Comment by waffletower a day ago
You can straw man all you like, I haven't used an LLM in a few days -- definitely not to summarize this article -- and what you claim is the central idea, is directly related to my claim. Its very easy to combine them directly: students intellectual development is going to be impaired by AI because they can't be trusted to use it critically. I disagree.
> You can straw man all you like
No one is misrepresenting your argument, it's well understood and being argued that it is false.
> students intellectual development is going to be impaired by AI because they can't be trusted to use it critically.
This debate is going nowhere so I'll end here. Your core premise is on trust and student autonomy, which is nonsense and not what the article tackles.
It argues LLM literally don't facilitate cognitive brain development and can actually impair it, irrelevant to how they are used so it's malpractice for university admins to adopt it as a learning tool in a setting where the primary goal should be cognitive development.
Student's are free to do as they please, it's their brain, money and life. Though I've never heard anyone argue they were their wisest in their teens and twenties as a student so the argument that students should be left unguided is also nonsense.
You said I didn't read the article. That is your weak and petty straw man. Very clearly.
I’m not sure how you lived through the last decade and came to the conclusion that people aged 17-25 make rational decisions with novel technologies that have short term gain and long term (essentially hidden) negative side effects.
It seems that 10% of college students in the U.S. are younger than 18, or do not have adult status. The other 90% are adults and are trusted with voting, armed services participation and enjoy most other rights that adults have (with several obvious and notable exceptions -- car rental and legal controlled substance purchase etc.) Are you saying that these adults shouldn't be trusted to use AI? In the United States, and much of the world, we have drawn the line at 18. Are you advocating that AI use shouldn't be allowed until a later cutoff in adulthood? It is not at all definitively established what these "essentially hidden" negative side effects are, that you elude to, and if they actually exist.
When AI tools make it easy to cruise through coursework without learning anything then many students will just choose to do that? Intellectual development requires strenuous work and if universities no longer make students strain then most won’t. I don’t understand why you think otherwise.