In our brave new AI world, academics pretend to teach, students pretend to learn and administrators pretend it all adds up to something called higher education.
AI scans materials and ideas that were produced in the past. Some sentences are true, some are false, and some are a little of both (half true). There are no guarantees that AI can distinguish the reliability of the "truthiness" of each statement that it encounters. (Of course most sentences are descriptive and make no claims as to "truth.") As for discovering new information or new ideas I am skeptical that AI can do it. Could AI come up with the theory of relativity as Einstein did? Other people might have but human thought has capabilities that neither we nor AI are capable of understanding. Quantum computers might do the math in a remarkably short length of time which could benefit our understanding of, say, protein folding. If that's part of AI then it would be good. But displacement of human workers by AI will lead to decay. And we don't know if AI will keep as humans around as pets.
Excellent, Steven. Absolutely spot on. Do you think the 'rot' commenced a long time ago, with the strong focus on the commercialisation of universities, rather than a focus of providing quality education to students who take pride in 'owning' their learning outcomes through authentic measurement of assessments? This of course requires a genuine desire to offer genuine education to genuine students who are prepared to spend the hard yards of genuinely learning.
I was at LSE under DFick (RG) Lipsey 1961-64, and worked with him at Essex Uni 1966-67. Only about 8 per cent of the population went to uni, and at LSE debate couild be intense, both in classes and debates. One class had two teachers with violently opposed views - they seeemed to hate each other! You couldn;t get by without a clear underrstanding of a wide range of teaching. The expansion of universities seems absurd, many will get very little beenfit from 3-4 years there and would be far better with a job..
This is an excellent essay. I'd be interested to know your thoughts on Jeremy Tate's initiative with the Classical Learning Test and if something akin could be replicated in Australia?
AI scans materials and ideas that were produced in the past. Some sentences are true, some are false, and some are a little of both (half true). There are no guarantees that AI can distinguish the reliability of the "truthiness" of each statement that it encounters. (Of course most sentences are descriptive and make no claims as to "truth.") As for discovering new information or new ideas I am skeptical that AI can do it. Could AI come up with the theory of relativity as Einstein did? Other people might have but human thought has capabilities that neither we nor AI are capable of understanding. Quantum computers might do the math in a remarkably short length of time which could benefit our understanding of, say, protein folding. If that's part of AI then it would be good. But displacement of human workers by AI will lead to decay. And we don't know if AI will keep as humans around as pets.
Excellent, Steven. Absolutely spot on. Do you think the 'rot' commenced a long time ago, with the strong focus on the commercialisation of universities, rather than a focus of providing quality education to students who take pride in 'owning' their learning outcomes through authentic measurement of assessments? This of course requires a genuine desire to offer genuine education to genuine students who are prepared to spend the hard yards of genuinely learning.
I was at LSE under DFick (RG) Lipsey 1961-64, and worked with him at Essex Uni 1966-67. Only about 8 per cent of the population went to uni, and at LSE debate couild be intense, both in classes and debates. One class had two teachers with violently opposed views - they seeemed to hate each other! You couldn;t get by without a clear underrstanding of a wide range of teaching. The expansion of universities seems absurd, many will get very little beenfit from 3-4 years there and would be far better with a job..
This is an excellent essay. I'd be interested to know your thoughts on Jeremy Tate's initiative with the Classical Learning Test and if something akin could be replicated in Australia?
Absolutely. Check out the ACES (Australian Classical Education) website.
Good angle. I approve of written exams but hadn't factored in the new inability to write!