Comment by subhobroto | Hacker News Reader

Comment by subhobroto | Hacker News Reader

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> allowing students to write their assessments with the help of LLMs changes the students’ depth of understanding, as well as their ability to synthesize, formalize, and drum up their own arguments and objections

indeed but LLMs improve these capabilities. Let me explain:

Most educators behave as if using an LLM robs the student of their ability to think. That has not and never been my experience.

You can just tell an LLM to debate, find out inconsistencies and issues in your writing, and challenge you, and it will very well do that!

LLMs for me, cheaply replace teachers who can barely be accessed during office hours because they are so busy doing research or overwhelmed with grading coursework.

In a typical educational setup, I might have half an hour at best with a teacher who looks kindly upon me, and at worst, five minutes with a teacher who doesn't like being around me. An LLM has no emotion, but it has knowledge, it has inference rules, and it has the ability to push back, debate, and find out inconsistencies, bugs and gaps in my thinking.

Behavior that is exactly what I need consistently, in a good teacher.

A frontier LLM is a good teacher who doesn't play games, has no emotion, infinite patience and always available for $20/mo.

> You can just tell an LLM to debate, find out inconsistencies and issues in your writing, and challenge you, and it will very well do that!

Sure, but the point is that you are supposed to be able to find these inconsistencies and issues in your writing. That is the skill.

Indeed, LLMs can be helpful as an alternative to a teacher, if thought of as a sophist (I have even done research on this [0]). But that is not the approach you are proposing.

If you want students to be able to reason about these things on their own, then LLMs doing the hard work of identifying the gaps in their logic is counter-intuitive.

[0]: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-98197-5_31

I honestly don't understand what we're discussing/debating? It feels like you think I'm countering your postition but I'm not.

I'm tired of people echoing a common trope that somehow LLMs replace critical thinking or steal learning opportunities from students - they do the opposite. They provide students more opportunities to sharpen their critical thinking and democratize learning.

In your parent post (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49225068), you asserted that "These are all useful skills, even in a post-LLM world.": I agreed with you, and proposed that you could use an LLM to debate you and furthur hone that skill because you certainly don't have unlimited time with a skilled human teacher but for $20/mo, you could debate a frontier model as long as you're awake, all day long.

Your research seems to be supporting what I just said, does it not?

> Indeed, LLMs can be helpful as an alternative to a teacher, if thought of as a sophist (I have even done research on this [0]). But that is not the approach you are proposing.

What according to you, did I propose instead?

I also need further clarification on the term "sophist", because in the US and the UK, it means a person who is "misusing" logic and attempting to deceive their opponents using trickery instead of an honest debate that centers around the objective truth. Their sole objective is to "win" a debate rather than appreciate debate itself or the merits of the topic itself. I believe, even in ancient history, Plato heavily criticized them.

For example: If we were debating whether child labor is wrong, a sophist who was put in a position "for" the topic would then argue there are good reasons why child labor is good. A "true" debator would concede that they could not support child labor and would not debate for the topic.

Is that what you meant by the term "sophist"? Or does "sophist" mean a "Debate Coach" or "Instructor of Rhetoric" or "teacher who excels in the art of debating"? If you meant "Debate Coach" but it sounds too simplistic, may I propose we use "Forensics Instructor" - because the term "sophist" in modern English certainly doesn't communicate that and its use will lead to confusion.

> then LLMs doing the hard work of identifying the gaps in their logic is counter-intuitive

Your use of the phrase "counter-intuitive" is unclear to me. Do you mean to say that:

1. it's actually a good idea that can certainly provide great outcomes but doesn't occur to a lot of people, or

2. that it's not a good idea at all because it just doesn't work?

3. something else?

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