Utter rubbish, designed as clickbait for older folks. Every generations dunks on the next one, right up until it's time to change the clock on the VCR and only the kids can do that.
Kids are growing up in a different world than we did. They need different skills, and probably a different cognition. Teaching them to deal with rapid attention shifts is probably going to equip them better for their actual lives than trying to make them focus on one subject for hours.
I think we're talking fast food rather than nicotine.
We know that fast food is bad for us. But fast food companies keep putting the things that we like into it. So a lot of people, when tasting actual, real, good-for-you, food decide that they prefer fast food. Other people are aware that fast food is bad for them and prefer real food. It's a choice that we leave up to the individual. Unfortunately we then allow the fast food companies to advertise so they can affect the choice.
We don't really have an answer for this as a culture. We should make the fast food companies responsible for the harms they're causing, but we don't have a mechanism for that. We could stop them advertising, as some countries have done, but that starts a whole process of questions about what the government can and can't do that ends up in bad places.
To be fair, they're still welcoming to foreigners in the bush, just as long as they're white. Rural Australia has many towns that have a strong Italian or Greek heritage (for example).
One Nation are flat racist rather than xenophobe, I think.
And it's being pushed by our billionaires for some reason. You'd think Gina would want cheap immigrant workers on her mines
> A CEO, a blue-collar worker, and an immigrant sit down together at a table upon which there is a plate of a dozen cookies. The CEO takes 11 of the cookies, then whispers in the ear of the blue-collar worker "Hey, I think he wants your cookie."
The problem with billionaires is that they truly have more money than they need. The only thing left for them to pursue is power. Cheap labor only helps them get more money. Racism on the other hand can be used to justify the destruction of democratic institutions which are a billionaires only competition.
just ran into this myself. I got Claude Code to build a tool that calls Claude for <stuff>. Now I have to create a console account and do the API thing and it sucks balls.
Did we lose something when we invented the calculator and stopped teaching the times table in schools? There have been millions of words discussing this, and the general consensus amongst us crusty old folks was that yes, the times table was useful and losing the ability to do mental arithmetic easily would be bad.
Turns out we were wrong. Everyone carries a calculator now on their phone, even me. Doing simple maths is a matter of moments on the calculator app, and it's rare that I find myself doing the mental arithmetic that used to be common.
I can't remember phone numbers any more. I used to have a good 50+ memorised, now I can barely remember my own. But the point is that I don't need to any more. We have machines for that.
Do we need to be able to write an essay? I have never written one outside of an educational context. And no, this post does not count as an essay.
I was expelled from two kindergartens as a kid. I was finally moved to a Montessori school where they taught individually by following our interests, where I thrived. Later, I moved back into a more conventional educational environment and I fucking hated every minute of it. I definitely learned despite my education not because if it. So if LLMs are about to completely disrupt education then I celebrate that. This is a good thing. Giving every kid a personal tutor that can follow their interests and teach them things that they actually want to learn, at the pace they want to learn them, is fucking awesome.
Any competent thinker should be able to structure an argument and present it in written form, that's an important skill to have.
If someone is unable to write an essay arguing something, unable to articulate complex thoughts and back them up with evidence, what does that indicate about their thinking?
I don't write essays either, but I'm sure I could. And maybe some of those docs or emails I write at work are made more effective by that.
There are literally hundreds of millions of people in the Anglosphere who have graduated from their education unable to coherently structure an argument and present it in written form.
It indicates nothing about their thinking. One of the smartest people I've known left school at 14 and couldn't read or write.
We mistake education for intelligence often. We mistake erudition for capability often. The thing you need to get a PhD is not intelligence, but the ability to follow directions and persevere. You certainly don't need to have any original thoughts, in fact they will only get in your way.
Being able to read or write, if given an opportunity to learn, certainly IS a marker of intelligence. That’s not a very high bar to pass considering toddlers can usually read. But it’s obviously not the only way to measure intelligence!
You claim the smartest person you ever met couldn’t read or write. So what kind of smarts did this person have? Genuinely curious. A really good memory? Emotional intelligence? Extremely persuasive?
I knew him for about 3 months, hung out with him regularly, before I figured out that he couldn't read. He was very good at manipulating the conversation to make me read things for him without me guessing it.
He paid off his mortgage by his mid-30's.
He taught himself to read and write alongside his eldest daughter when she learned. Keeping up with a kid while learning an entirely new skill is no minor thing.
He built his own house in the corner of a field without planning permission so that no-one knew he was there, and lived in it for long enough that he then didn't need planning permission.
He effectively retired in his 40's, and keeps bees for fun.
They call it "street smarts". He has it in spades. Also just genuinely a fun person to be around.
Maybe. But the education system was never designed for this kind of person. Challenging authority and doing things in unconventional ways is not tolerated in school. I think he dodged a bullet.
Calculators are good. But we still teach times tables and long division and prohibit calculators until kids learn how to do it the “hard way.”
We can’t give a generation of kindergarteners calculators and expect them to produce new math when they’re adults: how will they ever form mathematical problem solving skills?
I think the same principle applies for LLMs - they can be a tool but learning how to do things without them is still essential. Otherwise we might not have any more good authors in 10 years.
Before CAD, engineers had to draw designs on drafting boards. Similar concept here, I believe most classes still find it valuable for students to start with pencil and paper and grasp something at its most fundamental level, even if obsolete, before moving on to modern tools.
LLMs (and calculators, and CAD) should be used as a tool once the underlying mechanisms and skills are understood by its user, otherwise it’s like driving a car without knowing how to replace a flat tire. Sure you can call AAA, but eventually if nobody learns to change a tire with their own two hands, humanity won’t be able to drive. This obviously hyperbole but I hope it illustrates my point.
I’m fairly confident LLMs will be a net positive on society in the long run, just as calculators have been. But just like calculators are restricted at certain times in math classes, LLMs should be restricted in writing classes.
> We can’t give a generation of kindergarteners calculators and expect them to produce new math when they’re adults: how will they ever form mathematical problem solving skills?
Arithmetic has nothing, literally nothing, to do with "new maths". A calculator won't help you with algebra, or shortcut any mathematical problem solving. It will just help you with dividing up the restaurant bill, which is the hardest maths problem the vast majority of humans will encounter.
> I think the same principle applies for LLMs - they can be a tool but learning how to do things without them is still essential. Otherwise we might not have any more good authors in 10 years.
Did we stop having any good new portrait painters once we'd invented the camera? The people who really want to write a book will still write a book.
Commercial art has literally nothing to do with art, and everything to do with commerce. Art is not stored in freeport bunkers and used as collateral for loans.
All art aspires to the condition of music. It evokes an emotional reaction. If it does that, it doesn't matter where it came from.
> If it does that, it doesn't matter where it came from.
Personally, it matters to me quite a lot where art comes from, especially music. I have a hard time "separating the art from the artist". If I find out a musician is a creep/abuser/rapist, I can't enjoy their music anymore.
This belief obviously isn't widespread given artists like Michael Jackson, Chris Brown, R. Kelly, and Jimmy Page are still wildly popular. But I assume I'm not alone in this.
As for AI music, it's hard for me to imagine an "AI Musician" ever becoming very popular because I reckon most humans want some human-ness in their music. And I think if an existing artist ever put out AI music as their own, they'd lose some fans pretty quickly.
No, fair point. I'm the same, I can't enjoy the music if I know the artist is not a good person. Though I do think this gets taken too far; I can enjoy Pink Floyd even though I have huge disagreements with Roger Waters' politics.
I'm not sure I could tell the difference between AI and human music already. In a few years I'm pretty sure I couldn't. This is the bit where I'm not sure it matters. I mostly listen to music for the nostalgic emotions now anyway.
As they point out: "... the issue of Ukraine’s supposed manpower crisis. This idea has been a key part of the analysis for more than two years now, analysis saying Ukraine was on the verge of military failure."
The Ukrainians are adapting their battle tactics and use of drones to reduce their casualties. The Russians are not, and are suffering huge casualties as a result. Yet no-one is saying the Russian invasion is doomed because they're going to run out of young men.
To be clear: Ukrainian "new" tactic only really help them to reduce casualties on the offensive (estimated at 1 to 1, which is _crazy good_, since Starlink has been deactivated for Russians). Casualties on the defensive side being 2 or even 3 to 1 is expected. And Russia can afford that anyway.
Russia is doomed anyway, unless they manage to disarm their population at the end of the war (and Ukraine will have the same issue), and limit revanchism (Ukraine won't have this issue: if they win, revanchism won't be a societal issue, and if they loose, their revanchism will be an issue for Russia)
"The Russians are suffering huge casualties as a result". This, right here, is the best proof that social media usage is directly proportional with intellectual decline. God save us all!
It is because of the manpower shortage that, credit due, the Ukrainians have come with many innovative ways to use Drones in the ongoing war. But anyone who says Ukraine's military doesn't have a manpower shortage is either ignorant, misinformed or deluded - quite recently Ukraine announced that they would now be recruiting even 60 years old ( https://www.dw.com/en/ukraine-zelenskyy-signs-law-for-over-6... ). You do not hire old people to fight in a war unless you are desperate. Relying on drone warfare for defence however is still a short-term measure because the Russians too are learning from the Ukrainian and adapting accordingly ( https://edition.cnn.com/2025/11/22/europe/russia-rubicon-uni... ).
Kids are growing up in a different world than we did. They need different skills, and probably a different cognition. Teaching them to deal with rapid attention shifts is probably going to equip them better for their actual lives than trying to make them focus on one subject for hours.
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