… or banned until we have adequate time to study the long term effects this technology will have on child development.
we already struggle as a society with educating and shaping kids into well rounded, emotionally stable, socially competent adults.
we need to do a better job funding and prioritizing child welfare in general before we sign off on allowing billionaire owned Fortune 5 companies a direct pipeline into the consciousness of still developing human minds. just as a matter of public health policy, let alone performance/utility.
Many of us grew up expecting ai due to reading and watching science fiction. I doubt the majority expected it to be controlled by the worst people on the planet, or that it would be used to manipulate society, or that it would be environmentally destructive, or that it would be deliberately used for privacy invasion/control/fascism.
There is some utility, and frankly it won’t go away so kids should eventually be taught its use and its failures.
These LLM models can be very useful for organizing large data sets. I know I’ve saved hours of time by feeding it very specific instructions to create some data classes and subsequent symbology for a couple of hundred points.
However, it never would have worked if I didn’t already have the knowledge on how the software I was using to display my data worked and a strong knowledge of my data. It only worked because I was able to give it hyper specific instructions on how to process my data. Even then I still had to proof and make some tweeks, but ultimately a time saver.
This is what kids need to be taught. The first assignment given in high school allowing the use of AI should task students with running a selection of prompts to produce an incorrect statement or answer. Then students should be instructed to “trick” the AI into giving a wrong answer themselves.
Henry Ford made the car a commercial product for the average American. He’s a terrible guy and was a racist and a Nazi.
Yet it still makes sense for schools to have drivers ed. Most students will drive so investing time into making sure they do it safely is what makes sense.
It’s here, and it will continue to be here. I’d rather it not be, but denial isn’t productive. If we teach students what it’s actually capable of and its limitations maybe we can get people to stop using it as a conversation partner and a search tool.
Also let’s be honest here, my argument for its usefulness handles your issues quite well. Today we have people asking LLMs what to think about topic x. When I argued its usefulness by instructing it to take data set x, provided by the user, and do Y and Z to it. No way to insert an agenda into that. Of course you proof it afterwards as I said
I think that AI as, for example, a super-summarizer, or a search engine on steroids, is fairly good, but it at least should give ALL the sources that were used, put a big disclaimer, and a huge liability of responsibility, as user SHOULD and MUST be reviewing all sources.
Basically, it should be just a tool to find rather niche, rare, obscure or otherwise buried by SEO sources.
But if you just want it to do all the work for you, then you probably should be automatically disqualified from your educative or public institution.
unfortunately school administrations are kinda interested in it because it artificially boosts stats which means they can get a bigger piece of the pie the next quarter
Can’t read the article so idk if that’s the intention but Ai literacy needs to be taught at some point and a beurocratic ban wouldn’t let teachers include it in their curriculum
I definitely agree with this, tech literacy should absolutely be taught. I view this as similar to how elementary aged children aren’t allowed to use calculators in math, because it’s actually pretty important that you learn to do the basics. But the reality is that AI is being used in all sorts of professional environments in very productive ways now, and it will be important to learn how to utilize it skillfully and ethically.
But the reality is that AI is being used in all sorts of professional environments in very productive ways now,
The reality is that that claim is anecdotal at best as there is no way to quantify the productivity of LLM use.
Productivity is value generated per unit of cost. You cannot reliably predict the token use of successfully completing any given task or even reproduce the same token use for running the same task again later. If you cannot quantify the cost you cannot quantify productivity.
Yes, my information is anecdotal, but that’s no reason to dismiss it out of hand. I personally know attorneys, physicians, and software engineers for whom AI has become an integral tool in their work. These are all super competent people who understand how to use it and never rely on it for a final draft. That it’s increased their productivity individually is frankly undeniable. It sounds like you’re talking about expecting AI to spit out a reliable final product, which is absolutely not what it should be used for
New York City Public Schools, the largest school system in the country, has banned student-facing generative artificial intelligence tools in classrooms through eighth grade for this school year, adopting one of the most aggressive AI policies in the nation.
The moratorium follows intense pressure from parents and other advocates, who urged New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) to enact a two-year ban on AI in classrooms.
It also comes amid a more widespread backlash to technology that has spurred screen-time limits in dozens of school systems, including Los Angeles Unified, the nation’s second-largest public school district. Last year, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) banned cellphones from the state’s public schools, following similar actions in dozens of other states.
Mamdani’s plan calls for a one-year pause that he said can be extended or amended, depending on how the first year goes.
“This moratorium is a commitment to getting the future right,” Mamdani said during a news conference Wednesday morning. “Kids need to learn to think for themselves, they need to work alongside their peers, they need to learn how to ask better questions, and they need to learn what it feels like to not know the answer.”
The new policy also seeks to tighten screen-time limits for the youngest learners in the school district. The city is recommending 30-minute screen-time limits for students in third to fifth grade and 45 minutes for sixth to eighth grades.
Mamdani said the city will also disable AI components in more than 38 technology platforms that students have previously used. If AI capabilities cannot be removed from a program, the school district will stop using it.
Meanwhile, for older students, the city will pilot five “rigorously vetted” educational AI programs in some high schools, and introduce two 45-minute AI literacy modules designed to teach teens about AI-related bias, risks and ethical considerations.
i just recently heard its use pervasively in some dental offices since 2024, and they often give hallucinated areas on a tooth leading to unneccesary procedures and costs, this is probably why it wont be diagnosing cancer anytime soon(because it will likely hallucinate a tumor more than not.
Diagnosing is a separate process that involves several steps, so I’m setting that word aside but
Identifying cancer in imaging or pathology smears is one of the better things certain types (not generative, not LLM) of AI is actually good for. But again it’s specifically tweaked programs that aren’t just general usage.
It should be banned at every level of education, and in every government department, doctors office, hospital etc just for a start.
Banned unless utility is proven.
… or banned until we have adequate time to study the long term effects this technology will have on child development.
we already struggle as a society with educating and shaping kids into well rounded, emotionally stable, socially competent adults.
we need to do a better job funding and prioritizing child welfare in general before we sign off on allowing billionaire owned Fortune 5 companies a direct pipeline into the consciousness of still developing human minds. just as a matter of public health policy, let alone performance/utility.
We need to admit that the people who are behind ai make it very obvious that it is currently the very wrong path
There is more to ai than just its potential use.
Many of us grew up expecting ai due to reading and watching science fiction. I doubt the majority expected it to be controlled by the worst people on the planet, or that it would be used to manipulate society, or that it would be environmentally destructive, or that it would be deliberately used for privacy invasion/control/fascism.
It was meant to be a good thing.
Agreed. Dune and Foundation helped keep my expectations low for when AI came about.
I think there’s an argument to be made that the AI of today isn’t what AGI might look like.
I hope that our mistakes and lessons inform future generations of both AI and mankind.
There is some utility, and frankly it won’t go away so kids should eventually be taught its use and its failures.
These LLM models can be very useful for organizing large data sets. I know I’ve saved hours of time by feeding it very specific instructions to create some data classes and subsequent symbology for a couple of hundred points.
However, it never would have worked if I didn’t already have the knowledge on how the software I was using to display my data worked and a strong knowledge of my data. It only worked because I was able to give it hyper specific instructions on how to process my data. Even then I still had to proof and make some tweeks, but ultimately a time saver.
This is what kids need to be taught. The first assignment given in high school allowing the use of AI should task students with running a selection of prompts to produce an incorrect statement or answer. Then students should be instructed to “trick” the AI into giving a wrong answer themselves.
sam altman, alex karp, jensen huang, mark zuckerberg, elon musk… some of the big names of ai
Are these the people you want behind the education of children?
Their agenda is not a better society.
ai was of course inevitable, but as per usual humans are why we cannot have nice things.
Teaching children using something that is so detrimental to the environment, privacy, and standard of living is also disgustingly ironic.
You can name names all you want.
Henry Ford made the car a commercial product for the average American. He’s a terrible guy and was a racist and a Nazi.
Yet it still makes sense for schools to have drivers ed. Most students will drive so investing time into making sure they do it safely is what makes sense.
It’s here, and it will continue to be here. I’d rather it not be, but denial isn’t productive. If we teach students what it’s actually capable of and its limitations maybe we can get people to stop using it as a conversation partner and a search tool.
Also let’s be honest here, my argument for its usefulness handles your issues quite well. Today we have people asking LLMs what to think about topic x. When I argued its usefulness by instructing it to take data set x, provided by the user, and do Y and Z to it. No way to insert an agenda into that. Of course you proof it afterwards as I said
I have no issue with the usa having ai, as long as the usa builds a wall around itself, and its pollution.
Earth deserves better than trash.
Based.
I think that AI as, for example, a super-summarizer, or a search engine on steroids, is fairly good, but it at least should give ALL the sources that were used, put a big disclaimer, and a huge liability of responsibility, as user SHOULD and MUST be reviewing all sources.
Basically, it should be just a tool to find rather niche, rare, obscure or otherwise buried by SEO sources.
But if you just want it to do all the work for you, then you probably should be automatically disqualified from your educative or public institution.
unfortunately school administrations are kinda interested in it because it artificially boosts stats which means they can get a bigger piece of the pie the next quarter
Can’t read the article so idk if that’s the intention but Ai literacy needs to be taught at some point and a beurocratic ban wouldn’t let teachers include it in their curriculum
Man, we can’t even teach basic media literacy
I definitely agree with this, tech literacy should absolutely be taught. I view this as similar to how elementary aged children aren’t allowed to use calculators in math, because it’s actually pretty important that you learn to do the basics. But the reality is that AI is being used in all sorts of professional environments in very productive ways now, and it will be important to learn how to utilize it skillfully and ethically.
The reality is that that claim is anecdotal at best as there is no way to quantify the productivity of LLM use.
Productivity is value generated per unit of cost. You cannot reliably predict the token use of successfully completing any given task or even reproduce the same token use for running the same task again later. If you cannot quantify the cost you cannot quantify productivity.
Yes, my information is anecdotal, but that’s no reason to dismiss it out of hand. I personally know attorneys, physicians, and software engineers for whom AI has become an integral tool in their work. These are all super competent people who understand how to use it and never rely on it for a final draft. That it’s increased their productivity individually is frankly undeniable. It sounds like you’re talking about expecting AI to spit out a reliable final product, which is absolutely not what it should be used for
The article link works (it’s an archive.today link, not the WashPost site itself)
It doesn’t load for me, maybe I’m geoblocked
Ty for that
“educational ai programs” doesn’t sound great to me, but i guess that’s why they’re pilot testing it
i just recently heard its use pervasively in some dental offices since 2024, and they often give hallucinated areas on a tooth leading to unneccesary procedures and costs, this is probably why it wont be diagnosing cancer anytime soon(because it will likely hallucinate a tumor more than not.
Diagnosing is a separate process that involves several steps, so I’m setting that word aside but
Identifying cancer in imaging or pathology smears is one of the better things certain types (not generative, not LLM) of AI is actually good for. But again it’s specifically tweaked programs that aren’t just general usage.
https://futurism.com/the-byte/ai-pastries-cancers
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31110349/