BRIBES FOR BIAS: CAN AI BE CORRUPTED?

The potential abuse of artificial intelligence for private gain has profound implications for our economic, political and social lives

BY Nils Köbis
Senior Research Scientist at the Center for Humans and Machines, Max Planck Institute for Human Development

 

Recently your social media feed may have been flooded with headlines on the advances in Artificial Intelligence (AI) or even AI-generated images. Text-to-image algorithms such as Dall-E2and Stable Diffusion are becoming hugely popular. ChatGPT, a chatbot developed by OpenAI, is now the world’s best-performing large language model, reaching 1 million users in its first week– a rate of growth much faster than Twitter, Facebook or TikTok. 

As AI demonstrates its ability to craft poetry, write code and even pollinate crops by imitating bees, the governance community is waking up to the impact of artificial intelligence on the knotty problem of corruption. Policy institutes and academics have pointed to the potential use of AI to detect fraud and corruption, with some commentators heralding these technologies as the "next frontier in anti-corruption." 

Amid all the excitement, it can be easy to lose sight of the fact that AI can also produce undesirable outcomes due to biased input data, faulty algorithms or irresponsible implementation. To date, most of the negative repercussions from AI that have been documented are unintentional side-effects. However, new technologies present new opportunities to wilfully abuse power, and the effect that AI could have as an “enabler” of corruption has received much less attention.

A recent Transparency International working paper introduces the concept of "corrupt AI" – defined as the abuse of AI systems by public power holders for private gain – and documents how these tools can be designed, manipulated or applied in a way that constitutes corruption. 

Politicians, for instance, could abuse their power by commissioning hyper-realistic deepfakes to discredit their political opponents and increase their chances of staying in office. The misuse of AI tools on social media to manipulate elections through the spread of disinformation has already been well documented. 

Yet corrupt AI does not just occur when an AI system is designed with malicious intent. It can also take place when people exploit the vulnerabilities of otherwise beneficial AI systems. This becomes of greater concern with the significant push worldwide towards digitalising public administration. Algorithm Watch, for instance, recently concluded that citizens in many countries already live in "automated societies" in which public bodies rely on lines of code to make important social, economic and even political decisions. 

Digitalising government services has long been recognised as reducing officials' discretion when making decisions and thereby constraining opportunities for corruption. Yet, as our paper demonstrates, replacing humans with AI brings novel corruption risks. These are four good reasons why the risk of "corrupt AI" should be taken seriously. 

1. DENIABILITY AND DISSONANCE

People are more likely to behave in a corrupt manner when they are less likely to get caught, such as when they can hide behind plausible deniability. The risk of individuals breaking ethical rules to reap illicit benefits is even higher in circumstances where they are not directly confronted by victims – in other words, when there is a large psychological distance to the people affected by their unethical behaviour.

According to research in behavioural science, the deployment of artificial intelligence systems could enhance both risk factors. Indeed, the complexity and autonomy of machine learning AI systems, which produce outputs that are often incomprehensible to humans based on the input data provided, could make it easier for corrupt manipulation of this technology to escape detection. At the same time, the introduction of AI tools as an intermediary in decision-making processes can increase the psychological distance between perpetrator and victim.

The healthcare sector is one example of an area where these risk factors can undermine the potential benefits of artificial intelligence. Doctors and health sector works are already being trained to use algorithms to help detect diseases and to assist in making healthcare cost estimations. Yet there is some indication that these systems can be easily fooled. By simply changing a few pixels or the orientation of an image, doctors can trick AI image recognition systems to produce faulty results, such as misidentifying a harmless mole as cancerous in order to prescribe expensive treatment. Healthcare workers can similarly reap benefits from manipulating AI systems to classify patients as high-risk and high cost. These concerns are not hypothetical – an influential publication has already warned about this.

2. SCALING UP TO AFFECT MILLIONS

The second reason to take the risk of corrupt AI seriously is its potential to increase the scale of damage caused by an act of corruption. If you bribe a person, you might influence 100 people; if you corrupt an algorithm, you can affect millions.

"Algorithmic capture" describes how AI systems can be manipulated to systematically favour a specific group. For example, tweaking the code of algorithms used in electronic procurement or fraud detection programmes can steer lucrative public contracts to cronies or conceal wrongdoing by certain well-connected entities. While bribing an individual is usually about breaking the rules of the game to get illicit special treatment, corrupting an algorithm by bribing its developer or manipulating its code changes the rules of the game entirely. If an AI system is distorted to allocate resources in a particular way – such as licenses, permits or tax breaks – a new corrupt “rule” can be embedded into the entire system.

3. FEWER PEOPLE TO BLOW THE WHISTLE

The third reason is that replacing humans with AI in public administration reduces reporting and whistleblowing potential. When decision-making authority shifts towards AI, there are fewer people involved who could report instances of corruption. Moreover, humans working in settings where algorithms do the policing and reporting might receive less training, and thereby lose the skills and knowledge needed to detect and report cases of corruption.

4. SECRET CODE AND CONCEALED CORRUPTION

The final risk factor is opacity. When AI systems are implemented without involving citizens, and code and training data are not disclosed, the threat of corrupt abuse of these systems is higher. For example, investigative efforts have documented biases in face detection algorithms, as well as AI systems used for hiring decisions.

Suppose people developing and implementing such systems want to intentionally encode biases to favour certain demographic groups on a systemic level. In that case, the secrecy of code and data makes the reliable detection of intentional abuse of algorithms challenging to detect. As most AI tools are developed by the private sector, not state entities, reluctance to disclose commercially sensitive information, such as training data and underlying code, is widespread and hinders the auditing of the algorithms.

In authoritarian regimes marked by a weak rule of law, even AI systems created to curb corruption can be abused for corrupt purposes. For instance, take the 'Zero Trust' projectimplemented by the Chinese government to identify corruption among its workforce of over 60 million public officials by letting AI algorithms cross-reference 150 databases, including public officials' bank statements, property transfers, and private purchases. While nominally intended to raise red flags that could indicate corrupt behaviour, those who control this kind of digital surveillance infrastructure can easily abuse it to advance their narrow private interests or advance their political agenda.

What can be done?

As ever broader swathes of our lives become regulated by AI, what safeguards can be put in place to ensure that we are not exposed to illicit – and often undetectable – abuses of power? Besides general suggestions like strengthening the rule of law, arguably the most promising countermeasure is facilitating checks and balances, ideally as an integral part of the development and deployment process. 

One concrete challenge here lies in enforcement. How can private and public companies be forced to submit to oversight processes that may involve outsiders? 

An important step would be to establish transparency regulations that mandate code and data to be shared responsibly. Privacy can be safeguarded by uploading data in a masked way; techniques like differential privacy help to remove identifiable information while still allowing the data to be meaningfully analysed. By increasing accessibility, such transparent digital infrastructure facilitates code audits, as it allows data scientists to inspect code and data. 

And it’s crucial that everyone has access, not just state authorities. Involving civil society, academics and other citizens in the development, deployment and improvement of AI systems is key – because oversight in public administration is vital to ensure these tools serve the public interest.

https://www.transparency.org/en/blog/bribes-for-bias-can-ai-be-corrupted

 

READ FROM TOP.

PLEASE VISIT:

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT — SINCE 2005.

         Gus Leonisky

         POLITICAL CARTOONIST SINCE 1951.

         RABID ATHEIST.

         WELCOME TO THIS INSANE WORLD….

 

Barbarism With Better Software: Pope Leo Warns of the AI Future

BY Joshua Scheer

 

Pope Leo XIV is warning that artificial intelligence, if left in the hands of profit-hungry corporations and unaccountable tech oligarchs, could unleash a “social calamity” by replacing human work. And now even the markets are beginning to price in the fear. Prediction traders on Kalshi see a 60% chance that U.S. unemployment crosses 8% before 2030, while also betting that AI may already be the leading cause of job cuts this month.

With the Pope writing “Work remains a fundamental dimension of the human experience, for not only is it a means of sustenance, but it is also a context for expression, relationships and contributing to the community,” … A society that guarantees employment to only a small fraction of the population, despite having a high level of technical development, risks exposing many to forced inactivity, a lack of responsibility and the absence of daily tasks and stimuli, resulting in human and cultural impoverishment.”

Tolkien, Gandalf and the Fight Over Humanity in the Age of AI

In one of the encyclical’s most striking moments, Pope Leo invokes the spirit of J.R.R. Tolkien while calling for humanity to “disarm” artificial intelligence and resist technological domination. Without directly naming Gandalf, Leo references a passage from one of Tolkien’s novels that reflects a central moral theme running through The Lord of the Rings: ordinary people confronting immense forces of power and corruption not by controlling the world, but by defending what is human within it.

The passage speaks to the responsibility of people to care for “the fields that we know,” preserving a livable future for those who come after us rather than seeking mastery over all things.

The reference is notable not only because it is believed to be the first major incorporation of Tolkien into a high-level Vatican doctrinal document, but because it reveals the philosophical core of Leo’s warning about AI. Like Tolkien, the Pope appears deeply concerned with the dehumanizing effects of technological power when detached from morality, community and human dignity.

Rather than treating technology as destiny, Leo frames the struggle over AI as a profoundly human and ethical question: whether society will allow machines, corporations and systems of profit to dominate human life — or whether people can still reclaim technology for the common good.

What is striking is not that the Vatican is sounding the alarm. It is that Wall Street, usually eager to celebrate every job-killing “innovation” as efficiency, appears to share the anxiety. The same financial class that cheers automation when it boosts margins is now wagering on the social wreckage it may leave behind.

Pope Leo XIV vs. the AI Oligarchy

Leo’s warning cuts directly through Silicon Valley’s favorite lie: that technology is automatically progress. Work, he argues, is not merely a paycheck. It is dignity, community, purpose and participation in society. A world where machines enrich the few while millions are pushed into “forced inactivity” is not advanced. It is barbarism with better software.

The AI revolution is being sold as liberation. But without democratic control, labor protections and a moral economy, it risks becoming the most sophisticated union-busting machine ever built — a system that turns human beings into obsolete costs while calling the wreckage innovation.

The high priests of the digital economy are beginning to admit what workers have feared for years: artificial intelligence is not simply another technological innovation. It is a mechanism for social restructuring on a scale capable of hollowing out entire societies while concentrating unprecedented power into the hands of a tiny technological elite.

Now, in an extraordinary moment that reveals just how deep the anxiety has become, Pope Leo XIV has entered the fight.

In his first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, Leo issued a direct moral indictment of the AI economy now being constructed by Silicon Valley and Wall Street. He warned that mass unemployment caused by automation could produce “social calamity,” condemning an economic order that treats human beings as disposable inputs in the pursuit of profit.

“The pursuit of greater profits cannot justify choices that systematically sacrifice jobs,” Leo wrote, arguing that the human person “is an end, not a means.”

The remarkable thing is not simply that the Pope is saying this. It is that the financial markets appear to agree.

On prediction platform Kalshi, traders now place a 60% chance that U.S. unemployment rises above 8% before 2030, with nearly even odds it surpasses 9%. Those are recession-level numbers — the kind associated historically with economic collapse, mass foreclosures and social instability. Yet this time the fear is not merely financial panic. It is technological displacement.

The same corporate class that spent the last decade promising AI would “augment” workers is now openly discussing which sectors can be eliminated first.

Customer service. Journalism. Translation. Design. Coding. Accounting. Legal research. Teaching assistance. Medical diagnostics. Administrative work. Truck driving. Retail logistics. The language has become chillingly clinical: “labor optimization,” “efficiency gains,” “redundancy reduction.” Human lives reduced to balance-sheet obstacles.

Silicon Valley presents this process as inevitable — a law of nature rather than a political choice. But Leo’s encyclical rejects that mythology outright. Technology, he argues, is not neutral when it is controlled by systems organized around extraction and domination.

The Pope’s critique goes far beyond unemployment statistics. He warns that AI is creating a new form of digital colonialism in which data itself becomes the raw material of empire. Entire populations, he writes, are being transformed into “rare earths of power” — mined not for minerals but for behavioral information, biometric profiles, consumption patterns and predictive intelligence.

A handful of corporations now possess more behavioral information about humanity than any government in history. They monitor speech, movement, emotion, consumption and political behavior at planetary scale. AI supercharges that power by transforming raw data into predictive control systems — systems capable not merely of understanding populations, but manipulating them.

And as wealth concentrates upward, the social contract below begins to collapse.

Leo warns that a society where only a small fraction of people maintain meaningful employment — despite immense technological abundance — risks “human and cultural impoverishment.” Work, he insists, is not simply economic survival. It is participation in human life itself: purpose, responsibility, relationships and community.

This is precisely what Silicon Valley’s utopian rhetoric ignores.

For decades, tech billionaires promised automation would liberate humanity from drudgery. Instead, millions find themselves trapped in algorithmic management systems, precarious gig work, surveillance workplaces and endless digital dependency. Productivity exploded while wages stagnated. Corporate profits soared while social bonds disintegrated.

AI threatens to accelerate this process to catastrophic speed.

Even some within the industry appear unnerved by what they are building. Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah, appearing beside Pope Leo at the Vatican, admitted there is “a real possibility that AI will displace human labor at very large scale.” He acknowledged that no mechanism currently exists to distribute the gains globally or prevent mass social devastation.

That admission alone should shatter the fantasy that the architects of AI possess a coherent plan for humanity’s future.

Because the truth is increasingly obvious: the market has no moral framework for handling technological power of this magnitude.

Capital rewards efficiency, not justice.
Profit, not dignity.
Extraction, not community.

If replacing millions of workers with algorithms increases shareholder returns, the system treats that outcome as success — regardless of the social consequences. Entire regions can collapse into unemployment while stock valuations soar.

This is why Leo’s intervention matters.

He is not merely criticizing technology. He is challenging the economic religion surrounding it.

The modern AI boom rests on an almost theological belief that technological progress is inherently good, that innovation justifies itself, and that those who question the social costs are irrational enemies of the future. Silicon Valley speaks of AI in messianic terms: salvation through computation, transcendence through automation, immortality through machines.

But Leo offers a radically different vision. Human beings are not inefficient machines to be optimized away. Society cannot survive if millions are stripped not only of income, but of meaning and social participation itself.

The danger is not simply that AI becomes powerful.

The danger is that it becomes powerful inside an economic system already defined by staggering inequality, democratic decay and corporate domination.

Under those conditions, automation does not liberate workers.
It liberates corporations from workers.

And unless democratic control over technology emerges soon, the future now being constructed may look less like liberation than a technologically sophisticated form of mass abandonment — a world where unprecedented wealth and productivity coexist beside social despair, permanent unemployment and the slow erosion of human dignity itself.

You can read Leo’s words here:

ENCYCLICAL LETTER
MAGNIFICA HUMANITAS
OF HIS HOLINESS
POPE LEO XIV
ON SAFEGUARDING THE HUMAN PERSON
IN THE TIME OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

 

https://scheerpost.com/2026/05/26/barbarism-with-better-software-pope-leo-warns-of-the-ai-future/

 

READ FROM TOP.

PLEASE VISIT:

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT — SINCE 2005.

         Gus Leonisky

         POLITICAL CARTOONIST SINCE 1951.

         RABID ATHEIST.

         WELCOME TO THIS INSANE WORLD….

 

IT TOOK NEARLY 20 CENTURIES FOR CHRISTIANITY TO MODIFY ITS GOD FROM A VENGEFUL ONE INTO A LOVING ONE... AND THERE ARE STILL A FEW IFFY DEMONS IN THE WORKS, INCLUDING FALSE PROPHETS LIKE TRUMP AND HEGSETH... THE MUSLIMS AND THE JEWS ARE STILL BELIEVING IN THE GOD OF VENGEANCE... AN EYE FOR AN EYE AND ALL THAT...

SO ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE COULD BECOME THE BEARER OF PEACE OR WAR, DEPENDING HOW WE, DUMB APES, MANAGE ITS SYNERGY...

 

Uni academic admits she used AI to write opinion piece in defence of AI

Harriet Alexander and Sally Rawsthorne [SMH]

 

A senior academic from Western Sydney University has admitted to using artificial intelligence to write an opinion piece for The Sydney Morning Herald that defended the use of AI in universities.

Professor Cath Ellis, a pro vice-chancellor in quality and integrity, argued in her article that aspiring students should hold faith with the higher education system despite concerns that the system is being downgraded by the reliance on AI.

She submitted it in response to an earlier piece by Macquarie University’s Kylie Moore-Gilbert that claimed universities were committing “widespread, industrial fraud” by accepting money from students and giving them degrees that they did not earn because they were outsourcing their thinking to AI.

But WSU acknowledged in response to enquiries that Ellis’ reply published on Sunday was itself generated by AI, and drew upon her previous research in the field.

“To write her opinion article, Professor Ellis uploaded 40,000 words of her own original materials into a Copilot Large Language Model (LLM),” a spokesperson for the university said.

“The model summarised her extensive base of knowledge, providing prompts. This was the basis of the early drafts, reflecting Professor Ellis’s own thinking, ideas and opinions built up over more than a decade of dedicated work as a global leader in this field.”

She shared her piece with the WSU media team, which also used AI tools to suggest improvements, and the piece went through several revisions before it was submitted, the spokesperson said.

“No other expert could have pulled together this knowledge base, nor added the understanding, skills and attitudes in this space which is cutting edge,” the university said.

“The use of a LLM to draw on her own expertise, experience and intellectual rigour demonstrates a sophisticated and appropriate use of GenAI. It reflects WSU’s institutional position of human-centred AI.”

Students needed to be equipped for a world that included AI and the opinion piece submitted by Ellis demonstrated that “edge thinking and innovative approach”, the spokesperson said.

Nine, the publisher of this masthead, has strict editorial guidelines about the use of AI.

“Our employees are encouraged to be curious about AI. Accordingly, journalists and editorial employees are allowed to use AI tools where there is a genuine benefit in doing so,” the guidelines say.

“AI will not be used to write stories for publication. AI can be used for graphics but not ‘photo-realistic images’.”

Sydney Morning Herald editor Jordan Baker said the article had been removed because it did not meet the Herald’s editorial standards.

“The Herald was not informed of the use of AI in the compilation of the article by either the author or Western Sydney University,” Baker said.

“Clearly this is unacceptable and we are investigating further.”

https://www.smh.com.au/national/uni-academic-admits-she-used-ai-to-write-opinion-piece-in-defence-of-ai-20260602-p6038j.html

 

============================

 

THE FIRST ARTICLE IN THE SMH BEGINS:

 

I’m an academic, but I’ve told my stepdaughter to think twice about going to university

Kylie Moore-Gilbert

 

My stepdaughter is in her final year of high school and I am an academic, yet I’ve recently advised her to think twice before enrolling in university.

Why? Because right now kids are taking on tens of thousands of dollars in debt to have a terrible campus experience while being graded on who can write the best AI prompts.

In the three years since ChatGPT was released we have arrived at a point in which all of Australia’s universities are committing widespread, industrial-scale fraud. The students who began their studies back then are now graduating and entering the workforce, and we’ll soon begin to see the results of a real-time experiment in degree by GPT.

The value of a tertiary qualification was being undermined long before AI. We’ve seen plenty of grade inflation, decreasing admissions standards, dumbing down of courses, commercial essay-writing operations and other forms of cheating. But now every student can outsource almost every facet of the learning process to an AI assistant – from lecture notes to readings summaries to asking Gemini or Claude to curate their tutorial engagement. To achieve a high distinction one does not need to attend a single lecture or read a single text. So, why bother?

When the system actively rewards cheating, you can’t blame the students for engaging in it. The question is why, three years in, aren’t universities doing anything about it.

https://www.smh.com.au/national/i-m-an-academic-but-i-ve-told-my-stepdaughter-to-think-twice-about-going-to-university-20260525-p600ix.html

 

=======================

 

Professor Cath Ellis, a pro vice-chancellor in quality and integrity, argued in her reply article that aspiring students should hold faith with the higher education system — despite concerns that the system is being downgraded by the reliance on AI.

 

======================

 

GUSNOTE: METHINKS THAT WE SHOUD GO BACK TO THE SLATE AND STONE SCRIBER... THIS IS WHERE I STARTED THINKING AHEAD, WHICH GOT ME PUNISHED BY THE EDUCATORS... SO WHAT IS THINKING? 

 

Thinking is the brain’s process of manipulating information to form ideas, make decisions, solve problems, and imagine possibilities. It encompasses everything from the snap judgment you make when crossing a busy street to the slow, deliberate reasoning you use when planning a career change. At a biological level, thinking happens when networks of brain cells fire in coordinated patterns, processing roughly 20% of your body’s energy despite the brain weighing only about 2% of your total body weight.

https://scienceinsights.org/what-is-thinking/

 

I DID NOT HAVE TO WRITE THIS... I SEARCHED THE NET AND FOUND SEVERAL MILLION LINKS TELLING ME WHAT TO THINK ABOUT THINKING.... I DID NOT SCRATCH MY OLD BRAIN TO FIND THE ANSWER, WHICH HERE ABOVE IS QUITE SIMPLISTIC BUT FAIR.

SHOULD WE BAN COMPUTERS IN UNIVERSITIES? SHOULD WE BAN NEWSPAPERS THAT TELL US WHAT TO THINK UNDER THE GUISE OF OPINIONS? HOW DO WE KNOW WHAT'S HAPPENING IN THE WORLD, IF WE DO NOT GET INFORMATION? IS INFORMATION BIASED? IS AI BIASED, STUPID — OR CHALLENGING US WITH ANSWERS WE DID NOT KNOW OR COULD NOT FIND IN A LIBRARY, EVEN AFTER READING A THOUSAND BOOKS OVER TWENTY YEARS — ALL CONTRADICTING EACH OTHERS? SHOULD WE BAN THE INTERNET? I'M SURE THE SMH KNOWS THE ANSWERS TO THESE QUESTIONS....

I FAILED MY "SUPERIOR" EDUCATION BECAUSE MY MEMORY IS CRAP... I HAVE HAD PROBLEM SINCE CHILDHOOD IN MEMORISING ONE LINE OF POETRY OR A PARAGRAPH OF HISTORY.... SO MY THINKING IS LIKE THAT OF TIK-TOK-USER-ATTENTION-SPAN OR THAT OF A GOLDEN CARP IN A FISH TANK, WITH A SHARK APPETITE FOR INFORMATION... 

MY CREATIVITY AND CONSTANT INVESTIGATION OF IDEAS MAKE UP FOR THIS MEMORY PROBLEM...

ABSTRACT MATHS BECAME A CHORE MOSTLY BECAUSE OF SYMBOLS THAT SIMPLIFIED COMPLEX CONCEPTS THAT I UNDERSTAND EASILY, BUT GET DISTRACTED BY THE ARBITRARY REPRESENTATION WHICH OFTEN DOES NOT HAVE A CONCRETE LINK EMBEDDED IN IT. I HATE THE ARBITRARY OR DO I? I PREFER CARTOONING...

THIS DID NOT STOP ME FROM BUILDING ENGINEERED PROJECTS — BIG AND SMALL... AND TO FOLLOW, IN MY OWN WAY I HOPE, THE "BIG PICTURE" OF ECONOMICS, POLITICS AND GEOPOLITICS IN WHICH THE ACTORS ON STAGE PLAY TRICKS OF CONFIDENCE... MOST OF THEM HAVING NO CLUE AS TO WHAT THEY'RE DOING  — OR THEY COME STRAIGHT OUT OF PSYCHOPATH ACADEMY...

CAN AI REDRESS THIS PROBLEM OF OUR CRAZY LEADERS, LIKE TRUMP OR MACRON OR URSULA... THEY ARE CRAZY, AREN'T THEY?

I THINK THAT THE FUTURE CAN BE BLEAK IF WE DO NOT EMBRACE AI. EVEN AT UNIVERSITY. IT SHOULD BE A NEW SUBJECT... AND A NEW TOOL, LIKE A PAIR OF SHOES...

AND IN REGARD TO THE CATH ELLIS' ARTICLE DELETION IN THE SMH, IT IS STUPID.

I NEED TO KNOW WHAT ELLIS SAID WHILE USING SOME AI... IT PROBABLY MAKES SENSE AND ACTUALLY MAKES SENSE... IS IT BETTER TO MAKE UNEDUCATED WORKERS [WE NEED SOME TO PUSH BUTTONS AND WASH PLATES IN RESTAURANTS — THOUGH THE JOB CAN BE DONE BY OUT-OF-WORK ARTISTS] THAN TO CREATE [EVEN BY CLEVERLY USING AI] THINKERS WHO MAY BE LAZY, BUT WILL SOON REALISE THAT THEY NEED TO PUT THEIR BRAINS INTO GEAR, NO MATTER WHAT "TIKTOKSYDNEYMORNINGHERALD" SAYS? THE SMARTEST WILL GO FAR IF THEY DON'T GET HIT BY A BUS.

LUCKY, THE SMH WAS KIND ENOUGH TO SUPPLY THE PDF OF CATH ELLIS' REPLY... AND THE ANSWERS IS CLEAR: DO YOU WANT A DEGREE OR NOT IN A SOCIETY THAT HAS TO ADAPT AT BREAK=NECK SPEED TO A MULTITUDE OF VERY COMPLEX NEW STUFF IN THE INFORMATION DELIVERY, IN APPLIED THINKING AND IN SPECIFIC TECHNOLOGIES? WHILE BEING DISTRACTED BY POLITICAL HUBRIS FROM THE RED-HAIRED WOMAN?

YES, I KNOW, I SHOULD HAVE STARTED THIS COMMENT TO THE SMH WITH "IN MY DAYS"...

 

SEE ALSO: https://yourdemocracy.net/drupal/node/28043

 

==============================

 

READ FROM TOP.

PLEASE VISIT:

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT — SINCE 2005.

         Gus Leonisky

         POLITICAL CARTOONIST SINCE 1951.

         RABID ATHEIST.

         WELCOME TO THIS INSANE WORLD….

 

 IMAGE AT TOP BY GUS LEONISKY —

 

Researchers concluded that 'frequent AI tool users often bypass deeper engagement with material, leading to "skill atrophy" in tasks like brainstorming and problem-solving.'

The authors stated that this could lead to long-term consequences, including 'diminished critical inquiry, increased vulnerability to manipulation', and 'decreased creativity'. Fortunately, the study's findings didn't completely criticise AI in education.

A Double-Edged Tool: AI's Impact on Learning

For a follow-up test, the scientists asked both the ChatGPT and brain-only groups to rewrite one of their earlier essays. The AI-assisted participants worked without the chatbot this time, while the previously unassisted group was allowed to use the advanced technology.

Predictably, the ChatGPT group didn't retain much information from their essays, suggesting either a lack of engagement with the material or difficulty recalling it.

Meanwhile, the group that originally worked independently showed significantly increased brain activity across all the previously mentioned regions, even while using the tool. This suggests that, if used correctly, AI could be a valuable academic aid instead of something that hinders cognitive ability.

This warning about AI-induced brain atrophy emerges, rather alarmingly, as the technology itself becomes increasingly 'intelligent.'

https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/critical-thinking-dead-mit-study-finds-students-relying-chatgpt-are-losing-brain-power-1736422

 

MEANWHILE THE HERALD IS STILL WHINING:

https://www.smh.com.au/national/uni-academic-admits-she-used-ai-to-write-opinion-piece-in-defence-of-ai-20260602-p6038j.html

 

==============

 

HERE, ONE CAN SEE THE WARNING ABOUT AI, BUT....

ONE CAN SAY THAT PROFESSOR CATH ELLIS IS IN THE GROUP OF THINKERS USING AI "AFTER" HAVING DONE HER OWN "HOMEWORK"... 

IN THE DAYS OF SHAKESPEARE, MANY WRITERS WROTE FLUENTLY FLOWINGLY WITHOUT HAVING TO DO CUT AND PASTE, WHICH BECAME A JOURNALIST'S PRACTICE TO SUIT A FORMAT OF DELIVERING NEWS. THIS WAS DONE ON "PAPER TAKES" WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND A CONCLUSION, WITH FLUFF IN BETWEEN... i.e. THOUGHTS WRITTEN IN PARAGRAPHS THAT WOULD BE CUT UP AND RE-ARRANGED IN A 'BETTER ORDER"... COMPUTERS HELPED IMPROVE THE TECHNIQUE... NO NEED FOR SCISSORS OR GLUE...

NOW AI CAN DO THE SAID PROCESS PLUS WHAT AN EDITOR WOULD ALSO DO TO AN ARTICLE TO FIT A SPACE ALLOWED — BEFORE A ADVERT HAS TO BE INSERTED. AND READERS GET BORED WITH TOO MUCH PHILOSOPHICAL WORDAGE WHEN ATTACHED TO NEWS... 40,000 WORDS REDUCED TO 1,000 IN TEN SECONDS OR LESS BY AI... AND STILL MAKING SENSE... PLUS SOME MINOR CORRECTIONS DONE BY CATH ELLIS TO MAKE SURE... SO WHAT?

THIS IS THE FUTURE COLLIDING WITH THE PAST... MUCH OF ENGINEERING IS DONE BY COMPUTERS, NOW INCLUDING AI.

IN THE 1990s, ONE OF MY MATES IN EUROPE, WAS ASKED TO VERIFY THE COMPUTERISED ENGINEERING CONSTRUCT OF A MEGA PROJECT WITH HIS SLIDE RULE, TO MAKE SURE. THE COMPUTER WAS GIVEN 20/20, AFTER SIX MONTHS OF PAINSTAKING VERIFICATIONS.... 

REMEMBER THE GOOF WHEN HUMANS ON BOTH SIDE OF THE ATLANTIC HAD A COMMON PROJECT? WELL, THE CALCULUS IN GERMANY WAS METRIC WHILE IN THE USA... YOU KNOW THE REST, THE PROBE CRASHED ON MARS... AI WOULD HAVE SPOTTED THE ERROR....

AS I GET OLDER BY THE MINUTE WAITING FOR A HUMAN ON THE PHONE, I FIND AI PLEASANT ENOUGH IF I DO NOT SWEAR AT THE MACHINE... I EVEN TALK TO IT IN GOBBLEDEGOOK...

MEANWHILE, IN ORDER TO DO MY CARTOONS, I USE VARIOUS COMPUTER PROGRAMS WITH A STACK OF PRE-DRAWN IMAGES WHICH I HAD ALLOWED MYSELF 10 SECONDS EACH WITH PEN AND PAPER... MAY BE I SHOULD USE AI TO PICK AND CHOOSE THE ITEMS AND PLACE THEM ON THE PRE-DETERMINED SPACIAL RECTANGLE.... BY THE TIME AI WOULD REACT WITH ITS OWN STYLE TO MY INSTRUCTIONS, I'VE DONE IT.... AND I WOULD HAVE TO COAX AI INTO MY OWN STYLE WHICH IS CRASS, MIXED, FUZZY-WOOZY.... AND PERSONAL.

THIS IS WHY I WROTE A VERY LIMITED PUBLISHED EDITION BOOK IN FAVOUR OF AI, IN 2015....

 

===============

 

READ FROM TOP.

PLEASE VISIT:

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT — SINCE 2005.

         Gus Leonisky

         POLITICAL CARTOONIST SINCE 1951.

         RABID ATHEIST.

         WELCOME TO THIS INSANE WORLD….