[JohnN]

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

[Velvet]

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.

[tophcfa]

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

[Rainger99]

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.

[thelegges]

Originally Posted by Rainger99

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

[opinionist]

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

[Rainger99]

Originally Posted by thelegges

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

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?

[Velvet]

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?

[Rainger99]

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

[spinner1001]

Originally Posted by JohnN

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.

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

[Remembergoldenrule]

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.

[ronjon309]

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!

[RoadToad]

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.

[GpaVader]

Originally Posted by opinionist

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

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

[thelegges]

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.