OLDaily

On the moral responsibility to be an informed citizen
Solmu Anttila, Psyche, 2022/06/14

Education and ethics often walk hand in hand, perhaps never more so than today. This article, as the title suggests, considers the argument that we have a moral responsibility to educate ourselves (or to become educated). There are issues, which author Solmu Anttila documents. Is there even such a thing as moral responsibility? If so, what does epistemic responsibility look like? Are we responsible for beliefs influenced by external agents, like teachers and social media algorithms? Are we morally required to change our beliefs under certain conditions? When I refuse to accept that Pluto is not a planet, am I somehow morally wrong? Does it even help to assign moral responsibility for false beliefs? "Rhetorics of blame in public discussion of social problems … usually produce defensiveness and unproductive blame-switching." And is it even possible to avoid wrong beliefs? Perhaps, as Anttila says, "the burden should be shifted to those who have structural control over our information environments.

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Artificial intelligence in education: what issues do we need to start considering now?
Michael Webb, JISC, 2022/06/14

I like to think I've covered that, and would ague that we need to consider these issues in light of the benefits AI offers as well, but Michael Webb is right in saying we need to be considering these questions. But his first statement suggests what he thinks the real issue is: "The first thing to emphasise is that AI will never replace teaching staff – nor would we want it to." Is this true? It depends on what you mean by 'replace' - technically, cutting the cost of labour by 96 percent (which is what Echo did for the Brussells Times) isn't 'replacing', but I'm sure a lot of people would feel replaced. But if we could teach effectively at a fraction of the cost, wouldn't we want to?

But let's skip to the main point of this article, which is to introduce the newest edition of Jisc's AI in tertiary education report (32 page PDF). The report goes straight to a specific application of AI: AI-powered personalised learning. This, I think, is based in the typical descriptive-diagnostic-predictive-prescriptive data maturity model. But I think AI goes well beyond that, and have added two categories (generative and deontic) which are already well within today's AI capabilities. And similarly, I think the report's risk-based treatment of ethical issues isn't sufficiently comprehensive. I'm not saying the report is wrong in any sense - and indeed, it gets much more right than many similar publications. But I think it's incomplete in some important respects.

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Tech Can’t Teach but it Can Help with Feedback
Cristina Heffernan, Getting Smart, 2022/06/14

When Cristina Heffernan says tech can help with feedback, I wonder what she means when she says "tech can't teach". She writes, "the pandemic illustrated quite clearly that edtech cannot teach our students on its own." It illustrated no such thing, because I don't think anybody tried anything like that. I think what she means is that not all teaching can be digitally mediated, that is, there must be an in-person component. But that's a very different statement. What was missing in digitally mediated instruction was precisely things like formative assessment - teachers tried to use videoconferencing to do 'remote learning' that consisted mostly of direct instruction. And yeah, that failed, not surprisingly. But if tech can provide the formative feedback (and I agree, it can) then there's no reason the teacher can't be remote. There's nothing about being there in person that's special. It's just a case here (I think) of an author saying something she knows the audience wants to hear so she can say something with which they might otherwise disagree.

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Probing reality and myth in the metaverse
Cara Aiello, Jiamei Bai, Jennifer Schmidt, Yurii Vilchynskyi, McKinsey, 2022/06/14

This article from McKinsey is structured in the form of six 'myths'. It's a nice approach, but this presentation is in many ways misleading. The article wants us to believe that the metaverse is not a fad, not just for gaming, and is a place where businesses can made money. So it sets up an argument suggesting it's already being adopted by wealthier people and is used for things like shopping and learning. It says, for example, "consumers told us that they expect the metaverse to be a significant part of their everyday lives, spending four hours a day in the metaverse within the next five years." I'd be very surprised if they do. And it assures us that metaverse devices are "following mainstream device adoption curves," the chart they present has one clear outlier (and not in a good way): VR headsets.

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Will Learning Move into the Metaverse?
Pamela Hogle, Learning Solutions, 2022/06/14

The answer to the question in the title, in my view, is that "some of it will". But if you're expecting to start taking classes in VR auditoriums, think again. That's not going to stop the sales push, and we get a feel for that in this article (despite the token pushback from Jaron Lanier). Here are some of the products. The article quotes Bill Gates from last years saying "Within the next two or three years, I predict most virtual meetings will move from 2-D camera image grids—which I call the Hollywood Squares model, although I know that probably dates me—to the metaverse, a 3-D space with digital avatars." There's no chance that this prediction is accurate. The future of the metaverse is not meetings, it's environments, and this will take a long time to develop, and these will require specific learning objectives that can't be presented in real life or as a two-dimensional experience (eg., how to crew a submarine, how to repair a nuclear reactor, how to splice DNA, how to work as an ER assistant).

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Echobox streamlines content distribution for publishers on social media with new release
Echobox, 2022/06/14

I encountered a product called Echobox for the first time while preparing another post, and it's worth a mention here in its own right. Widely used by content publishers, Echobox (says it) uses artificial intelligence to optimize the performance of publication newsletters and social media. This has two facets. On the one hand, the use of AI allows publishers to automate processes, thus spending much less staff time. Also, it enables them to customize content and select the best post time to increase readership. The use of this same technology is a natural for online learning. I think that eventually people will stop signing up for courses (especially for continuing professional development (CPD)) and simply sign up for ongoing learning subscription services that offer a steady stream of learning resources. Services like Echobox will make this a lot easier to offer, and will no doubt be used in creative ways to drive revenue.

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The EU Digital Services Act: What it is, and what it could mean for publishers
What's New in Publishing, 2022/06/14

As Protocol reports, "Research shows that even as companies pledge to reduce misinfo, it still runs rampant... (for example) NYU researchers said Monday that YouTube has failed in its content moderation efforts... (and) social platforms haven't stamped out the spread of climate change disinfo." That's why Europe is moving ahead with its Digital Services Act (DSA), which "imposes strict and enforceable obligations onto Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs)." As this article (original on Echobox) reports, "The aim is to crack down on misinformation and abuse, as well as so-called 'dark pattern' interfaces — interfaces designed in such a way as to prompt certain actions from the user." It's not a done deal, though. Here's the European Commission page on the DSA.

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