The difference, it seems, is that I’ve been looking at these tools and thinking how I can use them in creative ways to accomplish a goal - and not just treating it like a magic button that solves all problems without fine-tuning.
To give you a few examples:
- There is something called the Picture Superiority Effect, which states that humans remember images better than merely words. I have been interested in applying this to language learning – imagine a unique image for each word you’re learning in German, for example. A few years ago I was about to hire an illustrator to make these images for me, but now with Midjourney or other image creators, I can functionally make unlimited unique images for $30 a month. This is a massive new development that wasn’t possible before.
- I have been working on a list of AI tools that would be useful for “thinking” or analyzing a piece of writing. Things like: analyze the assumptions in this piece; find related concepts with genealogical links; check if this idea is original or not; rephrase this argument as a series of Socratic dialogues. And so on. This kind of thing has been immensely helpful in evaluating my own personal essays and ideas, and prior to AI tools it, again, was not really possible unless I hired someone to critique my work.
The key for both of these example use cases is that I have absolutely no expectation of perfection. I don’t expect the AI images or text to be free of errors. The point is to use them as messy, creative tools that open up possibilities and unconsidered angles, not to do all the work for you.
It was written after the author attended a workshop where the presenter tried and seemingly failed to show how AI was able to write essays when prompted with the word "innovative" or produce a podcast on a book. The author also mentions an article by a university lecturer who claims that "Human interaction is not as important to today’s students" and that AI will basically replace it.
The subtitle of the article is "AI cannot save us from the effort of learning to live and die."
In other words, the article is about a specific trend in higher education to present AI as some sort of revolutionary tool that will completely change the way students learn.
The author disagrees and contends that pretending to replace most human interactions with genAI is a gimmick, and pretending that AI can make learning effortless is lying to students.
The way you use AI for learning language is certainly imaginative but you are not claiming that it replaces the quality of interacting with native speakers or possibly immersion in the culture. Your tool may be useful and clever but claiming it makes learning language effortless (as some AI apologists in education might) would make it a gimmick.