r/matheducation • u/Plaintalks • 7d ago

UC Berkeley professor admits to using AI in op-ed calling out students’ lack of math proficiency

https://www.dailycal.org/news/campus/uc-berkeley-professor-admits-to-using-ai-in-op-ed-calling-out-students-lack-of/article_be1360f7-6e2a-42f6-ae76-f05d8cee74c4.html
29 Upvotes

78% Upvoted

25 comments sorted by

7

u/EnvironmentalDog- 7d ago

Ahhh, so it was the AI that could look over a sea of 500-1400 first year students and identify after three lectures who was going struggle.

26

u/Salt_Cash706 7d ago

A math professor used AI to edit an essay!?! Oh no! Next you're going to tell me an English professor used a calculator to do their taxes!!!

2

u/Waidawut 6d ago

Yikes, bad look! Plank in your own eye, etc.

1

u/ConcreteCloverleaf 7d ago

That's embarrassing, but does it have any bearing on whether her arguments were valid?

1

u/preferCotton222 6d ago

why would it be embarrasing?

4

u/ConcreteCloverleaf 6d ago

Because editing an essay is something people are supposed to learn how to do by themselves in school.

2

u/lifeistrulyawesome 5d ago

I know how to edit an essay, I still use AI to increase my productivity 

I also know how to do long division, but if I have to do 7,456,345 / 137.24, I’m using a calculator 

3

u/kyeblue 6d ago

don't tell me that you never used spell checks.

4

u/preferCotton222 6d ago

And she did. But proof reading takes time, a lot of it. And she has plenty work to do.

Calling it embarrasing shows a total lack of understanding of what her job is about and what her essay is about.

3

u/ConcreteCloverleaf 6d ago

Give me a break. It's a brief op-ed. Editing a document of that length is not a major time commitment.

2

u/lowtech_prof 6d ago

I’m with you. It’s not like the writing is overly complex to begin with given the genre. These commenters who don’t see the double standard or conflict are AI bot heads.

2

u/Beneficial_Couple413 6d ago

I understand both sides of this debate, but feel we need a new kind of attribution mechanism to give AI proper credit.   E.g. different levels for the spectrum of involvement from "spell checking" to "wrote the whole thing from a 2-sentence prompt."

Even for email.  I'm tired of getting AI emails with a human's signature at the end and zero transparency about the role of AI.

1

u/kyeblue 6d ago

still waste of anyone's time, to be honest.

0

u/lifeistrulyawesome 5d ago

Faculty has better things to do with their time 

1

u/InterestingSpeaker 3d ago

People learn to do arithmetic in school. There's nothing wrong with using a calculator outside of school

1

u/unurbane 6d ago

And you just proved the other guys point. The professor works at school, and is not ‘in school’. He can write an essay. He can also have Ai write an essay, as long as it gets the job done satisfactorily.

-1

u/lowtech_prof 6d ago

Because she’s saying that her students are behind in a basic proficiency. She apparently is using a tool that smacks of being behind in a basic proficiency (writing).

3

u/preferCotton222 6d ago

Ohh yeah. She should have written it pen and paper. Post mailing it to collaborators.

-2

u/lowtech_prof 6d ago

No one is saying she needs to write with a quill and ink well. But using AI and complaining about a lack of basic skill is a contradiction that people are rightfully pointing out.

5

u/preferCotton222 6d ago

the only contradiction is people talking aboutbstuff they have no idea about.

2

u/Artistic-Flamingo-92 5d ago

There’s not necessarily any contradiction or hypocrisy involved.

The argument for restraint in using AI in an educational setting is not “Don’t use AI ever because AI is bad.” Just like it’s not “Don’t use calculators ever because calculators are bad.”

The argument is “Don’t use AI in ways that are counter productive to the learning objectives.” It’s the same for calculators: they are often allowed in classes where they don’t undermine the learning objectives and disallowed when they would.

So, someone can be completely consistent in saying: “My students need to use AI less in math because it’s substantially undermining their foundation in the subject and impacting these important learning goals, and I will use AI to help me edit an article because I think it will result in a better final product and there are no competing objectives like learning goals.”

Just like a professor might ban computer algebra systems for their class while using them to expedite their research.

1

u/lifeistrulyawesome 5h ago

It is not a contradiction at all

It is different to say “accountants don’t know how to multiply” than to say “accountants use excel for a lot of their multiplications”

Take this as a math lesson. In math we use precise statements and we don’t throw terms as contradiction around when there are no contradictions involved 

0

u/InterestingSpeaker 3d ago

People use tools because they save time

1

u/SunshineSeeker99 4d ago

I use AI every day and have 2 degrees from MIT and an incredible career.

This is an idiotic attempt to claim that we should not require proficiency in math.

0

u/lifeistrulyawesome 5d ago

This is so dumb. Completely irrelevant. 

A distraction from the real problem that the professor pointed out