AI on university campuses
 

My daughter is a university professor of microbiology. I asked her about AI and she said 11 of 47 students in her class this year used AI on their writing assignment. I was shocked it was that high!

I asked how she discovered and responded, I liked her approach (old man's DNA)
She said first, it's very obvious the student has not displayed that level of knowledge in class, previous writings, etc. She sits them in her office (one at a time of course) and asked if they used AI to plagarize, and that their response would factor into the punishment. All 11 pled guilty, 2 of them started crying. The one young man who thought he might challenge her, she replied "I liked what you wrote about genetic platicizing, can you expound on that a bit? - and he caved.

Punishment was to write a new paper, topic of her choosing, and graded one grade down - or take a zero. Without admitting guily, but proven guilty, the grade would be an F in the class and being reported to the Dean.

Our generation would not even think to do this, but times change and AI is finding it's place through trial and error. Let the college kids in your life know that scamming the university has a high degree of failure.
PS - Happy Mother's Day to all the moms

If one uses AI to teach them, as a personalized tutor, then they should become a better student. If the student simply presents AI’s work as their own then they are in fact, learning nothing. The value of AI is in how one uses it. This should be taught in classes.

The new Pope has identified AI as one of the most critical challenges facing humanity.

From what I have seen, AI does a lot of things better than many humans. One of them is writing.

Would you rather have a lawyer write the closing argument or have AI write it?

Would you rather have your minister draft the sermon or have AI draft it?

I read that the average pastor reported spending 11 hours and 30 minutes in sermon preparation per week.

Unless the minister is a phenomenal writer (very few are) I think that the 11.5 hours could be better used doing something more useful. He could be counseling people, visiting the sick, etc.

I would prefer quality - whether it is written by a man or by AI.

My spouse’s family has three Pastors.As young children (6-8yo) each would give sermons weekly to all the cousins gathered on the porch steps. All three after 40+ years have retired but continue to guest speak. After spending years visiting in their homes, a topic is picked for all three services.
Their sermons come together from visits with congregations, elderly, ill, and sometimes death. Not sitting for any amount of hours thinking up a sermon. All have said their words come from the spirit within, their notes guide them, not written speeches, but experiences. Each waking hour their sermons evolve with personal everyday life, slightly tweeting in their mind to reach as many of their flock. Inspiring it’s better to give then receive. Then thankful that God guided them to inspire and comfort those in need

Quoting “Sometimes I have that great topic I prayed on for Wednesday or Sunday Morning or Evening” then an hour before service an event happens and God tells me I need to prepare something more inspirational. More than once at a last minute have needed to step in for emergency sermon. With a few written notes, and guidance from sermons within.
For any family wedding there are no notes, just words from their heart, for guidance into their new life, and a slight hint of as a family we protect our own.

Personally knowing all three they listen to a higher calling for their inspiration, not facts and figures from AI.
Hopefully you can speak with your pastor to voice your concerns on the quality you think they should focus on. I am sure they will listen to your concerns, and take into account your thoughts on how they could improve with AI, instead of their heart.

I don’t see many clergymen thinking AI will inspire over God, but maybe you could convince them you read they wasted 11 hours, that should be put to prepare better quality, instead of inspirational

AI is a great power assist.
Letting AI do all the work is lazy.

You say that the three pastors in your family give great sermons. Do you find that to be the case with other pastors or are any of them boring?

And you avoided the question about a lawyer using AI. Would you rather have a poorly written closing argument written by an attorney or a great closing argument written by AI?

How about teachers? I have to say that the vast majority of my high school or college teachers were not that great and many were pretty bad. If AI could do a better job would you go with AI or take the boring lecturer?

I don’t see any problem with using AI as a tool, a tool for writing, a tool for information, even suggestions for creativity possibly etc and as a tool we need to learn to use to help us - it’s just new and some people seem worried about anything new or different. I’m not sure why the Pope is concerned, certainly not because AI will guide people away from the faith, it can’t do that. Perhaps because it could replace jobs computers can do and then people will be unemployed? Or that people can mistake a machine for a person because it seems to respond intelligently?

In my experience, about 90% of people think that they are in the top 10%. Therefore, they think that the other 90% might benefit from using AI but they would never use it because they are smarter than AI.

Years ago, I remember watching Ken Jennings play Watson in a jeopardy match. Before the match, Jennings said “I was pretty confident that I was going to win.”

Watson destroyed Jennings.

The final score was
Watson $77,147
Jennings $24,000

Writing is an act of thinking. Using AI for writing assignments is avoiding thinking, one of the hardest parts of learning. This professor gave these 11 students a second chance at the assignment without failing them and another opportunity to develop their ability of thinking. Good for her. (They did get a penalty for cheating.) And maybe these students learned from their experience of cheating on the professor's requirements.

In general, USA students are not taught how to think critically now. It starts in schools before university. Most schools largely teach students to take and pass exams.

But there is hope for giving students a real education. There is a small but growing movement trying to push students, parents, and schools back to giving students an education for critical thinking. It looks like a classical education that has been around for centuries but mostly fallen out of favor in the USA for multiple reasons.

For example:

Classic Learning Test (CLT) - Assessments for Grades 3-12 and

CLT in Florida | CLT

I retired two years ago as an elementary teacher. My third and fourth grade students were using AI to write papers. The computer on the teacher side can actually tell you the percentage of the paper that is plagiarized and actually link the sources. Of course very easy to tell plagiarism in most cases as your daughter said because doesn’t match everyday interactions and the student can’t explain what they wrote means. I dread in 20 years trying to find a doctor or mechanic that can truly think through a problem.

Our daughter is also a university professor. We just talked about the same issue. She expressed frustration that 4 of her students would us AI when expressly told them they would receive a failing grade. When confronted 2 confessed. The other 2 tried to talk around it but eventually did confess.
How dumb can you be!

I would not expect the use of AI to, of it'self, to be cheating.
It's a tool. To not draw from it would be ignorant.
But to copy/paste for an assignment would be an outright fail.

Not disagreeing, but they said the same thing about calculators...

Both PHD Nephew and Niece have only taught at Private Universities. So far AI isn’t an issue.

That may be due to in depth knowledge prior in applying, one AI and you are expelled with no return.

The need for artificial intelligence is inversely proportional to the availability of natural intelligence.

AI has to be taught. The devil is in the details...who was the teacher and what checks and balances were used during the teaching process.

Here is another perspective.
I retired from teaching 2nd grade in ‘08.
Since 2000 we had been teaching critical thinking skills to our students.
We had a lecturer instruct us that…”these students will have 10 jobs in their lives. Five of them haven’t been invented yet.” The only teaching that mattered was inductive and deductive reasoning and technology.
I also had to teach these 7 year olds the three R’s. Reading Riting and Rithmatic.
So we did multilevel teaching, just as the kids learned on many levels.
AI is a great tool to have in the toolbelt. . Teachers and students will both learn how to best use it.
And I’m sure these students will also go on to have 10 jobs, five of which haven’t been invented yet.

Pope
 

Did you know the Pope gets 33,000$ a month in pay and has no expenses and no taxes. What would Jesus say?

AI
 

AI is no different than an open book test................as long as student is reading the material they are getting educated. There is no room for creativity but they still get knowledge and thats the bottom line.

That’s like saying it’s okay for students to just use a calculator for simple math, but that doesn’t teach them what the numbers actually mean. I want people who think and understand, not just regurgitate.

Yes, but I used the calculator to teach my children in grade 3 multiplication. They made their calculation and then checked to see if they got it right. A calculator can be used just like a book, you can use it to learn and my students knew their multiplication (and as a result their division) tables orally up to 12 X 12 before they entered grade 4. Today I would teach them how to use AI.

Part of the motivation was teaching them the love of learning and the pride of achievement, not just to score on a test. Just like, I suppose a robot could be made which we could program to hit perfect hole in ones every time on the golf course - but it would not be as much fun as when we do it ourselves.

An example of how AI is being abused by kids who are clever AND lazy enough to do so. Teacher gives students an assignment. "Read Act IV and Act V of Hamlet, and write two pages, single-spaced, analyzing the dynamic between Horatio and Claudius."

Kid types into the google AI buffer: "Give me two pages, single space, analyzing the dynamic between Horatio and Claudius in Hamlet's Act 4 and 5."

Presses the enter key.
3.5 seconds later, student gets exactly that, perfectly typed, spell- and grammar- checked.

Prints it out, hands it in, gets an A.

Never learns anything about Hamlet. But who cares? The assignment was to submit an analysis, and the teacher got an analysis.

We didn't have calculators. We had to learn the actual math. My mom wasn't good at math. My dad was VERY good at it. He's the one who taught me how to understand it. No calculator, none needed. I learned to add and subtract on an abacus, and with coin and paper currency as my tools.

Dad taught me the "trick" to memorizing the 9 table. 9 18 27 36 45 54 63 72 81 90 99 108 117 126 135 144 The right-most digits go 0 through 9, the digit next to them will go 9 through 0, the digit next to that one will go zero through nine, and so on into infinity. - and when you add each digit of the multiple up, and keep adding until there's only one digit, the answer is always 9. That's how you can check your math to see if you're correct. Example - 9*4782=43,038. 4+3+0+3+8=18, 1+8=9.

Yes, we used slide rulers in engineering because calculators were not invented yet. And I remember a visiting student from India who had the sin and cosine tables in his head and could finish the equations before anyone else. We challenged each other, and had fun. The poor students who just tried to get by on tests etc never enjoyed learning and probably never enjoyed their work later either. I bet Sam Altman, and Elon Musk loved what they were doing, not just trying to get an A.

OBB, you sound like you had a brilliant father. I learned my love of math from my dad too.

I never did well on tests, and never got past Algebra 1, even when we DID have calculators (they showed up when I got into High School). When we got those calculators, my dad would quiz me on the understanding of the math, to make sure I was actually learning the algebraic rules. I didn't learn them. I could plug the info into the calculator and it'd spit out the answer, but I never did learn HOW it worked. I could never apply it.
UNTIL I learned to code. It wasn't until then, that it finally made sense. And that was all done using physical templates, like this one: Univac Remington Rand Flowcharting Template | National Museum of American History

The visual application of algorithmic expression was the only way I was able to learn it. A calculator spitting out the answer taught me nothing, ever.

No offense to your daughter, but the actual number was probably closer to 46… And that’s a low estimate… Kids use AI like they drink water…
I don’t know whether it’s good or bad, but it’s a little similar to when math teachers let us (or didn’t let us) use calculators…

Yes, because of how you, OBB, used it. I taught my students how to calculate the answer and the only thing the calculator was used for was to check if their answer was correct. In grades one and two, addition and subtraction can be taught the same way (with beautiful large kindergarten calculators). However, I have to admit that in later grades I never memorized, say the logarithmic tables.

I think what you say is interesting. I taught many children successfully, but I could not get my own daughter to learn. She was simply not interested. In grades 10 she was still working at grade 3 math level. But, then, she got a job later where she needed to apply higher math skills. She loved her work and was determined to do it. She hired her own private tutor and went through each year of math she missed so that she could do her job. Finally, she had the motivation.

It's a matter of brain wiring. Some people (such as myself) are visual and verbal thinkers. Numeric concepts don't really mean anything to us. We need to see those concepts applied to something tangible, or it goes right over our heads. Now, years later thanks to my dad and my computer programming class, I can spit out percentages without really thinking about them much at all. You give me a bunch of numbers, and I can figure out an approximate average within a few seconds, no calculator, pen or paper needed. I won't always be spot-on but I'll be pretty close to correct. I can now do it in my head. It is a visual process in my head. I imagine the numbers, I imagine writing it on paper, I imagine doing the "long math" and "long division." But it happens instantly. Because I learned the MEANING of the numbers, how they fit into the universe and their significance.

It's why, to me, kids who can't count change back should sue their teachers and their parents for not teaching them. If the total at check-out is $14.29 and you pull out a $20 bill and they plug in $20 on their cash register and open the drawer - then you say "oh wait I have four pennies!" they have no idea what they're supposed to do with that information. Their cash register has already instructed them to give them $5.71, and they've already pulled out the change (yes, I did that in my head too). You tell them you wanted quarters, not dimes. And that confuses them even more. So you have to tell them:

Subtract 4 from $14.29, since I just gave you the 4 pennies. That makes it $14.25. I give you a $20. Give me 3 quarters to make $15, and then another $5 to make $20. I mean HOW HARD IS THIS?

It's hard for them because they were never taught how to COUNT. Simple math, simple addition and subtraction. They have absolutely no idea how to do it. You can thank calculators for that.

Yes, they were taught to use the calculator as a crutch not as a reference item. My young students could do that too, but there was no pride or fun in doing it. Many games, chess, poker etc are built on math. People enjoy using their skills if you encourage it. And that is what I tried to do.

When it came to money, I asked the parents to give a small allowance to each one of my grade one child, so they could go to the store and buy gum, ice cream whatever. The students learned how much they could afford, to budget and to make change. We practiced with play money in the class.

"Our generation would not even think to do this".....my wife as a major university professor and dean (1970-2012) found students plagiarizing every year. When the computers and internet became of use the faculty had programs that would find plagiarism.....so this is not new, only easier to do.

A lot of people took a tangent on this. It doesn’t matter if a pastor or an employee uses ai, no student should use ai to do anything but to help them learn. If you let ai write a paper, 100% of the students won’t learn squat. Once the student actually learns their trade in school, then if they use AI in their job, they can proof read what ai wrote to see if it makes sense to pass it out. All ai output should be evaluated before using it.

Nowadays, all the colleges are dumbing down their criteria so everybody advances, which produces not so bright graduates. Some schools/states have made it a rule not to give students tests because they don’t want anybody to fail.

Remember when we transitioned from landlines to cell phones. At first there were dropped calls, then improved performance… but I can tell you that cell phones still cannot match the reliability of landlines. AI is here to help, but it too has screw ups; programmers are calling them “dreams.”

Doctors are using it to write their notes on patient exams. They can see more patients in a day because of it. Yet, I think a connection to the patient is lost - I always remember better when I have to write/type the information down. I’ve even changed my thinking, in the process of writing it down.

AI is a tool and used properly - an aid and used improperly - a potential accident. (Scammers, of course, use it as a weapon. Phishing emails are getting really hard to spot by bad spelling and grammar!)

Yes this is when “education” becomes meaningless. When anyone can pass…at my university the engineers passed a horse to get his degree. They write every test for him over the years and brought him on stage to accept his certificate. After that you had to id yourself to write an exam. This was way before AI, before computers, before calculators.

When higher education becomes an institution where 50% of the population can pass to get a degree, why bother? Just buy the certificate on line. Cheaper for everyone involved and just as valuable.

I don't know what Jesus would say but GrokAI said:

False. The claim that the Pope receives $33,000 a month in pay with no expenses and no taxes is not accurate, based on available information. Here’s a breakdown:

Salary: Historically, popes do not receive a traditional salary. Pope Francis, for instance, explicitly declined any personal salary, and his expenses were covered by the Vatican. However, some sources suggest that Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, may receive a monthly stipend of approximately $33,800 (or €2,500–€3,000 in some reports). This figure is not universally confirmed, and previous popes, like Francis, often donated such funds to charity or declined them entirely. The claim of a fixed $33,000 monthly salary is therefore uncertain and likely overstated for most popes.

Expenses: The Vatican covers the pope’s living expenses, including housing, food, travel, and security. This means the pope does not personally pay for these necessities, which aligns with the claim of “no expenses.” However, the pope may have personal expenses (e.g., charitable donations or minor personal items) that could come from a stipend, if accepted.

Taxes: The claim of “no taxes” is more complex. Vatican City does not impose income taxes on its employees, including the pope, so any stipend received would be tax-free in the Vatican. However, for Pope Leo XIV, a U.S. citizen, U.S. tax law requires citizens living abroad to file tax returns, potentially taxing income earned from working for a foreign government (like the Vatican). While certain exemptions (e.g., foreign earned income exclusion) or the unique nature of the pope’s role might reduce or eliminate tax liability, it’s not accurate to flatly state “no taxes” without considering U.S. obligations. The IRS may issue specific guidance for Leo XIV’s unprecedented situation.

In summary, the statement is false because:

The $33,000 monthly salary is not consistently verified across sources and does not apply to all popes (e.g., Francis declined it).

While the Vatican covers most expenses, personal expenses may still exist.

The “no taxes” claim overlooks potential U.S. tax obligations for an American pope like Leo XIV.

The situation is nuanced, and definitive claims about salary and taxes depend on the specific pope and their citizenship. Always cross-check such claims, as media reports can sensationalize or misrepresent Vatican finances.

Geez, how old are you? <teasing>

Please provide some documentation for the statement. It does not appear to be true!

You are confusing the Pope with the President.

The US President receives a monthly salary of $33,333.33 (based on the $400,000 annual salary)

Imagine paying $100,000 per year and cheating your way through.

This is why term papers are a good idea - at least the student has an idea what the assignment is - but all test for marks should be oral, just like they used to be.