Cal Thomas: AI: A substitute for real intelligence

I have a theory about the artificial intelligence craze that is delighting some and scaring others. It is that we are losing natural intelligence and thus risk seduction by something that can do the thinking for us. Never mind acquiring wisdom, which is defined as “the ability to use your knowledge, experience, and deep understanding to make sound decisions, good judgments, and insightful choices.”

Why bother with any of this when you can have AI take the place of your brain? Except that AI only responds to what you ask it to do – such as write an essay on a topic. It makes no moral judgments, much less conveys anything that might be considered wise.

Years ago, I read the final editorial in the now defunct New Times magazine. It accurately described modern America’s approach to just about everything: “There are almost no famous people anymore; only celebrities.” Fame as a concept, it argued, “is too suggestive of steady achievement.” One has to work and sometimes work hard to achieve. If AI can do it for you, why read books or newspapers? Why even bother to think?

The future doesn’t offer much hope if we consider the lack of educational achievement. According to the Center for Education Policy Research, U.S. education is experiencing a generation-long “learning recession with declining math and reading performance that began years before the pandemic.” It’s unlikely AI will reverse that trend.

In a new op-ed for MS NOW, Julie Margetta Morgan, president of The Century Foundation, makes the case for putting families and educators, not Silicon Valley, in the driver’s seat should AI be used in public schools: “We are not against innovation. We are against running an uncontrolled experiment on children without parental consent, independent evidence, or meaningful guardrails.”

Leaving aside what public schools are already doing without parental consent, she is right. But public schools have other problems. In New York City alone public schools have lost more than 150,000 students since 2015, dropping from more than a million students a decade ago to roughly 885,000, according to reports by the New York Post. “A significant number of parents have shifted their children away from traditional public schools toward charter schools, private/religious institutions, or homeschooling.”

That trend appears to be occurring throughout the country. According to The Reason Foundation, “Public school enrollment across the United States is declining nationally, with a projected loss of 2.7 million students (about 6%) between 2022 and 2031.”

China’s top state security officials have warned that advanced artificial intelligence poses a direct threat to the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s grip on power, reports The New York Times. In a high-profile essay, State Security Minister Chen Yixin warned that hostile foreign forces could weaponize AI to wage “propaganda and cognitive wars” against China.

While that might be considered a good thing, it can cut both ways. Members of the Trump and Biden administrations have accused China of waging a propaganda war against the U.S. and worldwide. AI might help the communist party’s efforts.

Again, it is unlikely AI will reverse the exodus from U.S. public schools and might even accelerate it. If young people learn they don’t have to do the hard work of acquiring knowledge, wisdom and thinking for themselves, AI will do it for them. That would be something Americans should truly fear.

Readers may email Cal Thomas at tcaeditors@tribpub.com. Look for Cal Thomas’ latest book “A Watchman in the Night: What I’ve Seen Over 50 Years Reporting on America” (HumanixBooks).