The "Godmother of AI" says the biggest AI risk in schools isn't cheating – it's students losing the desire to learn

[midian182]

Winners & losers: The problem of students using AI to cheat in schools is well documented, but Fei-Fei Li, aka The Godmother of AI, thinks there's a bigger risk. The Stanford computer science professor believes access to the technology will take away students' motivation and agency to learn. Nevertheless, Li doesn't believe a blanket ban is a good idea.

Speaking on an episode of the science podcast Huberman Lab this week, Li talked about the fears around how students are using AI.

"The absolute bad outcome is that our young generation, their agency and human-level motivation of learning and living is taken away by tools," the ImageNet inventor warned. "It should not be taken away by humans nor should it be taken away by machines."

If we see a generation of graduates who have completely relied on AI without actively trying to learn anything for themselves, they risk leaving education without having "properly developed the brain," Li said.

When it comes to AI use in schools, most of the focus has been on cheating. It's been an issue since ChatGPT went mainstream, and it reached endemic proportions back in August 2024 – though one professor recently found a clever way to identify students who were using it.

There's been less conversation about how AI can cause many students to lose both the motivation and ability to learn. Many kids wonder why they should bother learning something when AI can provide the answer instantly.

Researchers have found that AI is making students faster but they're losing their depth of thinking, which makes sense. Vivienne Ming, chief scientist at the Possibility Institute, told Business Insider earlier this year that most of the AI users she studied were using the technology to avoid thinking for themselves.

Li certainly isn't advocating for a complete ban on students using AI. She believes it can genuinely help struggling students who are already engaged in their learning. Li herself noted how she struggled with organic chemistry as a premed student, when teaching assistants and professors didn't have enough time to answer every question.

While there's no obvious solution, Li says we need to find a way to keep children and students' motivation and agency. "Let's find a way to give them the access and the right way of using these tools," she said. Li added that if AI is used properly in education, it could make the students of the future "way smarter than us because they are superpowered."

There have been several attempts to find this balance. OpenAI introduced a study mode designed to encourage critical thinking rather than simply handing over answers, while some computer science professors have shifted their focus from coding syntax to higher-level problem-solving. The UK government has also backed the use of ChatGPT for homework, arguing that it could be especially useful for children who struggle in traditional learning environments.

Permalink to story:

The "Godmother of AI" says the biggest AI risk in schools isn't cheating – it's students losing the desire to learn

 

[Theinsanegamer]

The schools already do a fantastic job of that by making education so incredibly boring, tedious, and outright hostile.

Here's the thing: what's going to happen in the real world? Well, people are going to let AI think for them. Doesn't matter what the school preaches. So in restricting AI use, all they are doing is ensuring their students are less familiar with the technology, and this less prepared, for the modern world.

Just like when they tried to ban the use of calculators in the 90s and 2000s, my teachers claimed "well you'll never have a calculator all the time when you're working" which was already stupid because pocket calculators had been commonplace for decades already. Then the iPhone came out.

 

[bviktor]

The schools already do a fantastic job of that by making education so incredibly boring, tedious, and outright hostile.

Oh yes, because schools have only been boring for the past 5 years, it was pure joy before that.

 

[Loadedaxe]

This is one of the more legitimate concerns about AI in education, because the problem isn’t really cheating. Cheating existed long before ChatGPT learned how to write a five paragraph essay.

The real question is whether AI becomes a tutor or a replacement brain.

If a student types, “Write my 700 word paper on the Roman Empire,” copies it, and goes back to TikTok, congratulations...we have successfully automated not learning.

But if that same student says, “I think military overstretch and economics were major causes of Rome’s decline. Challenge my argument,” now AI is doing something useful. It’s forcing the student to defend an idea, consider alternatives, and actually think.

We already accept this principle elsewhere. As the TheInsaneGamer pointed out, Calculators didn’t destroy mathematics because we still expect students to understand what the numbers mean before pressing buttons.

AI should probably be treated the same way.

Teach the fundamentals. Make students explain their reasoning. Use oral discussions, drafts, source comparisons, and classroom work. Then let AI help them explore ideas, get unstuck, or argue with a tutor that apparently has unlimited patience.

The irony is that AI may finally expose how weak some traditional homework assignments were to begin with. If your entire assessment can be completed by typing one sentence into a chatbot, perhaps the chatbot isn’t the only thing that needs examining.

So yes, there is a genuine risk here.

But it isn’t “AI will make everyone stupid.”

It’s students being allowed to outsource the uncomfortable part of learning...thinking.

Used properly, AI could make a curious student substantially better.

Used poorly, it becomes the world's most expensive homework vending machine.

And now I await the inevitable explanation that calculators, Wikipedia, spellcheck, Google, and probably electricity also destroyed civilization.

 

[Loadedaxe]

Oh yes, because schools have only been boring for the past 5 years, it was pure joy before that.

The point wasn’t that schools suddenly became boring five years ago.

The point was that schools already struggle to keep students engaged, and simply banning the technology they’ll be expected to use in the real world probably isn’t going to improve that.

We did this dance with calculators, the internet, Wikipedia, smartphones, and Google. Every time, the technology eventually became normal and education had to adapt around it.

Teaching students how to use AI critically, verify what it tells them, and know when not to rely on it seems a lot more useful than pretending it can be kept outside the classroom walls.

But yes, thank you for confirming that school was also boring in 1987.

 

[GeoffreyA]

The schools already do a fantastic job of that by making education so incredibly boring, tedious, and outright hostile.

Here's the thing: what's going to happen in the real world? Well, people are going to let AI think for them. Doesn't matter what the school preaches. So in restricting AI use, all they are doing is ensuring their students are less familiar with the technology, and this less prepared, for the modern world.

Just like when they tried to ban the use of calculators in the 90s and 2000s, my teachers claimed "well you'll never have a calculator all the time when you're working" which was already stupid because pocket calculators had been commonplace for decades already. Then the iPhone came out.

While I agree that modern syllabuses don't teach very well, the professor is probably right that students, relying on AI, might not develop the critical-thinking muscle in the brain. Better for it to be hard, like Goku training in 100x Earth's normal gravity, then, once they've mastered it the hard way, use AI in the real world.

 

[GeoffreyA]

Calculators didn’t destroy mathematics because we still expect students to understand what the numbers mean before pressing buttons.

The thing with calculators is that they don't rob the ordinary person of understanding maths but automate tedious calculations. Machine learning, as you point out, automates the thinking process (in a simulacrum sense). Therefore, I would argue, it is not on the same footing as a calculator.

 

[Anton Longshot]

Once upon a time me and friends discussed what would end the existence of the human race, and we agreed it would be stupidity.

I'm not so sure stupidity will eventually kill us anymore. It might be boredom.

 

[TechSam]

When I went through School and College education through 1998->2010 in the UK, I wasn't taught how to learn independently, be proactive and how to enjoy learning. I wasn't at all prepared for what happens after school. I didn't like school, I don't learn from lectures or whiteboards. I learnt way later in life I excel at hands on learning. I also made a lot of the wrong decisions by trying to learn stuff I wasn't good at.

I envy those students who, like John Carmack and Romero, discovered the "computer club". I wish I had a teacher to influence me to try those out. Instead I saw clubs as a waste of time and just wanted to go home and play on X game console at the time.