Test scores across OECD countries peaked around 2012 and have declined since. IQ scores in many developed countries appear to be falling after rising throughout the twentieth century. Nataliya Kosmyna at MIT's Media Lab began noticing changes around two years ago when strangers started emailing her ...

Test scores across OECD countries peaked around 2012 and have declined since. IQ scores in many developed countries appear to be falling after rising throughout the twentieth century. Nataliya Kosmyna at MIT’s Media Lab began noticing changes around two years ago when strangers started emailing her to ask if using ChatGPT could alter their brains. She posted a study in June tracking brain activity in 54 students writing essays. Those using ChatGPT showed significantly less activity in networks tied to cognitive processing and attention compared to students who wrote without digital help or used only internet search engines. Almost none could recall what they had written immediately after submitting their work. She received more than 4,000 emails afterward. Many came from teachers who reported students producing passable assignments without understanding the material. A British survey found that 92% of university students now use AI and roughly 20% have used it to write all or part of an assignment. Independent research has found that more screen time in schools correlates with worse results. Technology companies have designed products to be frictionless, removing the cognitive challenges brains need to learn. AI now allows users to outsource thinking itself.

  • SaraTonin@lemmy.worldEnglish
    78·
    2 个月前

    There was a Twitter exchange Erich did the screenshotted rounds a year or so ago, which went something like this:

    Tweet 1:

    Sometimes i spend so long crafting the perfect prompt that i realise what the solution is and don’t even have to ask ChatGPT

    Tweet 2:

    Bro just discovered “thinking”

    • shalafi@lemmy.worldBannedEnglish
      10·
      2 个月前

      Using AI as a rubber duck is what he did. I’ve used you guys in that manner. Quit a couple of asklemmy posts I had started because crafting the question and explaining the issue led me to a resolution.

      • Jerkface@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        2 个月前

        Before LLMs it was emails to my professor. I’m actually really grateful to have a chatbot available any time of day for this very purpose. Even if I never hit send, it’s so much easier for me to type it all out when it doesn’t feel like I’m just shouting into the abyss.

  • treadful@lemmy.zipEnglish
    38·
    2 个月前

    From the OG Guardian article:

    “It’s only software developers and drug dealers who call people users,” Kosmyna mutters at one point, frustrated at AI companies’ determination to push their products on to the public before we fully understand the psychological and cognitive costs.

    I disagree for a ton of reasons but what a great line.

  • fxleak@lemmings.worldEnglish
    28·
    2 个月前

    Yes, but not for the reasons this article points out.

    People have been proud to be stupid and afraid of knowledge for decades.

  • SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.worldEnglish
    25·
    2 个月前

    People were ignorant in previous centuries because they didn’t know better. Today they are willfully ignorant in spite of having the facts available.

    • TubularTittyFrog@lemmy.worldEnglish
      6·
      2 个月前

      the issue with becoming more knowledgable about the world is you feel less special.

      and people are desperate to feel special. our entire consumer economy is built around exploiting folks insecurities and convincing them that their purchases make them better than other people.

    • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.caEnglish
      1·
      2 个月前

      Today they are willfully ignorant in spite of having the facts available.

      What “facts”, because all kinds of stuff, once vetted by media is now equally represented as “facts” and “Science”, all over social media.

      The biggest problem we have right now is confidence bias, because you can find “facts” to support any predjudice, then call it “common sense”.

    • Retro_unlimited@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      2 个月前

      I saw a YouTube video from a professor that explains how our brains need at least 15 minutes of nothing so it can be creative. Everyone now has a smart phone that takes that away from us. AI is just next level taking that away from us. It’s destroying all our minds.

  • bampop@lemmy.worldEnglish
    18·
    2 个月前

    Before I used Google Maps regularly, I would be more aware of road layout while driving and soon become capable of navigating any town I visited regularly, without a map. It’s weird to drive through a place I last visited twenty years ago, knowing that last time I was there I’d navigate based on memory, but now I’m completely leaning on that device to do it for me. That mental faculty might not be absolutely lost, but I don’t use it and I don’t suppose I would ever have developed it if I were learning to drive today.

    Perhaps it’s obsolete, and a modern brain can now use those resources for something more relevant. Over the course of human history we have developed tools to use our finite mental resources more effectively, but never without a price. Socrates feared that the use of writing would weaken our memory and true understanding. I’m sure he was right, at least about the memory, but it was worth the price. Without writing, nobody would know what Socrates thought about anything.

    But with AI, we’re not enabling ourselves to do more and develop new faculties, because AI seeks to be our universal crutch. Perhaps under other circumstances it could be better, but the entities pushing AI want us to be compliant consumers hypnotized by a endless stream of advertising slop. Fundamentally, they are not incentivized to help us develop our potential. They want to replace us.

  • The Velour Fog @lemmy.worldEnglish
    16·
    2 个月前

    Looking around at my family, neighbors and coworkers getting hoodwinked by AI left and right… yeah that tracks.

    • threeduck@aussie.zoneEnglish
      6·
      2 个月前

      Chatgpt helped me build my garden beds, build a lamp out of an old telephone, learn Japanese grammar quirks, improve lacklustre recipes, look after my plants and stop my dog from barking. That’s this month.

      I could have gone to Reddit or blogs and scrounged around for hours/days to find that info, but chatgpt had already aggregated it and neatly presented it.

      The Luddites who refuse to use AI are simply that. You either don’t understand it’s weaknesses and learn to work around them, or you’re becoming your techphobic grandparents.

      • Null User Object@lemmy.worldEnglish
        20·
        2 个月前

        Maybe you missed this part in the snippet above.

        Those using ChatGPT showed significantly less activity in networks tied to cognitive processing and attention compared to students who wrote without digital help or used only internet search engines. Almost none could recall what they had written immediately after submitting their work. She received more than 4,000 emails afterward. Many came from teachers who reported students producing passable assignments without understanding the material. A British survey found that 92% of university students now use AI and roughly 20% have used it to write all or part of an assignment. Independent research has found that more screen time in schools correlates with worse results. Technology companies have designed products to be frictionless, removing the cognitive challenges brains need to learn. AI now allows users to outsource thinking itself.

        • threeduck@aussie.zoneEnglish
          2·
          2 个月前

          I mean, sure, if you use it to write an essay of course it’s gonna impede knowledge retention. But that’s the equivalent of going “the ctrl-c/ctrl-v command is associated with reduced pre-frontal cortex activation”.

          I mean, I don’t care if people refuse to get on board with new tech, but it screams a lack of understanding of the tech. People are going “musk bad, Altman bad, tech bro bad” and going “therefore chatgpt bad”.

          Na chatgpt good, handy, I fed it my current Employee Enterprise Agreement and the previous 2, and asked via deep research for a comparison of them all, against comparable businesses to see if our pay increases were fair. Ive got a meeting today to argue for increases, after ChatGPT found that we were a little under. What a brilliant tool!

          • Null User Object@lemmy.worldEnglish
            3·
            2 个月前

            after ChatGPT found

            Did it, though? Or did it just tell you that make a probabilistic guess that those particular words could follow your prompt in that particular order, and you just credulously believed it.

            • threeduck@aussie.zoneEnglish
              2·
              2 个月前

              I mean, it cited the exact line in the other hospitals EA, that’s what deep research mode does. Methinks you don’t know how far chatgpt has come, and are just basing it off of the original models?

      • BreadstickNinja@lemmy.worldEnglish
        12·
        2 个月前

        I’ve also used it successfully for those kinds of special cases - particularly translating complicated medical documents back and forth to Japanese due to my wife’s treatment.

        But I think the caution here is overreliance. Using it in a university setting, where you feed it everything you were supposed to read and understand, and having it write down all the analysis that you were meant to analyze, and what have you personally gained as a result? The article cites students who couldn’t even recall what they’d “written” after submitting an assignment.

        You can use it as a tool, or you can use it as a crutch. If you outsource your whole thought process to a computer, I can see the detriment.

      • TeamAssimilation@infosec.pubEnglish
        6·
        2 个月前

        If you’re using AI as a more powerful search engine, more power to you, that’s IMO how it should be used.

        The problem is too many people use it to avoid learning and critical thinking, because it’s much easier.

      • TubularTittyFrog@lemmy.worldEnglish
        5·
        2 个月前

        before chat gpt we called that using google.

        whether you got it from chagpt or saw it on a site that gpt got it from… you still had to read it or watch a video of it.

      • The Velour Fog @lemmy.worldEnglish
        4·
        2 个月前

        Lol ok buddy. Part of having a brain is y’know, putting it to work instead of outsourcing all critical thinking and knowledge to a mediocre statistical parrot.

        Part of the learning process (as well as retention of information) is working and searching for an answer or doing hands on activities involving trial and error, etc.

        But you seem to just prefer to take the easy route and have things done for you instead of expending an iota more of effort than you think you should. That’s really unfortunate.

        Btw, I take Luddite as a compliment so thank you for your kind words this fine morning. I think everyone should take a leaf from their books and raise concerns about declining wages and workers being replaced by subpar chatbots.

        • threeduck@aussie.zoneEnglish
          2·
          2 个月前

          Part of the learning process is working and searching for an answer

          That logic can be used to poo-poo literally any study aid. Why is watching a YouTube video on how to tamp a post superior to a chatgpt summary?

          Why take the train when you should “expend an iota of effort” and make the 3 hour walk to work?

          This is unsound logic that I expect on Reddit, not Lemmy. Go continue your crusade against the spinning jenny, small-minded Luddite.

      • Perspectivist@feddit.ukEnglish
        3·
        2 个月前

        It feels like more and more people are taking pride in what they don’t do or what they aren’t, rather than in what they actually stand for. You see it in the people who brag about not using ChatGPT, not being on Twitter, not owning a car - or in those who define themselves by their hatred for others: the rich, meat eaters, republicans, whoever the current outgroup is.

        It’s like their entire identity revolves around opposition. Their sense of belonging comes not from shared values, but from shared resentment. If the only thing that unites you with your tribe is who you hate, then you don’t really have much of a tribe - just a mob.

        What’s most ironic is how many of these same people see themselves as independent thinkers, even though their views often are completely predictable once you know what they’re against. It’s as if they can’t even decide what they believe until they’ve first heard what “the enemy” thinks.

        • JacksonKerr@lemmy.nzEnglish
          2·
          2 个月前

          Yeah man, it’s normal to be proud of not participating in bad things. Are you going to argue that car-centric infrastructure, over-consumption of meat, and billionaires hoarding wealth aren’t bad things?

          I’m not car-free or vegan. There’s not much these people could say to convince me to become one. I already agree with them, I just don’t have the fortitude to live the theory despite them being objectively correct. In their position I imagine it’s frustrating to interact with people like me. Even moreso people who don’t understand their views to the point that they’ll say that their whole identity revolves around opposition.

          I don’t use a smartphone because I don’t want to contribute to the monopolistic social medias. People often take as a very noteworthy part of my character and want to talk about it. Many people probably even think of that as the “main thing” about me. However, that’s only because that’s the thing they tend to remember. They probably haven’t seen me out busking, making things out of leather, or doing programming projects. If they did, that’s not as unusual so they aren’t as interested. However, as soon as I put my phone on a table at the pub that’s what they remember and we start talking about because people are interested in things that are different.

          Did you know Michael Phelps is an avid golfer? Most people don’t because most people only know a few things about most people. This is made even worse when people are judgemental and turn up their noses at people they claim are “virtue signaling” and refuse to ever get to the point where they know the person.

          Your view that most people’s identities revolve around opposition is interesting because it seems that view mostly comes from the groups opposing the ones you mentioned to me. Car people have a weird hatred for cyclists, meat eaters for vegans, wealthy people tend to hate the poor, claiming them to be the authors of their own poverty because they’re not willing to admit they’re causing harm.

          At some point you have to accept that many things you do harm other people and accept that. I eat meat despite it being immoral and admit that. It’s not healthy to lie to yourself.

    • tehn00bi@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4·
      2 个月前

      Yeah, I was recently introduced to Bonhoeffer, his insight is incredible and the fact that similar mistakes are taking place today.

      Peter Turchin is as close to Hari Seldon I think we’ll have, his models point to a lot of turmoil in the future.

  • Tehdastehdas@piefed.socialEnglish
    16·
    2 个月前

    Also heavy metals:

    Increased blood lead level in children has been correlated with decreases in intelligence, nonverbal reasoning, short-term memory, attention, reading and arithmetic ability, fine motor skills, emotional regulation, and social engagement. … The effect of lead on children’s cognitive abilities takes place at very low levels.

    High blood lead levels in adults are also associated with decreases in cognitive performance and with psychiatric symptoms such as depression and anxiety.

    Lead poisoning # By organ system - Wikipedia

    And microplastics:


    And ragebait:


    • 14th_cylon@lemmy.zipEnglish
      18·
      2 个月前

      i suspect slahdot people are quite happy in their bubble there without the facebook and other users…

    • demonsword@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      2 个月前

      from the not-very-good-at-analogies dept

      Slashdot is like a canned fart in a bottle forgotten in the attic. Open up the bottle, take a sniff… welcome back!

  • melsaskca@lemmy.caEnglish
    11·
    2 个月前

    I guess, yes? When social engineering is stronger than free will and common sense then I’d call that gullible/stupid.

  • SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.worldEnglish
    8·
    2 个月前

    I could say anything is a crutch that removes the burden from our minds. Calculators remove the burden of doing basic math and map apps remove the burden of maintaining a mental map. Both of these can result in a person who can’t independently do basic calculations or navigate and won’t understand the methodology behind the calculations. Now if this is a problem is open to debate.

    Now using AI to avoid learning is a problem since it results in fraud. “I claim I understand this but I don’t.”

    • batmaniam@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      2 个月前

      This is a great conversation because I’m one of those people who’s terrible at arithmetic, but quite good at math. As in: I can look at a function, visualize it in 3D space, see what different max, mins and surfaces are dominated by what terms etc, but don’t ask me to tally a meal check. I’d be useless at applying any math without a calculator.

      Similarly, there’s a lot of engineers out there that use CAD extensively that would probably not be engineers if they had to do drafting by hand.

      The oatmeal did a comic that distilled this for me where they talked about why they didn’t like AI “art”. They made the point that in making a drawing, there are a million little choices made reconciling what’s in your head with what you can do on the page. Either from the medium, what you’re good at drawing, whatever, it’s those choices that give the work “soul”. Same thing for writing. Those choices are where learning, development, and style happen, and what generative AI takes away.

      That helped crystalize for me the difference between a tool and autocomplete on steroids.

      Edit: to add: you’re statement “I claim to understand but don’t” hits it on the head and is similar to why you have to be careful if plagiarism in citing academic review papers. If you write YOUR paper in a way that agrees with the review but discuss the paper the review was referencing, and, even accidentally, skip over that the conclusion you’re putting forward is from the review, not the paper you’re both citing, that’s plagiarism. Notion being you misrepresented their thoughts as your own. That is basically ALL generative AI.

  • B-TR3E@feddit.orgEnglish
    7·
    2 个月前

    Not me. Because I am smart.I know because I’m smart. If I were stupid, I wouldn’t know. See?