GenAI and Critical Thinking / Problem-Solving Skills

Artificial Intelligence Leadership

George Freeman Thought Leader | Author | Architect| Florida, United States

In an age (now and into the future) where expert knowledge and generated content are at our children’s, youth’s, and young adults’ fingertips, critical thinking and problem-solving skills will likely take a backseat to the satisfaction of an instantly sourced answer or customized essay or dissertation from GenAI-based tooling.

When realistically, the need for these skills will become even more vital as the quality of interrogable knowledge deteriorates due to AI-based frameworks iteratively consuming the whole of knowledge diversity, including existing and newly compiled content loosely derived from GenAI into models that again are interrogatively consumed and the cycle repeats.

Unfortunately, without extreme controls, which would be problematic in and of itself, the above pattern will result in the dithering of resolved knowledge and the obfuscation of fact, requiring the consumer to leverage critical thinking / problem-solving skills to distill the truth (far beyond the needs of today)—but will the consumer of the future have these skills?

Here are my questions:
- Do you view this setup as a plausible outcome?
- What are the likely impacts if this is the slippery slope to a future society that lacks challenge-based skills?
- What, if anything, should we do to mitigate this possibility?

Posted: Mar 11, 2024 10:00 PM

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Kiron Bondale Retired | Mentor| Retired Welland, Ontario, Canada

George -

This is not a problem unique to GenAI as it existed previously at a lower level of impact with Internet searches. I would also think that over time, GenAI products will be trained on some sort of a weighted source basis where the weighting increases based on the perceived quality of the source. We are experiencing the typical challenges of the very early stages of a disruptive product introduction.

If anything, I feel that this presents an opportunity to replace memorization-based learning with problem solving or critical thinking-based approaches. Such skills will be needed to effectively generate input data (including prompts) and results from AI and non-AI tools.

Einstein's attributed quote about spending 55 minutes of an hour thinking about a problem comes to mind, except as AI tools become more capable, it will be 59.5 minutes thinking about and iterating on the description of the problem and .5 minutes to feed it to the AI tool!

Kiron

Posted: Mar 12, 2024 7:53 AM

SHADAV MOHAMMAD ANSARI PMO| ITC INFOTECH INDIA PVT. Ltd. New Delhi, Delhi, India

Hi,

Plausibility of the Setup: Yes, the setup you've outlined is plausible. As AI technologies advance, there's a growing reliance on instant access to information and automated content generation. This can potentially lead to a decreased emphasis on critical thinking and problem-solving skills among younger generations.

Likely Impacts: If this trend continues unchecked, it could have significant negative impacts on society. Firstly, there could be a decline in the quality of knowledge as AI-generated content may lack nuance and context. This could lead to misinformation and the spread of falsehoods, eroding trust in information sources.

Mitigation Strategies: To mitigate this possibility, several steps can be taken:Education Reform ,Ethical AI Development, Promoting Lifelong Learning , Community Engagement etc..

Posted: Mar 12, 2024 8:01 AM

Sergio Luis Conte Helping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based Organizations Buenos Aires, Argentina

No problem to use generative AI. Generative Ai will not generate a solution. Will generate different solutions with a chance of success. Adding to add, if you want to use generative Ai for problem solving then you have to prompt it in a predefined format to get a quality result. The format will demand you have knowledge about the critical thinking path.

Posted: Mar 21, 2024 5:42 AM

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GenAI and Critical Thinking / Problem-Solving Skills

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