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AI breaks effort from output
Effort was the point
Teachers used to have students answer questions and write essays, then judge the finished product. The effort behind the product was the point, and the output stood in for it. With AI, the performance no longer tracks the effort. If the effort is the point, the grade and the output stop mattering, and the whole way of teaching has to be rethought.
A gym for the brain
School works like a gym for the brain. A personal trainer tells you what weights to lift and in what order, and asking the trainer to lift them for you would be pointless, because you only get stronger by lifting. AI tools are shredded when it comes to answering questions. They can do high school work for a student.
Handing off the thinking
Reading something long and working out what matters and what it connects to is thinking too, and it is one of the skills school exists to teach. AI can synthesize a whole pile of texts in seconds, which leaves a real question about how much of that work a student should hand to a machine and how much to do themselves.
Why does struggling help people remember?
Psychologist Robert Bjork coined the term desirable difficulties in the 1990s for learning conditions that feel harder in the moment but last longer. In a 2006 study, Henry Roediger and Jeffrey Karpicke had students read passages and then either reread them or take a recall test. A week later, the students who had tested themselves remembered more, even though rereading had felt more effective. Earlier, in 1978, Norman Slamecka and Peter Graf found that words people generated themselves were remembered better than words they only read.
How do muscles get stronger from lifting?
Lifting puts mechanical tension on muscle fibers, which sets off signaling that raises the rate of muscle protein synthesis. Over the following days, the body adds protein to the fibers so they can handle that load. In the first weeks of training, most strength gains come from the nervous system learning to recruit more muscle fibers, not from bigger muscles. Visible growth in muscle size shows up later.
Why did Plato worry about writing?
In the Phaedrus, written around 370 BC, Plato has Socrates tell a story about the god Theuth offering the invention of writing to King Thamus. The king answers that writing will produce forgetfulness in learners, who will trust marks outside themselves instead of their own memory. He adds that it offers the appearance of wisdom without the reality. Plato's own works survive only because they were written down.
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