J. Budziszewski reflects on the future of thinking in the classroom and beyond.
Some people think AI will revolutionize education. But will it do so by eroding the very habits on which learning depends? I recently had the pleasure of conducting an interview about AI with J. Budziszewski, who has spent more than forty years teaching students how to think, read, and reason. Budziszewski has watched generations of youth move from typewriters to laptops to smartphones—and now into the era of artificial intelligence.
In this first half of our conversation, Budziszewski reflects on what technology, and specifically AI, is doing to reading, writing, attention, grading, and the very habit of sustained thought. He explains why he no longer assigns take-home essays and what he does instead to assess his students’ reflections on readings. And while he acknowledges the benefits AI can bring to specific narrow tasks, such as finding patterns in X-rays, he suggests that exercising caution and limiting AI use will help us protect our ability to think clearly. As Budziszewski puts it in our conversation: “For all but the most mechanical tasks, a human mind is a vastly better instrument.”
Enjoy the first half of the exchange and don’t miss the conclusion in my next post!
