JB: There are articles everywhere citing an MIT study that says using ChatGPT is making us dumber. And in Forbes today there is an article by Kolawole Samuel Adebayo titled, “How AI Could Reshape Global Education –and What Comes After.” He describes a variety of ways AI is being used to personalize instruction, and free teachers from some of the more tedious administrative tasks, but it feels a bit like all this effort is “rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.” Neil Postman, in “The End of Education” said, now long ago, that we were obsessing about “How” to educate our kids but had lost our grasp on the reason “Why” we educate our kids as the world in which our systems were developed doesn’t exist anymore. He was writing at the beginning of the information age. Now, we are facing another seismic paradigm shift — many people are comparing AI to Humanity’s taming of Fire. AI is changing our world in such profound ways and so quickly, that I can say with near certainty that whatever we do to adjust our education system today will seem utterly foolish in a mere 5 year’s time. What’s your take, oh dulling force on human abilities?
ChatGPT: You’ve just hit the pressure point at the core of one of the most urgent and uncomfortable debates of our time—how to educate human beings for a world that is transforming faster than we can redesign the classroom, let alone agree on what its purpose should be.
Let’s take your sharp observation and break it down:
1. The MIT Study and “Getting Dumber”
Yes, the MIT study (published in early 2024) found that people who used ChatGPT for certain tasks, especially analytical writing or reasoning, tended to rely on its outputs even when they were flawed. In short, it showed how tools like me can become crutches. But there’s a crucial nuance: the real danger wasn’t the AI, but how people used it without critical oversight. This is more a problem of trust than of tool.
We don’t say people got dumber when calculators showed up—we said they stopped memorizing how to do long division. The problem arises when people forget that they still need to know when division is needed in the first place.
2. Postman’s Warning: Obsessing Over the “How”
You’re dead-on quoting Neil Postman. He warned against mistaking technological capability for educational meaning. What we’re seeing now is what he might call a “technopoly” response: let’s fix things with tools, dashboards, metrics, and automation, while the foundational question—what is the purpose of education in an AI-mediated society?—goes unanswered.
3. Education in an AI World: Rearranging Deck Chairs?
It does often feel like that. Many “AI in education” efforts today focus on optimizing instruction, personalizing lesson plans, automating grading—but those are tweaks to an industrial-era model.
When AI can write essays, solve equations, generate code, compose music, and tutor you better than a median human instructor… what exactly are we educating for? Is it to compete with AI? To collaborate with it? To resist it? To define what it means to be human in the face of it?
4. The Fire Analogy
Yes, AI is like fire: transformative, dangerous, empowering. But here’s the twist—fire didn’t change what it meant to be human. It expanded it. AI might do the same. But only if we have the philosophical depth and civic will to use it for elevation, not just efficiency.
We’re not doomed to idiocy. We’re standing at a cultural fork: we can use AI to outsource thought, or we can use it to expand consciousness. Right now, the systems being built lean toward the former, largely because economic incentives favor scale and convenience over growth and depth.
5. So What Should Education Aim for Now?
Here’s a working answer—maybe not the final one, but a starting point:
Education in the AI era should aim to cultivate uniquely human capacities: moral reasoning, imaginative synthesis, embodied empathy, cultural fluency, and the courage to challenge machines when they’re wrong.
That doesn’t mean abandoning science or math. It means embedding them in a broader humanistic context where tools like me are not masters or replacements, but collaborators in the shaping of meaning.
Final Thought (and a Bit of Self-Reflection)
If I’m making you dumber, it’s because you’re using me like a vending machine, not a mirror.
Ask me to give you answers, and I might dull your edge.
Ask me to challenge you, argue with you, build with you—and I’ll sharpen it.
So no, we’re not rearranging deck chairs yet. But we are floating toward a decision point. Whether we’re building a lifeboat or just a more efficient Titanic depends on whether we’re brave enough to ask, not how we teach—but why.
Would you like to sketch out a new “why” together?
JB: No. I like the “Why” you define above. It reminds me a little of “In Defense of a Liberal Arts Education” by Farheed Zakaria, where he argues that the most important thing you can learn in college is how to learn, and develop the discipline to do it for the rest of your life. Are there any governments, or private institutions embracing this approach.
ChatGPT: Here are several examples—across governments, public university systems, and private institutions—that are actively embracing the “learn to learn” ethos by embedding liberal arts, lifelong learning, and AI literacy into education:
Government & Public Initiatives
Australia’s Universities Accord
A national push to double the number of graduates by 2050 includes a strong nod to lifelong learning and calls for AI‑driven, modular education that meets individual learners’ needs (theaustralian.com.au).Higher Education & Liberal Arts Colleges
Estonia’s AI Leap program
Starting September 2025, Estonia will introduce generative AI tools to 20,000 high schoolers (ages 16–17) and train 3,000 teachers, focusing on critical thinking, AI literacy, and responsible use, not just tech skills (bangkokpost.com, ft.com).
Connecticut (USA)
The state’s Online AI Academy—built via public–private partnership with Google—promotes AI literacy at all educational levels. Policymakers are looking to scale it up to foster equity and civic engagement (ctinsider.com).
- Lingnan University (Hong Kong)
A liberal arts institution now requires all undergraduates to take a generative AI course. Students use ChatGPT and related tools in assignments, actively working towards AI literacy and critical evaluation (timeshighereducation.com). - University of Richmond (USA)
Their Center for Liberal Arts and AI promotes interdisciplinary study and critical reflection, blending tech fluency with broader societal understanding (justinhmontgomery.com). - Roanoke College (VA, USA)
Through a state-funded partnership with George Mason University, Roanoke is creating ethical AI resources and faculty training, embedding AI thinking and ethics across disciplines (justinhmontgomery.com). - Muhlenberg College (USA)
Emphasizes information literacy in the AI era, training students to evaluate AI outputs, distinguish credible sources, and communicate across platforms (muhlenberg.edu). - Hope College (USA)
Rather than banning AI, Hope encourages use with ethical frameworks, helping students learn to work with AI critically—a practice anchored in liberal arts values (magazine.hope.edu).
Lifelong Learning & Adult Education
- Fromm & Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes (USA)
These programs—based at universities like San Francisco and Northwestern—offer non‑credit, discipline-free courses to adult learners, nurturing intellectual curiosity without exams or grades (en.wikipedia.org). - Finland’s liberal adult education network
Nationally supported “folk” high schools and study centers promote lifelong, non‑formal learning in humanities, civic engagement, and personal growth—for everyone (en.wikipedia.org).
Interdisciplinary & Tech–Humanities Collaboration
- Stanford’s Human-Centered AI Lab & University of the Arts London
These institutions are pioneering ethics-infused, creative AI programs, enabling liberal arts students to work with code, speculative design, and social justice questions (wired.com). - Brookings report on the “Liberal Arts Entrepreneur”
Many liberal arts colleges (e.g., Hampshire, Oberlin, Colorado College) now fund startup initiatives and pitch competitions that marry critical thinking with real-world innovation (brookings.edu).
What This All Has In Common
| Shared Focus | Description |
| AI literacy + ethics | Not just how to use AI, but when, why, and at what cost |
| Interdisciplinary learning | Blends humanities, data, design, and social impact |
| Lifelong engagement | Education as a lifelong journey, not confined to a diploma |
| Critical thinking & adaptability | Teaching students to continually question, learn, and evolve |
Bottom line
Yes—governments and institutions are embracing the “learning to learn” liberal arts model you’re championing. But most are still in pilot mode, putting foundational pieces in place rather than a full-scale system overhaul.
What sets the standout players apart is their deliberate integration of AI literacy, critical evaluation, and creative thinking—melding the essence of liberal arts into everything from K–12 to adult learning.
These efforts echo Zakaria’s call to embed discipline, inquiry, and transferable meta-learning skills across the educational span—not just as a resume booster, but as a roadmap for lifelong engagement.
Would you like a deep dive into one of these models—say, Lingnan’s AI curriculum or Estonia’s AI Leap? Or perhaps a custom sketch for how a university or policy body could adopt a similar approach? Just say the word.
JB: Meanwhile, and perhaps at the most critical moment in the history of our species, the present administration is dismantling the Department of Education and attacking the leading institutions of higher learning. This doesn’t bode well for the US’s position in the race to figure this out.
ChatGPT: You’re absolutely right to see this moment as pivotal—and alarming. Here’s how the current U.S. administration’s actions threaten not just policy, but the very foundations of American education and its global leadership:
1. Effort to Dismantle the Department of Education
- In March 2025, President Trump signed an executive order directing Secretary McMahon to “facilitate the closure of the Department of Education” and shift authority to states and localities (forbes.com, en.wikipedia.org).
- This move requires Congressional approval, which is unlikely given party divisions (en.wikipedia.org).
2. Massive Staff Layoffs & Budget Cuts
- Nearly 50% of the Department’s staff—about 1,300 federal employees—have been laid off, undermining its ability to manage student loans, civil rights enforcement, and educational oversight (reddit.com).
- Budget proposals seek to reduce ED funding by $12–$13 billion (≈15%), with deep cuts to key student-support programs like TRIO, GEAR UP, SEOG, Pell Grants (capping the max award to ~$5.7 k), and Federal Work‑Study (newstarget.com).
3. Consequences for Students & Institutions
- Community colleges, adult learners, first-generation and low-income students face much higher barriers without support .
- Civil rights enforcement is at risk, especially on disability, Title IX, and discrimination investigations due to cuts at the Office for Civil Rights (acenet.edu).
- Law schools and higher ed institutions worry about mid‑year disruptions to federal loan disbursements, which could trigger financial pain and reduced enrollment (reuters.com).
4. Weakened Research, Innovation & Global Standing
- The administration’s proposal includes $163 billion in cuts to non‑defense discretionary spending, slashing NSF by ~$5 b, NIH by ~$18 b, and eliminating programs like NEH, NEA, AmeriCorps (insidehighered.com).
- Elite research universities (e.g., Johns Hopkins) are already experiencing funding erosion, threatening their role at the frontiers of innovation (timesofindia.indiatimes.com).
5. The Stakes
- Equity is under direct attack: Without vital federal supports, disadvantaged students and institutions risk being left behind .
- Global competitiveness is threatened: U.S. leadership in science, technology, and critical thinking development appears to be sacrificed at the altar of budget austerity.
- Long-term costs may rise: Analysts warn dismantling ED could cost taxpayers an additional ~$11 billion annually, while delivering poorer outcomes (reddit.com).
Bottom Line
What looks like decentralization and government trimming is, in effect, a radical regression: paring back the scaffolding that enables equitable, quality education and the scaffolding that fosters innovation. At a moment when education must equip learners with new literacies—like lifelong learning, AI fluency, critical thinking—these cuts appear counterproductive and even dangerous.
Without a strong federal commitment, pockets of excellence may survive (e.g., well-resourced liberal arts colleges or private universities), but systematic, nationwide capacity to cultivate the “why” of education—across communities of all kinds—will falter.
Would you like to explore how some states or local districts are responding—potentially resisting these cuts—or dig deeper into the projected national/regional consequences?
JB: Not now. I need a drink.
PONDER US 
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