AI – useful tool or nightmare?

AI has long been part of our lives, but no more so than over the last 14 months. There are of course many conveniences associated with AI technology, especially self-learning. I love, when I am busy, getting Siri (now identifies as a male) to do the run around for me whilst I am driving. He organises my notes, reads me my text messages, writes responses, reads my emails and the list goes on. I have even found myself having a conversation with him on longer drives, bored, but a good opportunity to test the extent of the AI technology on this device.

The dangers of course are, and we have long known this, the data collection associated with the use and the learning technology, that starts to gather intricate details about our likes and dislikes and our habits.

In the educational and VET (Vocational Education and Training) sector, it is starting to become a nightmare and may in fact impact humanity in the long term, more than we realise.

I enjoy designing and writing documents, and the predictive text quickly allows me to achieve much more in much less time than it used to. A simple push on the ‘tab’ button on the keyboard and we have ourselves a sentence, and another. Self-learning technology gets to know your subject matter and your writing style. I love conducting research and posing the question in different ways and from different dimensions and getting a more holistic view of the subject matter. The key is of course to check the validity and accuracy and ask the ‘critical thinking’ questions, to ascertain the level of fact and truth buried in the information provided.

From a Registered Training Organisation’s (RTO) perspective, it is fast becoming a nightmare, as students are solely relying on completing their assessments and assignments with the aid of AI. Whilst they have technically produced the correct answer, and we ‘should’ therefore be marking them as correct, they have in essence not demonstrated their understanding of the subject matter or how they believe the principles are applied in practice in the real world. They have simply demonstrated that they are able to tap into AI and copy and paste the answers.

Challenging the students on this and trying to explain that this does not necessarily achieve the aim and is in fact a breach in the RTOs policies and procedures, often leaves them disgruntled and disappointed in their provider. We are finding that no amount of policies and procedures or warnings are sufficient, and they are simply being ignored. They probably hope that the RTO does not have the tools in place to validate the use of AI, or simply does not have the time. This is an even worse situation for TAE learners or TAE upgrades, as they, being trainers and assessors in the industry, should in fact know better, and be aware that this is a fundamental breach in one of the Principles of Assessment – ‘Authenticity’. The work must be the student’s own work and if other sources have assisted in the response, then they must be adequately cited.

Trainers and assessors are not assisting the issue, as they are already time poor, and these days spend a lot of time mentoring and supporting the learners, and are therefore perhaps not assessing as many assessments as they would like to make the income viable for them. We are noticing, that the higher grade of trainer and assessors are exiting the industry and diversifying or stepping sideways in the VET sector, whilst we struggle to keep the remaining trainers and assessors compliant with their professional development (PD) and vocational currency. But that is a subject matter for another day. Due to the increased use of AI everywhere, assessors now have the added task of checking for AI, are time-poor to do so, and often have not been provided with adequate tools to conduct the checks adequately.

I can’t help but wonder, how much AI – especially as it is progressing – is causing humanity to regress. Critical thinking and problem solving seems to be an ever disappearing skill. Skills essential for the workplace and industry. If AI will do our thinking and problem solving for us, how much are our essential skills being stunted? What does this mean for humanity in the long run?

Then there is the issue of the accuracy of the information provided. They say that this type of tool is only as effective as the information you feed it and how accurate the instructions are that you put in. However, what if the intentions of the creators are not that of good, but intentionally evil, and to deliberately mislead and feed mis – and disinformation to us? This is a question that has been posed before.

There was a case recently, where both the plaintiff’s and defendant’s solicitor’s submissions in a court case were solely based on AI. Upon the judge checking the accuracy of the Acts and precedents cited, it turned out that all of the Acts and precedents did not exist or were incorrect. This raises serious concerns regarding the reliability of AI. And we are finding this in student responses as well, where the outcomes and responses from the learners often simply do not answer the question.

So, where to from here? Where does this leave education? Where does this leave humanity?

I mean, using AI as part of your research tool kit is inevitable. How can we make learners and the new generations aware of the damaging and long-term side effects of heavy reliance on AI?

The ‘dumbing down’ of humanity? The stunting of critical thinking and problem solving which amongst some other skills differentiates the human species from the rest of the animal kingdom.

Is that the ultimate goal? How can we as parents, leaders in industry and educators encourage and improve critical thinking and problem-solving skills, and lead learners away from the ever-growing shackles of AI?

Food for thought!

We invite discussion from readers.

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