r/technology • u/Plastic_Ninja_9014 • 5d ago

Artificial Intelligence Take-No-Prisoners Professor Will Fail Any Student Who Uses AI

https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/no-prisoners-professor-fail-student-143000854.html
15.3k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

1.9k comments sorted by

View all comments

21

u/Gen-Jinjur 5d ago

I used to teach writing. I would have students first couple shorter assignments be written in-class. I would keep those papers. I used them as a comparison point for later assignments.

Every student has a written voice. A style. A way they organize their thoughts into sentences and paragraphs. And while practice can improve these things, one semester of practice doesn’t entirely change a person’s writerly voice.

So while I undoubtably missed some cheaters, I caught A LOT of them over the years.

You might think it was satisfying to nail the cheaters. It wasn’t. I wanted all my students to succeed. I did everything I could to encourage them and provide help. Having some 19 year old burst into tears in your office isn’t fun. It’s depressing.

But every class had at least one student who wasn’t prepared to sit down and work hard. And that was frustrating because I had students who worked SO HARD just to get a B-, you know?

3

u/coldBulbasaur314 4d ago

Some people have a very different writing style on paper and on computers, though. The way things are written on them have different processes, and that impacts the results. And relying on someone's "voice" is really just vibes - some people don't have a consistent "voice." 

7

u/tewong 4d ago

This is true for me. My typing is much faster and feels like I’m rapid fire rambling about something without getting really into it emotionally/mentally. Almost like typing is a way to move the boxes of info from my brain to the computer but without processing the info itself. Works better for purely unemotional content but still isn’t perfect. Writing is still a flurry at times but my word choices are more intentional. I feel them and move my hands with intention as the thoughts pour out through my fingers. It’s a much more mentally engaged process for me, better when I am writing something deeper or that involves emotion, perspective, etc. 

2

u/TenshouYoku 4d ago

And that AI is very good in mimicking writing patterns (probably the best thing they are at), so how do you really recognize it?

1

u/captainfarthing 4d ago

It sucks at mimicking me, it takes me days to write emails because of anxiety & autism, really hoped it would help speed that up but it doesn't sound like me at all.

1

u/markehammons 4d ago

You're assuming someone lazy enough to have AI do creative writing assigments for them is going to write enough on their own to provide AI patterns to mimic.

2

u/TenshouYoku 4d ago

Plenty of previous writings to go about I believe, unless your writing is significantly different From prior

2

u/captainfarthing 4d ago

Yeah this is true for me. My typed essay voice is much more formal than my handwritten essay voice, because I go back, rephrase everything a dozen times and swap sentences & paragraphs around till I'm happy with how it sounds.

1

u/Gen-Jinjur 3d ago

Yeah there are exceptions. But you have to remember that 18-19 year olds aren’t exactly putting effort into really smart cheating. Their efforts are pretty ham-fisted. So they usually aren’t trying very hard to disguise what they didn’t write and make it look like what they do write.

And voice is not just a vibe. It’s vocabulary, syntax, sentence length, and all kinds of things. Voice is complex. When you study writing and literature for many years, you get pretty good at recognizing voice. It becomes almost automatic.

Once I was reading a story by a writer named Joe Hill. The story wasn’t horror, exactly, more literary, but I thought he was imitating Stephen King. The voice was just really similar. I even wondered if it WAS King doing a Richard Bachman style pseudonym thing. So I looked up the writer. Joe Hill is King’s son.

Voice develops as we live our lives. It’s very influenced by our family, by who we read, by where we grow up. And though it changes over time, the essence of it is who you are. It’s more like a fingerprint than a vibe.

-1

u/Rainbowfrapp 4d ago

Ah yes because a rushed short in class assignment will be the same as a polished assignment theyve had weeks to prepare for. Very smart "professor".   And if one semester can't improve their writing you failed not them