What is “chatGPT”
I don’t think chatGPT needs much of an introduction. It entered in our lives in late November and it is not going to go away for a long while now. It allows user to write some prompts and get a Natural Language model to answer in any language an to pretty much any question that he get posed.
In one way or another, most of us has come into contact with this “AI” Fanta scientific technology coming from the future. This is the trajectory we are going to follow for the next years. If there are 20 “Megatrends” well AI is going to lead them all.
But enough with speculations, I wanted to share my thoughts on the ethic of using such tools in every day life and where might the boundaries be, from using it to sharpen our knowledge or to fake being smart and pretend to be someone else.
Therefore I asked to the direct interested one. ChatGPT.
The input
“Is it ethical for a student to use chatGPT, in order to write faster motivational letters, and draft of emails in order to save time to concentrate more on other creative stuff, research and in general other more interesting stuff, given that is not counterproductive? Another example would be to write a motivational letter to enter a course in which he has a lot of interest but too many things to do for preparing a well written and professional text”
The answer
It is ultimately up to the individual to decide whether using a tool like ChatGPT to write motivational letters or emails is ethical. However, it is important to consider the potential consequences of using such a tool. If the student’s use of ChatGPT results in a letter or email that is not their own work and does not accurately reflect their own thoughts and writing abilities, it could be considered plagiarism and may lead to disciplinary action. Additionally, if the student relies too heavily on ChatGPT and does not put in the effort to improve their own writing skills, they may not be adequately prepared for future academic or professional writing tasks. Ultimately, it’s best to use these tools as a tool to help you and not a replacement of your own efforts and skills.
Well
The answer is sharp and concise.
If the student’s use of ChatGPT results in a letter or email that is not their own work and does not accurately reflect their own thoughts and writing abilities, it could be considered plagiarism and may lead to disciplinary action.
This short phrase, collects all my thoughts and showcase them in the most brilliant form. The reflection of our own abilities can really be seen in a text, but mostly our actions and things we did and that we take as ours.
What my grandmother thinks
I have talked about this tool with my grandmother and as always when I talk about technology she feels far away from this witchcrafts. She said something interesting thought that can be taken as a starting point of some thoughts flow. She said and I quote:
Everything great is done by people, just like you and if you want to do something great it has to come from yourself.
She is literally afraid of what technology can do even if she acknowledges what good has been brought by innovations. Having said that she doesn’t want to have to do with such things, she is too old to learn.
Finally me
In the end I don’t have any answer in this world, yet(?), but something I can tell for sure. If the goal is to go from A to B, you might decide to get by bike, by foot or even by car. I think is ultimately up to us to choose the method in which we reach any goal. Surely it has to be consistent to our thoughts, and just because we have a car and therefore we can visit all the places in a year that will take a lifetime to do by foot, means we are better off. We just had a different journey, maybe it was even worst then the second person’s one. I hope you can see the analogy here.
The goal and the end of a person has to stay the same, with time this tool will allow to get there, with less risks, maybe even faster and with some different path. Ultimately is the goal we reach that fulfil ourselves and the journey we took there, definitely not the tools used.
If we can learn during the process, always be integrity with ourselves and never faking our abilities and accomplishments, it will become irrelevant which tools are we using and why.
I am no Oracle
This is how I came to think now, but I am very curios about other’s prospective and ideas. Let’s create a healthy discussion in the comments.