On May 27th, Olya Kudina from TU Delft will deliver a lecture on the meaningful integration of generative AI in university education. The lecture is organized by the Department of Philosophy but is open to all who are interested. Teachers, staff and students from all Faculties are welcome to join the lecture and the discussion afterwards. Registration beforehand is appreciated.

Large Language Models (LLMs), such as ChatGPT or LaMDA are often presented as a breakthrough in AI because of their ability to write convincing texts in a matter of seconds and when presented only with a short opening sentence. In education specifically, there are concerns about LLMs displacing the opportunities for critical reasoning through the act of writing and the consequent pedagogical challenges in this regard. In this presentation, I explore the critical appropriation of LLMs in higher education. Theoretically, I will follow the lenses of technological mediation and sociotechnical systems approach to explore the potential impact of LLMs on the value of education. First, I will survey the technological background of LLMs and the students' emerging reactions to this technology before proceeding with the ethical analysis. Here, I will focus on the appearance of intelligence, misinformation risks, bias, and the ecological sustainability aspects of using LLMs in the classroom. The paper will draw on a case study of using ChatGPT in philosophy-related classes and other empirical data on using LLMs in education. I will not only focus on concerns but also present a range of opportunities for the educational context, as well as suggest several ways of how to approach LLMs in higher education from a perspective of human-AI collaboration and sustainable integration.

Olya Kudina is assistant professor in ethics of technology at TU Delft. Her research focuses on the dynamic interaction between values and technologies, and aims to accompany technological development with ethical reflection and cultural sensitivity as essential counterparts. To this end, her philosophic work is inspired by (post)phenomenology, Dewey’s pragmatism, and bioethics and integrates qualitative empirical methods from STS and psychology. Olya’s recent research explores the responsible use and design of Natural Language Processing and Automatic Speech Recognition algorithms, with applications in voice assistants such as Alexa and conversational agents such as ChatGPT. She is co-director of the AI DeMoS Lab that focuses on the relation between AI and democracy, and responsible AI development practices. She is also co-editor of the Journal of Human-Technology Relations.

27 May 2024

14:30-16:30 

City Campus UAntwerp

Rodestraat 14 - 2000 Antwerp

Hall: R.008

Registration: anthony.longo@uantwerpen.be​