This article is a perfect example of how legitimate research gets turned into sensationalist nonsense, and the post on Lemmy is making it worse.
The study involved 1,222 participants across three experiments. Researchers had people use AI to help with math and reading comprehension, then tested them when that assistance was removed. They found that participants were more likely to struggle with accuracy and persistence when they had to work independently.
That’s an interesting finding. It’s worth discussing.
But this whole fixation on “just 10 minutes” is ridiculous. Ten minutes of AI use under specific experimental conditions does not mean that ten minutes of ChatGPT permanently damages your brain or destroys your ability to think for yourself. The study did not demonstrate that.
There’s a pretty significant difference between showing that people can become reliant on assistance and struggle when that assistance is suddenly taken away, and claiming that AI use fundamentally erodes your cognitive abilities. One is an experimental finding. The other is an exaggeration of what that finding actually means.
And this is where I have a problem with the article and the way it’s being presented on Lemmy. The actual research is interesting enough without having to dress it up in sensationalist headlines. If the point is that people need to struggle with difficult problems to develop their skills, then make that argument. It’s a perfectly reasonable one.
But “using AI for 10 minutes erodes your ability to persist at hard things” is a hell of a lot more dramatic than what the research actually establishes.
There’s a difference between reporting scientific findings and manufacturing a narrative around them. We should be capable of discussing the potential downsides of AI without resorting to clickbait and misrepresenting what the research actually says.
Forgive me, but i’m not understanding why you find the headline to sensationalize or over state the actual findings of the study. The abstract of the paper directly says:
we provide causal evidence for two key consequences of AI assistance: reduced persistence and impairment of unassisted performance.
I’m struggling to discern a meaningful difference between “erodes your ability to persist at hard things” and “reduced persistence of unassisted performance”. Forgive me for not understanding but I would appreciate your explanation. The paper’s very own conclusion actually uses the term erosion:
Here, we show that AI interaction can result in significant impairments in independent performance and persistence – capacities that are foundational to life-long learning. If brief exposure produces measurable erosion, the cumulative effects of daily AI use over months or years may be profound and difficult to reverse
I found a definition of erosion: “the gradual loss of something as a result of an ongoing process”. Trust can erode and be rebuilt; soil can erode and be restored.
I agree that 10 mins of foundation model assistance likely doesn’t “permanently damage your brain or destroy your ability to think for yourself”. However, in my reading of the Berkeley news piece, I find no claim of this specific kind. Does the text of the press release explicitly claim the duration of effect is long-term or lasting? Does it explicitly claim the the erosion is permanent? Again, I find myself confused what you are arguing against.
TLDR: LLMs are better information aggregators than Google, which has become a mess of ads and SEO spam. Using AI to complete homework isn’t inherently cheating; homework is practice, not an exam. If schools want to measure independent knowledge, they should use supervised assessments instead of take-home assignments. And if an assignment offers little educational value, perhaps the assignment is the problem, not the tool students use to complete it.
I think the more important takeaway from this study is that people produce better results when querying LLMs than when using traditional search engines. To me, that points to a problem with conventional search more than it demonstrates a detriment to using LLMs.
Have you tried Googling anything in recent years? It’s a bloody mess. Google increasingly prioritizes what it wants you to see, and more importantly, what advertisers have paid it to show you. Finding genuinely useful information has become an exercise in digging through sponsored results, SEO spam, and pages that exist primarily to generate ad revenue.
LLMs, for all their faults, are arguably better information aggregators at this point. That isn’t necessarily a ringing endorsement of AI, considering that they aren’t particularly good at searching either. It just illustrates how bad conventional search has become.
I wouldn’t interpret using an LLM to complete a task as inherently equivalent to students cheating. I’d argue that LLMs are simply another tool for finding, processing, and synthesizing information. If students can produce better results using those tools, perhaps we should be asking why we’re so determined to prevent them from doing so rather than examining the tools themselves.
And frankly, you can’t really cheat on homework. It’s homework, not a supervised examination. Students should be able to complete assignments using whatever resources are available to them. If the objective is to determine what students can accomplish independently, then schools should assess that through supervised examinations rather than take-home assignments.
More importantly, there’s a broader question about whether we’re assigning too much homework in the first place. Research has repeatedly found that its educational benefits depend on factors such as age, workload, and assignment quality. If an assignment provides little educational value beyond producing a completed worksheet, then perhaps the problem isn’t that students are using AI to complete it. Perhaps the assignment itself isn’t worth doing.
Agreed, I tend to get more interested in topics and learn more than I expected, for new neural networks. I think it’s like any tool and using it right can be useful. Our brains can make new connections learning about different topics and how they are related, systems thinking and problem solving. We can search online and read the sources directly too, and verify more with increasing importance of the topic. For example, going to defend yourself in court, do a lot of research from quality sources and still reconsider lol. Just like large claims require large evidence, same idea for other resources including llms, and no need to avoid it like it’s some new Witch panic. The energy people use daily mindlessly absorbing video streams is more than text based llm use and follow up confirmations.
Learning new things and recognizing connections between topics is beneficial for the brain, as it strengthens neural pathways and enhances understanding. This process, known as neuroplasticity, allows the brain to adapt and improve its ability to learn over time
This article is a perfect example of how legitimate research gets turned into sensationalist nonsense, and the post on Lemmy is making it worse.
The study involved 1,222 participants across three experiments. Researchers had people use AI to help with math and reading comprehension, then tested them when that assistance was removed. They found that participants were more likely to struggle with accuracy and persistence when they had to work independently.
That’s an interesting finding. It’s worth discussing.
But this whole fixation on “just 10 minutes” is ridiculous. Ten minutes of AI use under specific experimental conditions does not mean that ten minutes of ChatGPT permanently damages your brain or destroys your ability to think for yourself. The study did not demonstrate that.
There’s a pretty significant difference between showing that people can become reliant on assistance and struggle when that assistance is suddenly taken away, and claiming that AI use fundamentally erodes your cognitive abilities. One is an experimental finding. The other is an exaggeration of what that finding actually means.
And this is where I have a problem with the article and the way it’s being presented on Lemmy. The actual research is interesting enough without having to dress it up in sensationalist headlines. If the point is that people need to struggle with difficult problems to develop their skills, then make that argument. It’s a perfectly reasonable one.
But “using AI for 10 minutes erodes your ability to persist at hard things” is a hell of a lot more dramatic than what the research actually establishes.
There’s a difference between reporting scientific findings and manufacturing a narrative around them. We should be capable of discussing the potential downsides of AI without resorting to clickbait and misrepresenting what the research actually says.
Forgive me, but i’m not understanding why you find the headline to sensationalize or over state the actual findings of the study. The abstract of the paper directly says:
I’m struggling to discern a meaningful difference between “erodes your ability to persist at hard things” and “reduced persistence of unassisted performance”. Forgive me for not understanding but I would appreciate your explanation. The paper’s very own conclusion actually uses the term erosion:
I found a definition of erosion: “the gradual loss of something as a result of an ongoing process”. Trust can erode and be rebuilt; soil can erode and be restored.
I agree that 10 mins of foundation model assistance likely doesn’t “permanently damage your brain or destroy your ability to think for yourself”. However, in my reading of the Berkeley news piece, I find no claim of this specific kind. Does the text of the press release explicitly claim the duration of effect is long-term or lasting? Does it explicitly claim the the erosion is permanent? Again, I find myself confused what you are arguing against.
“Using a compiler for ten minutes erodes your ability to write raw machine code”
This is… Unfortunately completely true. ☹️
“Students who cheat on their homework don’t learn as much” is a better headline.
TLDR: LLMs are better information aggregators than Google, which has become a mess of ads and SEO spam. Using AI to complete homework isn’t inherently cheating; homework is practice, not an exam. If schools want to measure independent knowledge, they should use supervised assessments instead of take-home assignments. And if an assignment offers little educational value, perhaps the assignment is the problem, not the tool students use to complete it.
I think the more important takeaway from this study is that people produce better results when querying LLMs than when using traditional search engines. To me, that points to a problem with conventional search more than it demonstrates a detriment to using LLMs.
Have you tried Googling anything in recent years? It’s a bloody mess. Google increasingly prioritizes what it wants you to see, and more importantly, what advertisers have paid it to show you. Finding genuinely useful information has become an exercise in digging through sponsored results, SEO spam, and pages that exist primarily to generate ad revenue.
LLMs, for all their faults, are arguably better information aggregators at this point. That isn’t necessarily a ringing endorsement of AI, considering that they aren’t particularly good at searching either. It just illustrates how bad conventional search has become.
I wouldn’t interpret using an LLM to complete a task as inherently equivalent to students cheating. I’d argue that LLMs are simply another tool for finding, processing, and synthesizing information. If students can produce better results using those tools, perhaps we should be asking why we’re so determined to prevent them from doing so rather than examining the tools themselves.
And frankly, you can’t really cheat on homework. It’s homework, not a supervised examination. Students should be able to complete assignments using whatever resources are available to them. If the objective is to determine what students can accomplish independently, then schools should assess that through supervised examinations rather than take-home assignments.
More importantly, there’s a broader question about whether we’re assigning too much homework in the first place. Research has repeatedly found that its educational benefits depend on factors such as age, workload, and assignment quality. If an assignment provides little educational value beyond producing a completed worksheet, then perhaps the problem isn’t that students are using AI to complete it. Perhaps the assignment itself isn’t worth doing.
Weak.
Have LLMs become better than Google?
Or has Google just gotten shittier than LLMs?
My SearXNG instance never lies to me, and returns results better than Google used to before they fully enshitified
Seems like a biased study yea. Why not get someone to do something manually first without AI, then give them AI to see if they do it better or worse?
Agreed, I tend to get more interested in topics and learn more than I expected, for new neural networks. I think it’s like any tool and using it right can be useful. Our brains can make new connections learning about different topics and how they are related, systems thinking and problem solving. We can search online and read the sources directly too, and verify more with increasing importance of the topic. For example, going to defend yourself in court, do a lot of research from quality sources and still reconsider lol. Just like large claims require large evidence, same idea for other resources including llms, and no need to avoid it like it’s some new Witch panic. The energy people use daily mindlessly absorbing video streams is more than text based llm use and follow up confirmations.
This is a really smart take on things.
Yah this should be pinned
Yah. Turtally.