Technically, an AI is an artificial intelligence, but that’s not what ChatGPT and other tools really are. Current “AI” are massive pattern recognition and pattern recreation software tools.
The software reviews massive datasets - words, pictures, etc. - and takes notes about the patterns it finds there. For images, some of those patterns might be: “Things that get tagged with ‘dog’ are fluffy and adorable, and occasionally snarling.” For text, those patterns might be, “Were you raised in a” is often followed by “barn”. The computer makes millions or billions of these pattern notes, and stores them in what is known as a model.
To use the software, the human user inputs text, and then the machine creates an answer based on the notes in the model. For images, these answers start with random static that is then adapted iteratively until it matches the patterns in the notes baked into the model. That’s how tools like MidJourney create beautiful, unique images - start with something random, then refine it until it matches the d desired patterns. Text works a little differently, but still starts with randomness and moves towards something more plausible.
📌 Click here to read on.
I tools can help students research more effectively and efficiently, find new potential lines of thought in their work, and focus their research efforts on the most fruitful sources of information.
The educational opportunity in AI is to help students realize these benefits without outsourcing their thinking and learning to a machine. PowerNotes’ platform can help students and educators achieve these goals by improving the student learning process with AI as an learning aide, not a learning replacement.
Open Prompting
An early study funded by the National Science Foundation, MIT, and George Mason University found that knowledge workers who effectively use AI tools like ChatGPT accomplish their tasks 40% faster, with 18% higher quality on average. The workers in the study were generally using ChatGPT to perform open prompting - using a chat input, workers prompt the AI with questions or requests, and the AI responds based on the patterns it has observed previously in its large data set. For some queries this can be extraordinarily useful.
📌 Click here to read on.
In the first article in this series, we discussed what AI is and how it works generally. In part two, we discussed how PowerNotes helps teachers and students realize the opportunity that AI provides to enhance teaching and learning. In this article, we’ll cover how PowerNotes mitigates the dangers of AI. Those dangers include, at least, the risk of students outsourcing their learning and first order analysis to a machine, the AI producing hallucinations instead of useful output, and threats to students’ data privacy. PowerNotes addresses all three dangers so that educators can bring AI into their classrooms in a controlled and effective manner that supports good pedagogy and student growth.
📌 Click here to read on.