Thoughts on learning - alanza.xyz
I’ll go ahead and begin by claiming that generative AI has plateaued, if not already peaked. I might come back to justify that claim later on, but the purpose of this post is to share some musings on generative AI as a tool for accessing expertise.
If you trace the arc of the other recent flash-in-the-pan technologies, their plateau or peak seemed to coincide with them reaching deep into the public ken. Like, by the time the conversation about NFTs was really starting to reach a fever pitch, that was when it was truly sunk. I’m observing the grift of AI, not to be too mean about it, reaching the academy. It’s possible to use AI in some contexts as just a buzzword to provide cover in your title or abstract for your actual talk topic, in the way that “topological data analysis” worked for a while within mathematics. Something interesting with AI in this regard, though, is that its buzzword power is pretty interdisciplinary. Will it replace mathematicians? Artists? How does it impact my research in the social sciences? I’m amused.
I’ll concede that generative AI does appear to provide something that NFTs never did, namely a practical use-case for a nonzero number of ordinary people. Indeed, it’s been interesting to compare the themes in conversations I’ve heard between users of generative AI who are in a “have not” relationship to subject-matter expertise with those who have the expertise.
