Of course a big part of the problem too is who is in control of the technology. Instead of being there to support humans, the owners of the technology have engaged in large-scale, industrialised theft of so much of human creativity. Even when present day alive creatives issue their disagreement and unwillingness to share their work with generative AI, the tech bros don't listen, and keep stealing.
I use AI extensively, but I don't use it to write anything. It's a boring, bland writer with an annoying tendency to pander.
Using it has greatly deepened the scope of my research, though. Because it's able to give diverse answers to a single question, I often find things using AI that I couldn't find using a conventional search engine. True, about 30% of what it tells me is hallucinated, but another 30% is material I wouldn't have found on Google.
I don't think we should consider whether to use AI as a yes/no question. The issue is how to use AI so that it supports humanistic endeavor.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on AI. I think it’s a tough topic as the use of it in research and academia can be so morally and ethically complex and controversial. Personally I won’t and don’t use it. I can understand (as I can see why people would use it, for the fact that it makes a task that’s “not exactly easy or enjoyable faster or more efficient “. But is this ethical?
As someone wishing to go into academia professionally at some point, and as a former writing fellow/tutor for my undergraduate college, I am beyond relieved to hear that there are still students going to writing centers to meet with a *real* tutor. Education is a personal experience and I do not believe AI could ever replicate that.
Teachers and students are much more than mere collections of data or information; we are lived, embodied creatures with a complexity of thoughts that are always—somehow—interconnected; it is my belief that one of the reasons AI can not be successful is because it is in capable of true creativity. We cannot, nor should we, outsource a poor mimesis of a person.
I am a researcher too, and completely agree with you. For what I’ve seen, people who are creatives, researchers and/or educators are the most alarmed by AI. Maybe we are the most aware that our brains, thinking and cognitive processes simply cannot be replaced by a machine.
I appreciate your thoughts a lot! I think we are going to see a fundamental shift in human thought as AI takes over. This could be good if we have the discipline to regulate it properly. We no longer memorize texts like they did in antiquity because literary rates are high and books are accessible. After the rise of Google we started memorizing how to find information, rather than the knowledge itself. Academics realized that one needs to resist this impulse to truly learn, but I don't know if society writ large does/did. With AI, it could be hugely detrimental to our critical thinking abilities. To even begin regulating this, there needs to be a reliable way to distinguish between text produced by AI or a human and we dont have that yet. We also don't have privacy laws in America, which I think is an important aspect of regulating AI. These models dont work without absurd amounts of data, and it should not be this easy to strip-mine the internet and customers for it. I do think academics will resist the urge to replace their own thought with AI suggestions, but I worry the rest of society will not. I also think, given the inevitability of students using AI, it is important to show them how to use it effectively and honestly. As someone with ADHD, I can proofread something a million times and still miss an obvious grammar or spelling error so I use AI to proofread. As models improve, I think using AI to gather sources while researching is another valid use. If you just need a bibliography for an assignment and don't actually read said sources, you gain nothing. But if you are researching for a larger project and need guidance for where to start looking on topic X, AI can be helpful. It's a tool, but a more dangerous one than past iterations of thought shifting technology aids. Ok, rambling over haha
This is perfect you’ve nailed it. Rejecting efficiency in favour of effort is and resisting big tech by doing so… this is where we need to get people to be
Thanks for this fantastic piece, Hannah! I've often pondered the need for efficiency. Had efficiency been in place, most of the most fabulous creations of humankind wouldn't have seen the light of day. I can be it wasn't efficient to build the pyramids, Machu Picchu, the megaliths of Göbekli Tepe, besides the paintings and illuminated manuscripts you've mentioned. I'm okay with AI assistance in grammatical corrections (read Grammarly/Prowriting Aid), but not a a substitute for the creative process.
AI is used to identify civilians to bomb in West Asia (i'm sick of calling it "middle east"). USA wishes it had AI tools back when it was ruining the lives of innocent people in Iraq, look at the genocide in Palestine! Israel and USA are assisted by Google, Microsoft, Meta and Apple.
I agree with what your view a lot, especially when it comes to developing skills like writing and critical thinking as an academic, but as an early career researcher in biology I have to say after my own PI gave me a piece of friendly advice about how anyone who doesn't code with AI tools is going to fall behind, I have begun to feel afraid about staunchly rejecting AI use in my work. It's ironic, because this echoes what you argue about efficiency and the point of acquiring skills through a degree program, and I absolutely do agree when it comes to how students are using AI to write whole papers and folks using it to "make art", but I also do see an argument for how AI can be a useful and constructive tool to acquire or improve one's skills - as long as the user sets out to use it that way. With coding, for example, AI solutions can be really helpful in introducing new functions or programs or coding structures the user didn't know, and it would be a lot more efficient than a googling spiral - while actually learning something new! I do recognise, though, that this might be unique to coding, of which the MO in learning IS essentially googling errors and referencing other people's solutions anyway, so maybe not that different from using an AI tool in and of itself, but very different from skills like writing. But to that end, I do want to agree with another commenter about how AI can be good if it is properly regulated, and properly introduced as a tool to enhance human capability instead of as a replacement, rather than resolutely refused. Partly because it will be around and people will be using it anyway - I think the academic landscape has already changed enough that generative AI has left substantial footprints everywhere to be completely banished. (Though I have to say I'm unsure how this regulation should look like or how it could even be enforced, when even educators now find it difficult to discern real student work and AI assisted work.) All that said, I'm not sure if I've developed this viewpoint only because of the unintentional scare my PI gave me with her advice. I think regardless as a young academic the omnipresence of generative AI is terrifying, especially with how it brings dwindling capabilities of students and bogus science successfully being published. It hurts my heart to see students unwilling to interact with materials and go through the difficult parts of learning (despite being the most important parts), but I now see it more as something to adapt to, rather than to outright reject it. I wonder if there is or should be a difference in the value of genAI depending on the field or skill.
PS it also hurts my heart to read about how you feel despaired about your phd dreams, but i do not blame you. even my phd dreams feel delusional at this point and i already started mine... fingers crossed to a more optimistic future for us
PPS whew this was long. sorry about the disorganised rant and the stem writing style
👏👏🏾👏🏼 Keep ranting.
Of course a big part of the problem too is who is in control of the technology. Instead of being there to support humans, the owners of the technology have engaged in large-scale, industrialised theft of so much of human creativity. Even when present day alive creatives issue their disagreement and unwillingness to share their work with generative AI, the tech bros don't listen, and keep stealing.
I use AI extensively, but I don't use it to write anything. It's a boring, bland writer with an annoying tendency to pander.
Using it has greatly deepened the scope of my research, though. Because it's able to give diverse answers to a single question, I often find things using AI that I couldn't find using a conventional search engine. True, about 30% of what it tells me is hallucinated, but another 30% is material I wouldn't have found on Google.
I don't think we should consider whether to use AI as a yes/no question. The issue is how to use AI so that it supports humanistic endeavor.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on AI. I think it’s a tough topic as the use of it in research and academia can be so morally and ethically complex and controversial. Personally I won’t and don’t use it. I can understand (as I can see why people would use it, for the fact that it makes a task that’s “not exactly easy or enjoyable faster or more efficient “. But is this ethical?
As someone wishing to go into academia professionally at some point, and as a former writing fellow/tutor for my undergraduate college, I am beyond relieved to hear that there are still students going to writing centers to meet with a *real* tutor. Education is a personal experience and I do not believe AI could ever replicate that.
Teachers and students are much more than mere collections of data or information; we are lived, embodied creatures with a complexity of thoughts that are always—somehow—interconnected; it is my belief that one of the reasons AI can not be successful is because it is in capable of true creativity. We cannot, nor should we, outsource a poor mimesis of a person.
Exactly, I totally agree. So well put!!!
I am a researcher too, and completely agree with you. For what I’ve seen, people who are creatives, researchers and/or educators are the most alarmed by AI. Maybe we are the most aware that our brains, thinking and cognitive processes simply cannot be replaced by a machine.
I appreciate your thoughts a lot! I think we are going to see a fundamental shift in human thought as AI takes over. This could be good if we have the discipline to regulate it properly. We no longer memorize texts like they did in antiquity because literary rates are high and books are accessible. After the rise of Google we started memorizing how to find information, rather than the knowledge itself. Academics realized that one needs to resist this impulse to truly learn, but I don't know if society writ large does/did. With AI, it could be hugely detrimental to our critical thinking abilities. To even begin regulating this, there needs to be a reliable way to distinguish between text produced by AI or a human and we dont have that yet. We also don't have privacy laws in America, which I think is an important aspect of regulating AI. These models dont work without absurd amounts of data, and it should not be this easy to strip-mine the internet and customers for it. I do think academics will resist the urge to replace their own thought with AI suggestions, but I worry the rest of society will not. I also think, given the inevitability of students using AI, it is important to show them how to use it effectively and honestly. As someone with ADHD, I can proofread something a million times and still miss an obvious grammar or spelling error so I use AI to proofread. As models improve, I think using AI to gather sources while researching is another valid use. If you just need a bibliography for an assignment and don't actually read said sources, you gain nothing. But if you are researching for a larger project and need guidance for where to start looking on topic X, AI can be helpful. It's a tool, but a more dangerous one than past iterations of thought shifting technology aids. Ok, rambling over haha
This is perfect you’ve nailed it. Rejecting efficiency in favour of effort is and resisting big tech by doing so… this is where we need to get people to be
Fine piece !
Thanks for this fantastic piece, Hannah! I've often pondered the need for efficiency. Had efficiency been in place, most of the most fabulous creations of humankind wouldn't have seen the light of day. I can be it wasn't efficient to build the pyramids, Machu Picchu, the megaliths of Göbekli Tepe, besides the paintings and illuminated manuscripts you've mentioned. I'm okay with AI assistance in grammatical corrections (read Grammarly/Prowriting Aid), but not a a substitute for the creative process.
AI is used to identify civilians to bomb in West Asia (i'm sick of calling it "middle east"). USA wishes it had AI tools back when it was ruining the lives of innocent people in Iraq, look at the genocide in Palestine! Israel and USA are assisted by Google, Microsoft, Meta and Apple.
I agree with what your view a lot, especially when it comes to developing skills like writing and critical thinking as an academic, but as an early career researcher in biology I have to say after my own PI gave me a piece of friendly advice about how anyone who doesn't code with AI tools is going to fall behind, I have begun to feel afraid about staunchly rejecting AI use in my work. It's ironic, because this echoes what you argue about efficiency and the point of acquiring skills through a degree program, and I absolutely do agree when it comes to how students are using AI to write whole papers and folks using it to "make art", but I also do see an argument for how AI can be a useful and constructive tool to acquire or improve one's skills - as long as the user sets out to use it that way. With coding, for example, AI solutions can be really helpful in introducing new functions or programs or coding structures the user didn't know, and it would be a lot more efficient than a googling spiral - while actually learning something new! I do recognise, though, that this might be unique to coding, of which the MO in learning IS essentially googling errors and referencing other people's solutions anyway, so maybe not that different from using an AI tool in and of itself, but very different from skills like writing. But to that end, I do want to agree with another commenter about how AI can be good if it is properly regulated, and properly introduced as a tool to enhance human capability instead of as a replacement, rather than resolutely refused. Partly because it will be around and people will be using it anyway - I think the academic landscape has already changed enough that generative AI has left substantial footprints everywhere to be completely banished. (Though I have to say I'm unsure how this regulation should look like or how it could even be enforced, when even educators now find it difficult to discern real student work and AI assisted work.) All that said, I'm not sure if I've developed this viewpoint only because of the unintentional scare my PI gave me with her advice. I think regardless as a young academic the omnipresence of generative AI is terrifying, especially with how it brings dwindling capabilities of students and bogus science successfully being published. It hurts my heart to see students unwilling to interact with materials and go through the difficult parts of learning (despite being the most important parts), but I now see it more as something to adapt to, rather than to outright reject it. I wonder if there is or should be a difference in the value of genAI depending on the field or skill.
PS it also hurts my heart to read about how you feel despaired about your phd dreams, but i do not blame you. even my phd dreams feel delusional at this point and i already started mine... fingers crossed to a more optimistic future for us
PPS whew this was long. sorry about the disorganised rant and the stem writing style