Google Ultra (now "Advanced") is Old News: Our Parens Patriae Obligation to Develop Students for a world of AI agents, limitless energy, and uncertain employment

It's time to start preparing our students

TLDR

*Google’s Gemini
*Closer to Agents
*Transformations in economics and energy
*Debate

Today, Google released Gemini, its ChatGPT4 competitor.

Many of its new capabilities are now available in Bard (bard.google.com), so those who have been using Bard will see significant improvements. There is also an upgrade version—Gemini Advanced—that you can access for $20/month (the first two months are free, so you can try it out).

Google released it today, but they announced it in December. At that time, they said it was competitive with ChatGPT4 (with marginal improvements). Some examples in this post by Ethan Mollick, who had early access, suggest that this is accurate.

So, it’s sort of a big deal, but it’s a little bit of a “ho-hum:” We have similar capabilities elsewhere including in Open Source models (Mistrial is close on these benchmarks)).

The update to the free Bard/now Gemini that any student can use without paying may be more significant.

More Significant: We are much closer to AI Agents

The Information (and OpenAI has been claiming since November that this is coming): "Open AI is developing a form of agent software to automate complex tasks by effectively taking over a customer's device. The customer could then ask the GPT to transfer data from a document or spreadsheet for analysis, for instance, or to *automatically fill out expense reports and enter them into accounting software.* Those kinds of requests would *trigger the agent to perform the clicks, cursor movements, text typing, and other actions humans take with the different apps.*

Andrew Ng says these agents can already operate autonomously for at least 30 minutes, and this is just the beginning. Mustafa Suleyman originally said this would take 3-5 years; we *could* have these working the way he imagines them in 1-2 years.

[Take a minute and imagine what you and/or your students could do with these agents}.

The debate over jobs will continue. Net gain? Net loss? Who knows for sure, but I think it’s safe to say we are headed for at least greater transition unemployment than we saw at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, with the “Luddites” wanting to keep their jobs. This is all the more likely because study after study says students are not leaving K-16 with the skills they need to succeed in this world (durable/soft skills + AI skills).

Energy Transformation

The transition to an AI world is not the only technological challenge we are facing.

The development of fusion energy will not only provide the energy necessary to support a world where AI is infused (we couldn’t support significant AGI without a change in energy systems even if we completely ignored the environmental consequences), but it will trigger a radical economic transformation.

Countries such as Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Russia, and the UAU remain largely dependent on oil exports.

Do we want Russia to disintegrate?
What immigration challenges will the US face if Venezuela’s economy collapses?

The world is starting to experience an era of enormous change, and society does not always handle change so well.

Our Students

Our students will live in a world nothing like ours. While most will benefit from radical advances in health care that are supported by AI, AI will deliver massive disruption to the economic system, present many challenges, and introduce significant uncertainty. And interacting with machines that are a lot smarter than us will just be strange.

We have a responsibility to help them prepare for this world.

In K–16 education, we operate under the doctrine of “parens patriae.” which means “parent of the nation" in Latin. This empowers the state with a parental role, entrusting it with the responsibility to safeguard the welfare and rights of minors, particularly within the realm of K-12 education. It underscores the state's duty to act in the best interest of children, guaranteeing that educational policies and practices are aligned with their needs for development and protection.

The doctrine of parens patriae has been invoked in several U.S. Supreme Court cases to justify limitations on students' rights within the educational context, emphasizing the state's role in safeguarding the welfare and safety of its students.

The Court established that students retain their right to free speech in schools unless it disrupts the educational process, highlighting the balance between student freedoms and the school's operational needs. Following this, New Jersey v. T.L.O. (1985) allowed for searches of students' belongings with reasonable suspicion rather than probable cause, emphasizing the prioritization of safety and order within the educational setting over individual privacy rights. Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier (1988) further clarified the school's authority by permitting the censorship of student newspapers for reasons tied to legitimate educational concerns, thus reinforcing the school's control over student-led expressions in school-sponsored activities.

This doctrine can be conveniently used to justify more and more control over students, but it also creates a responsibility to prepare our students for a world where they will spend their days with machine intelligence tools that are substantially smarter than they are in many ways?

What are we doing to help prepare students for this world?

What are you doing?

Debate is always a good place to start.

Where are you starting?