I would have to be prepared for the response, “Better than usual.) But again ChatGBT flunked. Whew!.
That failure buys us some time. A.I. may well be able to take on such assignments in the future. And the future moves fast in A.I. settings. My guess is that colleges and universities and professional associations has a year or two, at best, to think through the implications of this technology.
Some serious brainstorming is in order. Who will take the lead?
Already one can foresee students submitting essays and term papers written by A.I. Their origin will be hard to detect. Will essay writing move into “flipped classrooms,” while lectures and discussions move on line?
More important, I believe, is the Big Question, “What is the difference between an essay produced by A.I. and one by a human? What are we looking for in such essays: Mastery of facts and bibliography? Logical reasoning? Or something more - , something to do with personal values and insights?
“Don’t Deplore. Explore,” I told myself so I logged on to ChatGBT.com (It’s easy and a one week trial costs only $1.00.) I decided I’d test its limits by asking it some hard questions. “I need an essay on riddles in Icelandic Sagas” I typed in. Sorry, the answer came in less than a a minute. That’s beyond our current range, the response told me.. But we may be able to help you in the future.
Maybe, I thought,, the site could d better with comparative politics. So I asked it to draft a newsletter on comparisons between ancient Greek politics and contemporary American politics. (If I got a good answer I thought I might have some fun sending the result to my Then and Now Newsletter readers, asking them at the end if they noticed anything unusual about it. I would have to be prepared for the response, “Better than usual.) But again ChatGBT flunked. Whew!.
That failure buys us some time. A.I. may well be able to take on such assignments in the future. And the future moves fast in A.I. settings. My guess is that colleges and universities and professional associations has a year or two, at best, to think through the implications of this technology.
Some serious brainstorming is in order. Who will take the lead?