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🇰🇷 South Korea /Culture & Society

AI is the sweetest shortcut... 'learning' is disappearing

From Hankyoreh · () Korean

Translated from Korean, summarized and contextualized by DistantNews.

At a glance

In-depth Named sources Context piece
  • The rise of generative AI is blurring the lines of traditional education, with students increasingly using AI for assignments and facing new forms of academic dishonesty.
  • Experts warn that relying on AI for easy answers creates an "outsourcing of cognition," potentially hindering long-term problem-solving skills and creating a "borrowed competence."
  • The article calls for a redefinition of learning and literacy in the AI era, emphasizing adaptability and the ability to learn continuously in a changing world.

The advent of generative artificial intelligence has thrown the educational landscape into disarray. As AI tools like ChatGPT become more sophisticated, they are increasingly used to complete school assignments and essays, leading to a surge in new forms of academic dishonesty. This trend, however, is seen not just as a moral failing of students but as a challenge to an educational system that may no longer be fit for purpose.

The paradox of cognitive outsourcing.

— Gu Bon-kwonDescribing the phenomenon where students' problem-solving abilities decline over time despite short-term gains from using AI.

Experts draw parallels to the calculator and search engine, tools that initially sparked concern but eventually became indispensable. They suggest that future generations will engage in new forms of intellectual work using AI, and the current period is a transitional phase. However, a fundamental human tendency towards "cognitive parsimony" means people often opt for the easiest path to an answer. Generative AI represents the most "sweetest cognitive shortcut" in history, but easily obtained answers are often fleeting.

Recent studies indicate that while students using AI may achieve high short-term results, their long-term problem-solving abilities decline. This "paradox of cognitive outsourcing" is compounded by the danger of mistaking AI-generated output for one's own ability. Education, as described by psychologist Robert Bjork, should involve "desirable difficulties" that foster genuine learning. Generative AI, by smoothing over these difficult processes, risks eliminating learning altogether.

What is most necessary to teach children is not 'how to learn more information,' but 'how to live while constantly changing,' and 'how to face the fact that I don't know.'

— Yuval Noah HarariStressing the importance of adaptability and facing uncertainty in the face of rapid change.

Historian Yuval Noah Harari emphasizes that the most crucial skills for the future are not more information but "how to live while constantly changing" and "how to face the fact that I don't know." This requires continuous learning and mental flexibility. Media researcher Christoph Engemann likens AI-era reading to a "new Latin," suggesting that while literacy is accessible, true mastery of reading and writing as tools for thought is becoming a skill possessed by a select few, functioning like a "cleric's tool."

In the AI environment, reading is becoming a skill that only a few can handle, functioning like a 'cleric's tool.'

— Christoph EngemannDescribing how advanced literacy in the AI era might become a specialized skill.
DistantNews Editorial

Originally published by Hankyoreh in Korean. Translated, summarized, and contextualized by our editorial team with added local perspective. Read our editorial standards.

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