Ben Williamson

I did this before in German but I guess today is a good day to compile English resources on why AI isn‘t actually intelligent and also a real danger: 🧵

The New Eugenics Companies Oops, I meant to say generational health and embryo selection

New blog post: The New Eugenics Companies
(Oops, I meant to say generational health and embryo selection)

good morning happy back to school to all who celebrate, happy one week of summer left to all the syllabus scramblers, happy grr to the quarter system people, here's some help for all of us in the college classroom

against-a-i.com

Generative AI is not a ‘calculator for words’. 5 reasons why this idea is misleading Big tech wants generative AI systems to seem like neutral, reliable tools – but the reality is far more complicated.

Fantastic article debunking the common argument that "it's just a tool, like a calculator".

Calculators do not undermine autonomy - "Over time, reliance on these systems risks placing the power to make everyday decisions in the hands of opaque corporate systems"
theconversation.com/generative-a...

Here’s my bottom line on the firehose of AI higher ed discourse: for the vast majority for us it’s over. “It” here is not “college” or “teaching”’per se; rather, “it” is the transactional underpinning of those endeavors. Let me explain: 🧵

AI Grader | Free Grade Predictor For Students Get a grade estimate and targeted feedback before you submit. Grammarly’s AI Grader helps you revise with confidence.

It looks at people’s Rate My Professor. 💀

"Scientists and technologists, as well as investors and CEOs, are often loath to admit that what they do is political. But ... the forces that guide you and the decisions you can make are shaped by politics and have political effects."

Given the gravity of the conclusions of this risk assessment of AI teaching assistants - they're 3 of the top concerns many have voiced about AI in schools - the recommendations yet again responsibilize teachers for the tech industry's lack of responsibility in education 🤑

AI Teacher Assistants AI Teacher Assistants - Learn more and get Common Sense Media's research-backed tips.

AI used in schools can act as "invisible influencers" in students' learning, introducing them to biases and inaccuracies, undermine research-based curricula, and outsource teachers' thinking, says new risk assessment of AI teaching assistants www.commonsensemedia.org/ai-ratings/a...

Enumerating AI effects in education Photo by Igor Omilaev on Unsplash Over recent weeks, controversy has surfaced over research publications claiming to show statistical evidence that generative AI has beneficial effects on learning.…

The general state of research on AI effects in education really casts serious doubt on most claims of its potential - as thatbpaper and others show - though the effort to wow educators and policymakers through statistics remains strong codeactsineducation.wordpress.com/2025/05/28/e...

ChatGPT in Education: An Effect in Search of a Cause Background As researchers rush to investigate the potential of AI tools like ChatGPT to enhance learning, well-documented pitfalls threaten the validity of this emerging research. Issues of media co...

"Claims of ChatGPT's effectiveness for learning are currently unfounded."

Say even researchers who themselves conceive, build and evaluate AIED systems for learning... onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Routine AI assistance hits skills of health experts performing colonoscopies Study comes amid rapid adoption of the fast-developing technology

Hard to know how much weight to put on this single observational study but it is suggestive of keeping a close eye on the impact of using AI assistants on human ability
on.ft.com/3Jdskyj

Sam Altman is planning to rival Elon Musk's Neuralink OpenAI is planning to invest in a brain implant startup called Merge Labs, which aims to merge humans and machines through artificial intelligence.

“The new company, called Merge Labs, aims to merge humans and machines together through artificial intelligence and is raising funds at a $850 million valuation…”

AI Education: South Korea slows down on AI education South Korea’s government wanted to modernize its education system with AI textbooks. But the project failed due to lack of preparation and skepticism from parents – A sobering example for others to co...

Looks like a LOT to learn from Korea's failing AI in education experiment - about the power of parent and teacher pushback, strength in teacher unions, dangers of overaccelerated tech solutionism, ideological preferences - for any who viewed it as an emulable model www.freiheit.org/north-and-so...

The new UK government wants to learn from other nations’ approaches to Artificial Intelligence, as well as share our thinking. Optimising AI in education will support our mission to spread opportunity to every child in our country. AI has lots of applications. There’s so much excitement about how it’s already transforming many aspects of our lives. But I think the best reason to be excited is the reason we’re here today. AI is not just about streamlining transactions or optimising chatbots. AI has the power to enhance education - the best thing a society can give its children. If we can enable it, AI will add value to young people’s futures.

Notably it was during a visit to South Korea last August that one of England's education ministers claimed they wanted to learn from Korea's innovations in AI for education. Hope they're following this latest development as closely www.gov.uk/government/s...

Instead of regurgitating the bromide that LLMs are just "autocomplete on steroids" (even by people who know better), maybe we can actually engage in some public education. The problem with genAI is better expressed through a classic computer science concept, known as SYMBOL GROUNDING. 🧵

Or, even better than bluesky follows, they could look up some actual research on AI in education and get on the phone to its authors! bsky.app/profile/benp...

South Korea pulls plug on AI textbooks South Korea’s National Assembly passed a bill on Monday stripping artificial intelligence-powered digital textbooks of their legal status as official teaching

Big AI in education news from South Korea.

After huge government financial support, masses of media, substantial backing from education publishers, and a lot of international interest, it's now abandoning its flagship AI textbooks program for schools
m.koreaherald.com/article/1054...

Education and the New Cult of Efficiency Raymond Callahan's 1962 book Education and the Cult of Efficiency remains a classic study of public education in the US, chronicling how in the early twentieth century schools' goals became business g...

Our society has prioritized productivity and efficiency over learning for a century now, so when Altman et al say AI is a "PhD in your pocket," they don't mean "smarter" as much as "cheaper" and "faster" 2ndbreakfast.audreywatters.com/education-an...

"Most of the promotion of A.I. in schools boils down to: Well, it’s happening, and so students need to know.

But there’s nothing attaching it to learning outcomes. There’s nothing assessing its risk to privacy, to data, to the mental and emotional and cognitive development of students."

This is maybe the worst part about being an educator in the AI era.

AI companies are *stealing your time* by making you work around it/find it/adjudicate it. Time that, 4 years ago, you would have used to improve your materials, or stay up-to-date on some area of research.

“For many students in Colombia, Meta’s AI upgrades have become the go-to bots. Meta has a controversial agreement with telecommunications companies that restricts some users on cheaper data plans to using specific apps and sites including those from Meta.”

AI tools used by English councils downplay women’s health issues, study finds Exclusive: LSE research finds risk of gender bias in care decisions made based on AI summaries of case notes

'Artificial intelligence tools used by more than half of England’s councils are downplaying women’s physical and mental health issues and risk creating gender bias in care decisions, research [led by Sam Rickman, LSE] has found.' 1/2

Absolutely not. Because of the organization of the enterprise of AI in education around the aims of finance capitalism, "teaching AI" will result in the erosion of the educational enterprise and its further organization around capitalist, neo-liberal ideologies.

Here we go again. The implication here is that the way AI generates its output is with human-like cognition. Which is untrue. "Cognitive capabilities humans have" is not the same is "outputs comparable to those of humans."
www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

The AI powered Library Search That Refused to Search From Clarivate's Summon to Primo Research Assistant, content‑moderation layers meant mostly for chatbots are "quietly" blocking controversial topics from being searched

[Blogged] The AI powered Library Search That Refused to Search - From Clarivate's Summon to Primo Research Assistant, content‑moderation layers meant mostly for chatbots are "quietly" blocking controversial topics from being searched
aarontay.substack.com/p/the-ai-pow... - milking this again

Another semester approaches and faculty face a super charged version of ChatGPT. I want to talk about value and meaning with my students, not necessarily AI. Here are some ideas to do just that. I also have a session submitted to SXSW Edu about AI aware teaching that I’d love for you to vote for. 👇

Very real question I have for folks bringing AI into their classrooms proactively (from a place of 100% curiosity!):

How are you navigating students who have explicitly named their discomfort or unwillingness ethically with the technology?

Goodbye, $165,000 Tech Jobs. Student Coders Seek Work at Chipotle.

Silicon Valley leaders for years promised high-paying jobs to kids who could code.
Now, with industry layoffs and increase use of A.I. coding tools, recent computing grads are struggling to land tech jobs.
www.nytimes.com/2025/08/10/t...

Question: who is marking your GCSE? Answer: an AI examiner Traditional exams may soon become a thing of the past as bots help assess pupils’ achievement in education revolution

'Exam boards are already trialling AI examiners, using machines to “double mark” papers alongside a human assessor. Some tests, including IGCSEs, are delivered digitally.' 1/3