An AI’s rendition of Camazotz. In Madeleine L’Engle’s “A Wrinkle in Time,” Camazotz is described as a dark, seemingly ordinary planet on the surface, but it is completely controlled by an evil entity called “IT,” which essentially makes the planet appear uniform and oppressive, with its inhabitants acting in a robotic, synchronized manner, lacking any individuality or free will

On LinkedIn, in response to my response to Paul Matthews, someone kicked off a conversation that’s made me do some thinking

My initial response had included:

I’m more concerned about private/charter schools and rich folks who can afford top AI solutions, using those to continue to get ahead. Poor folks will try to use AI to level the playing field, even as local data centers destroy the environment where they are forced to live. We can play disaster, ain’t it awful all day, right?

Let’s focus on the power of the human spirit to overcome that lizard brain to accumulate power, wealth, resources. Tennis? I thought the game 2030: Space Colony. Those poor aliens. They won’t see the space marines and colonizers, er, colonists in search of a new life, coming.

Then, in response to Paul’s follow-up reply, I wrote:

If you’re referring to the Arizona/Austin, Tx schools, I definitely see your point. Consider if 90% of instruction is at the phase of learning that is focused on new ideas/skills/concepts, and productive struggle is critical to learners at this phase, AI interrupts disastrously. I would think that AI is MOST helpful at Transfer Learning, where people who have moved beyond Surface/Deep Learning, where they can use it as a thought partner and rapid prototyping, meta-tool.

So, with that in mind, we agree wholeheartedly that siphoning money from public schools to unproven charter schools only benefits the legislators and money-grubbing grifters. It leaves the American population in public schools trying to learn something to make a living, think critically to navigate life well, low and poor with dirty, leaded water, unnecessary burdens to dreams and aspirations.

Some folks, like Anashay Wright, focused in on certain aspects of what was said:

“Poor folks will try to use AI to level the playing field…” THIS is the comment we’re not discussing enough. We use hashtag #AIAsAnAlly in underserved Black communities for this very reason… I talk about it often.

She then shared a video so I could listen, which I resolve to do in the next few days.

Here’s a transcript of what she said in the video:

But now you’re telling me, right, we have the power to say game on in our community. You want a one pager and a dock and a deck? I’m gonna give you three. We have the ability to speak our genius into a book in three minutes and sell it and generate another revenue stream. When I saw chat GPT, I had been secretly using this. When I got ready to write a grant, I spoke it into my text. Okay, and I was for the first time. I didn’t have a problem. Oh, you can’t communicate in a linear. I’m not typically.

For the first time, we can capture the brilliance and genius of communities and people that we could never hear from. You want to worship the written word?

Bring it on.

Fascist Government Use of AI

To me, putting AI in the hands of a fascist government raises serious concerns.

Domesticating Education

I find the fact that this quote that I highlighted in this blog entry in April, 2014 (and long before that) is still relevant today to be problematic:

“Those who cannot claim computers as their own tool for exploring the world never grasp the power of technology… They are controlled by technology as adults–just [they were]…controlled [by] them as students.

Source: Toward Digital Equity: Bridging the Divide in Education; Editors: Gwen Solomon, Nancy J. Allen, and Paul Resta

Consider the wisdom found in Patrick J. Finn’s book, _Literacy with an Attitude_.

The author makes a few points that there are different kinds of literacy. Yet, literacy is not seen as dangerous in the U.S. because we have two kinds.

First, there is empowering education, which leads to powerful literacy, the kind of literacy that leads to positions of power and authority. Second, there is domesticating education, which leads to functional literacy, literacy that makes a person productive and dependable, not troublesome.

When you plop a kid in front of a computer and you don’t ask them to make something, and you want the computer to drill them, you are advocating for a domesticating education.

Powerful literacy involves creativity and reason—the ability to be skeptical, critical about what is read, viewed, or heard…it is also the ability to write one’s ideas so that another person can understand them.

When you suggest using AI in schools, I am concerned that the focus is more on MAKING MONEY for the ed tech companies. I am concerned that for governments that seek to control their populations, stripping away their citizenship rights, and demolishing programs and benefits, concentrating their financial efforts at improving charter schools at the expense of public schools (Go Public! as is being done in Texas and other places), the goal isn’t AI-empowered learning.

Rather the aim is drill-n-practice, AI-augmented indoctrination of dominant values (e.g. twisted Bible-based values) that promotes a “domesticating education” a la Patrick Finn’s book, “Literacy with an Attitude.”

The intent remains the same, made evident by actions taken, but the tools change.