The Gond is shifting under our fee.
- AI knows more than any one person knows, but every person knows thins that AI does not know.
- A large university may know more than AI knows, but the knowledge is fragmented and distributes.
- The universe of information includes important, useful information and seemingly unimportant information it is hara to know what might become important someday. It is good to have scholars focused on obscure narrow topics.
- Education is still a matter of teaching people ow to access information and to turn information into knowledge.
- The professional distinction between teachers [who transfer information] and scholars [focuses on knowledge production] will become more stark
- Knowledge production is upstream from information transfer. Most interaction with AI-chat models occur downstream. Or , if you think of knowledge as pyramid, most AI chat is at the very base level.
- Methods of organizing and systematized information are becoming more important. Catalogs canons and curated lists will become more valuable.
- The textbook industry should be worried.
- Scholars are best situated to know what is not yet known, to identify “blank space “in the universe of knowledge.
- Higher education will be less about ensuring students know what they’ve red and more about ensuring they read what is not yet know by AI.
- The written essay will no longer be the default for student assessment.
- At the time of this writing. AI writing is technically proficient but culturally evacuated.
- Until culturally inflected AI is developed, models such as ChaGPT will stand apart from culture. Knowledge production within culture will not fully be absorbed by AI.
- Specific and local cultural knowledge will become more valuable.
- Experiential learning will become the norm. Everyone will need an internship. Employers will want assurances that a new graduate can follow directions, complete tasks, demonstrate judgment.
- Programs such as Hallie Pope’s Graphic Advocacy Project will argue for new communication tools and modalities.
- Year ago, I assigned Hélène Cixous’s feminist classis “The Laugh of the Medusa” 1975] and a student came to class saying, “I cant ‘write a response essay. Instead, I am going to give you a jug.” And she did. Assessment may take new and unexpected forms.
Hollis Robins is dean of humanities at University of Utah.