December 24, 2024: 2024 in Review: AI

[I was initially trying to decide whether to focus my annual Year in Review series on heavy or light topics, but then I realized this was 2024—we had it all, from the serious to the surreal, the absurd to the awesome. So I’ll start with a couple tough subjects and move toward some happier ones. I’d love your end-of-year reflections as well!]

I harbored a brief plan to outsource the writing of today’s post to ChatGPT (and then to comment on how the program did or, far more likely, did not live up to my lofty goals for my own writing, natch), but here’s the thing: generative AI programs like that most famous one are not just shitty writers and thinkers (as that excellent hyperlinked post from the folks at the USC Libraries notes), they also are blatantly stealing from others’ work and, to follow up yesterday’s post (with a side of AI that I don’t think nearly enough folks are aware of, or that at least I don’t see in our conversations about AI in higher ed nearly consistently enough), contributing directly to the climate crisis while they do so. (I believe that’s equally true for other, non-generative forms of AI, but I have far less experience with and knowledge about them.) When I talk with students about why I hope they’ll avoid using generative AI for any part of their work and writing in my classes, I emphasize all those levels for sure. But I also come back to one main point, the same one I’ve always made when it comes to questions of plagiarism and the like: I respect my students deeply, and I hope they will always likewise respect their own work, their own time, their own money and investment of all types in their education, as well as our shared community together. To my mind, such respect demands at least that we talk together about AI any and every time it might be in play—and at most, and ideally, that we avoid outsourcing any part of our work and voice to these problematic programs.

Next 2024 reflection tomorrow,

Ben

PS. What do you think? What stands out from this decades-long year?