Discussion
“Teachers who use AI ‘will replace those who don’t’, the chair of the Oireachtas committee on artificial intelligence has warned.
Fianna Fáil TD Malcolm Byrne said he was worried Ireland was at risk of falling behind in discussions around how AI can be ‘responsibly integrated into our formal education system.’”
Fianna Fáil TD Malcolm Byrne is a fool who doesn’t have the first clue about what he’s taking about.
@aral It's a threat, no?
@aral it's becoming more and more obvious to me as a teacher that we need to teach kids how to use AI responsibly, how to check if what they are seeing is real.brfore sharing it. We need to be having discussions about the ethics of it, both in relation to climate and copyright infringement as well as about the ethics and natural consequences of trying to pass off AI work as their own. Ignoring it and hoping it goes away, or punishing kids for using it is doing them a disservice as educators.
@aral I worked with Irish Govt for about 11 years now. Every single politician I met was a career twonk and every election they just play musical chairs.
Any AI implementation will be just another half arsed project delivered over budget and way past deadlines.
I urge anyone thinking it's a good idea to look at systemic failures of government that refuses to deal with multiple crises but has time to blab about this. It should be a non starter.
@aral I'm so tired of this BS in Ireland. Textbook FOMO, of the absolute worst kind. Just want to be part of the destructive zeitgeist however possible.
@aral I thought you might like to know that I called Malcolm Byrne's office yesterday, after a little bit of digging. I didn't speak to him directly:
- I asked if Mr. Byrne is aware of the abhorrent contradiction between his embrace of AI in education and his role as a Climate and Environment spokesperson for Fianna Fáil.
- I questioned why Mr. Byrne is choosing to ignore key information from the committee he chairs. Specifically, on November 18th, a speaker named Dan McQuillan spoke in the committee of how AI in education would be detrimental to truth and democracy. (@danmcquillan notes: https://www.danmcquillan.org/irish_parliament_opening_statement.html)
- I asked if he is aware of the large, organized resistance to the uncritical adoption of AI in education. His comments suggest that teachers are uninvolved or unaware.
- I raised the issue of his conversations with data center developers, such as Echelon, in his constituency. I wanted to know if his support for AI in education is linked to these business interests.
- I also challenged the framing of his comments. While the article presents his views as those of the committee chair, I informed his office that I have records from other committee members, including Paul Murphy TD, indicating that these statements do not represent the actual views of the committee.
His response is in the image below.
@aral @danmcquillan let it be known that the reporter from the Irish Independent did not have much else to comment. The statements were from an interview conducted during the TUI conference in Kilkenny, which is ongoing I believe.
I got a statement from Paul Murphy's office that confirmed that "[these] are indeed wild statements made by Malcolm Byrne and do not reflect the views of the AI committee. [...] much of the committee is very critical of such statements and the government's general disregard of the consequences of AI implementation and replacement of critical roles in society."
These statements by Mr Byrne do need to be seen as an abuse of power in the role of the Chair of the Committee, and we must continue to trust in the proceedings of Oireachtas Committees.
@colm @danmcquillan Thank you for following up with this.
💕
@aral I thought you might like to know that I called Malcolm Byrne's office yesterday, after a little bit of digging. I didn't speak to him directly:
- I asked if Mr. Byrne is aware of the abhorrent contradiction between his embrace of AI in education and his role as a Climate and Environment spokesperson for Fianna Fáil.
- I questioned why Mr. Byrne is choosing to ignore key information from the committee he chairs. Specifically, on November 18th, a speaker named Dan McQuillan spoke in the committee of how AI in education would be detrimental to truth and democracy. (@danmcquillan notes: https://www.danmcquillan.org/irish_parliament_opening_statement.html)
- I asked if he is aware of the large, organized resistance to the uncritical adoption of AI in education. His comments suggest that teachers are uninvolved or unaware.
- I raised the issue of his conversations with data center developers, such as Echelon, in his constituency. I wanted to know if his support for AI in education is linked to these business interests.
- I also challenged the framing of his comments. While the article presents his views as those of the committee chair, I informed his office that I have records from other committee members, including Paul Murphy TD, indicating that these statements do not represent the actual views of the committee.
His response is in the image below.
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