Over the past few weeks, the ChatGPT product from the OpenAI initiative has been in the news, primarily for its ability to write an accurate seamless essay about any topic that the user has in mind. I’ve been playing around with it for a couple of weeks and thought that I would kick off the New Year with a review.
In my recent article discussing the Daedalus issue on Artificial Intelligence and Society, I mentioned that the issue’s editors had organized the papers submitted in several different categories. The Michael Spence paper that I discussed was part of On the economy & future of work category. I selected that category for discussion since one of the many purposes of education, and arguably the primary purpose, is to prepare our citizens for work.
I have been a fan and a subscriber to Daedalus, the Journal of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, for many years. In 2021, the journal became an open-source journal, making its new issues available to all, and the academy is in the process of digitizing back issues to make them available. The most recent issue, Volume 151, Number 2, is titled “AI & Society” with an all-star group of contributors.
The launch of the James Webb Space Telescope triggered more than a few memories of mine. One of those memories was the alleged quote from astrophysicist and tv host, Carl Sagan, who referred to the number of stars in the universe as “billions and billions.”
Another memory was when Dr. Phil Ice and I presented a paper about online student retention at the biennial conference of the Oxford Internet Institute at Oxford University.
I consider myself a well-read person who manages to stay on top of most of the current news despite the distractions from multiple media sources as well as warring political factions. In a recent article about Artificial Intelligence (AI), I read a statement about AI’s influence on SDG 4, quality education.
I had no idea what SDG 4 was, where it came from, and its context in the AI discussion, so I typed it in my search engine and the top choice was the United Nations’ Department of Economic and Social Affairs Division for Sustainable Development Goals webpage.
