Yes! I recently ran across this book chapter on critique that was great and helped to pull apart and define the tension with criticism. direct.mit.edu/books/book/4... Wrote about some of my takeaway here. joshbrake.substack.com/p/we-need-cr...

The Role of Critique

direct.mit.edu

Generative AI offers a set of potential benefits for learning. But like any technology, those benefits are inextricably tied to a set of drawbacks. What might Frog and Toad’s battle with cookies teach us about engaging generative AI in the classroom? blog.joshbrake.com/joshbrake/th...

The Cookie Box Principle

Generative AI and the temptation to overestimate our willpower

blog.joshbrake.com

The latest from @timothyburke.bsky.social is worth a read for all educators thinking critically about genAI and what it means for higher education.

Academia: The Questions Are Big! It's the Curricula That Got Small.

Thursday's Child Has Far to Go, But He At Least Read T.J. Kalaitzidis

open.substack.com

It’s one thing to experiment. It’s quite another to tinker. We shouldn’t be tinkering with AI in the classroom this fall. Either do the work to articulate the question you’re trying to answer and the specific ways you hope the AI tools will fix it, or don’t use it at all.

Don't Tinker With AI in the Classroom

It's fine to play around by yourself, but if you choose to engage genAI with your students, make sure to think it all the way through

open.substack.com

Yes, personalized lesson plans and resources are helpful for enhancing learning. But what’s much more impactful is the personal attention of a teacher. Attention that focuses not just on academic and intellectual development, but on the whole of what it means to be a flourishing human being.

“Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery mediocrity can pay to genius.” - Oscar Wilde Says almost all you need to know about the AI x Studio Ghibli discourse of late. First Johansson, now Ghibli, what next?

One of the best features of the Internet is the hyperlink. It makes the act of citing one’s sources seamless and helps point the reader to the origin of one’s thoughts. It is a technology that is aligned with a culture of attribution.

"What does it mean to be human? Do humans possess intrinsic moral worth irrespective of any economic value? What does it mean for us to be embodied creatures? How ought we treat our fellow humans? What does it mean to flourish?" - @joshbrake.com open.substack.com/pub/joshbrak...

Mens Sine Manus

Why AGI can't deliver on its promises

open.substack.com

My biggest hope for AI in education is that it increases friction. Yes, we need to eliminate parasitic friction but friction is a fundamental component of learning. Our discussion (like so many around AI) is suffering from poorly chosen words.

Trying to nail down an exact definition of AGI is a fools errand. The more important conversation needs to be focused on when, how, and why we decide to seed our agency to these systems.

In much of our conversation around AI's impact on education we're mixing up education and schooling. This week I turn again to Jacques Ellul and ask what his conception of "technique" might offer us as a lens through which to understand AI and its influence on us.

Technique's Deception

Pursue education, not schooling

joshbrake.substack.com

"There is no salvation to be found in efficiency." Oh boy, I needed to read this sentence waking up this morning. Stop what you're doing and go read @joshbrake.com: joshbrake.substack.com/p/techniques...

Looking at the lessons learned from pilots and autopilots has something to teach us about how we should think about the downstream consequences of AI for us and our students.

We're Forgetting How To Fly

What autopilot systems can teach us about the dangers of relying on AI

joshbrake.substack.com

Great piece here from @erikhoel.blogsky.venki.dev summarizing the main takeaways from the recent Microsoft paper discussing the impact of generative AI on critical thinking. Those of us helping young people to find their way toward building expertise should take particular notice.

brAIn drAIn

The enhancement and atrophy of human cognition go hand in hand

theintrinsicperspective.com

HMC's Department of Engineering provides Mudders with hands-on experience in engineering analysis, synthesis and practice including applied research as early as students’ first year. Learn more via this short YouTube video. uqr.to/edathmc.

Ursula Franklin is not a household name, but I'm on a quest to make her one. She continually comes to mind as I'm thinking about the questions we should ask about AI and its coming and present impact on us. I'm grateful for her work and her courage to ask unpopular questions.

Ursula Speaks

We ought to listen

joshbrake.substack.com

Efficient learning is analogous to efficient weight training. There are better and worse ways to train, but at the end of the day, you’ve got to lift the heavy things. I’m all for using AI to help us learn better, but let’s make sure we’re not just shilling the cognitive version of the ab belt.

Empathy is a core aspect of effective teaching. When you experience pain and suffering, it’s an opportunity to bring it with you into the classroom and model honesty and vulnerability with your students. It’s one of the many aspects of the human teacher that AI can never replace.

Beauty for Ashes

Why teaching with honesty and vulnerability matters

open.substack.com

I finally figured out what those “baby in car” bumper stickers are all about. It’s just a euphemism for “sleep deprived parent at the wheel.”

We live in Altadena. Perhaps you've seen our town on the news. It's not been a good week. Despite it all I’m resting in God’s goodness for me, my family, and my neighbors. I know that he has a plan for us despite the pain and suffering and that he’s big enough to hold our anger too.

Greetings from Altadena

Clinging to God's providence in the aftermath of the Eaton Fire with open-eyed gratitude

joshbrake.substack.com

As we enter the new year, we'd all benefit from developing a personal hedgehog concept. Find the small set of things that at the intersection of your passion, talent, and value creation engine and direct your energy there.

Get In Touch with Your Inner Hedgehog

To build a career that counts, focus on the intersection of your passion, talent, and what creates long term value

joshbrake.substack.com

I ended up writing about that little painted cat I found and the contrast it created for me to AI-generated content. theconvivialsociety.substack.com/p/the-cat-in...

The Cat in the Tree: Why AI Content Leaves Us Cold

The Convivial Society: Vol. 6, No. 1

theconvivialsociety.substack.com

What technology can do is only a small part of the story. The much bigger question is how as a society and as individuals we respond.

What if—just hear me out—we spent our time and energy helping humans embrace their agency instead of trying to paste a dim replica onto AI? Agentic AI is just another quest to create a shallow simulation of a deep human trait.

I should really write a blog post about how all the economic incentives around AI are pointed at less compute, not more, in the long run. That’s exactly what we saw with inference costs the past two years and we’ll likely (finally) see it with training as well.

Kelsey Hightower@kelseyhightower.com · 2y ago

DeepSeek, a LLM trained for a fraction of the cost of GPT-Xx models, in 2 months for 6 million, on limited GPUs due to export restrictions, and competing head to head. This is crazy. It's not the AI part I'm excited about, it's the level of efficiency. github.com/deepseek-ai/...

To understand AI and its potential in education (both positive and negative) we’ve got to be clear-eyed that our patterns of behavior and the values that are upstream of them are being intentionally manipulated. We’re living in a Skinner box. Let’s pay attention to that fact.

We're The Lab Rats Now

The only sustainable way approach to AI and education is to recognize that our technological world is an operant conditioning chamber

open.substack.com

A simple, eye-opening question I'm asking a lot these days: to what problem is <insert AI tool here> the solution?

More thoughtful analysis on the latest AI x Education hullabaloo from @himself.bsky.social. The challenge these days is increasingly one of finding the signal in the noise. The disputes that are happening are worth having, but arguments on both the pro and con side tend to be overwrought.

AI Fight Club and what it hides

Ritualized combat and syllabi that speak

programmablemutter.com

If you’re not scared about agentic AI yet, I suggest you to watch a toddler throwing their weight around via Alexa. Truly eye opening.

It’s a Heatherwick kind of day.