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Comment by comicjk | Hacker News Reader

Computers have been able to do arithmetic faster, better, and cheaper than humans for decades. But we still teach children to do arithmetic, and grade them on how well they do it (almost never as well as a computer). Why? Because doing more useful and creative math is a lot easier if you can do a little arithmetic.

The purpose of college essays has never been the quality of the product. The purpose is to have students practice so that, when they really do have to convey something in writing, they can convey it well. If an idea exists only in my head, it will take a very long time for an essay-writing bot to write it for me.

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> The purpose is to have students practice so that, when they really do have to convey something in writing, they can convey it well.

Then have a human grade it. Have personalized feedback instead of a cookie-cutter grading that's just another data collection scheme + some basic keyword matching to catch stupid mistakes.

Speaking from experience, the person that writes best code (in terms of both raw quality and readability) also seem to write the best docs.

Maybe teaching essays are sideways to efficient communication?

Although we have machines that now cut and bind books, the best book binding (and most aesthetic) are done by hand by enthusiasts on, e.g., Reddit. Moreover, such book binders don't feel threatened by machines, I would think, like how people who do DIY do it because they like it, rather than because they have to do it.

Even if an AI can write an essay, that would not stop me from writing. Essays have another important dimension, which is that of creativity and the message. I think the only real relevance is in the context of school work, outside of that I don't think the AI's ability is that important. People are intelligent already, and competition between writers or the general tendency to influence each other sometimes is even a good thing.

Is it possible you have cause and effect reversed? I received this as "learning to code well can also teach good communication skills"

I think you're right - an essay should communicate a key thought, broken down in logical steps, coherently tied together. This is important for a whole host of skills.

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