AI and the Question
What do to with it?
eyesonbrasil/Mike Friedrichsen
Rio de Janeiro, 2 sept. 2026– Between “F*** AI” and the plan to hijack an AI, send it into the past and destroy the evil AI before it develops its own consciousness – probably in the style of Terminator 2.
Ronny Chieng’s Harvard speech actually hides a very clever thought. You just have to listen carefully to recognize the punchlines.
His main point: AI makes the mediocre in particular dumber, while it becomes a real lever for those who already have enough intellectual “escape velocity”. In other words, if you don’t master the basics, the AI doesn’t give you a shortcut, but an excuse.
This is pretty much in line with what the MIT study on “cognitive debt” from excessive LLM use he cites describes. And then there’s this Buddhism story:
His friend lets the AI summarize “Buddhism Made Simple” in 10 seconds and then enlightenment: none.
This is exactly the point we must not forget in digital education: “The creating is the fun part.” If you let the thought process be completely taken care of, you not only “speedrun” Buddhism, but also your own development: shortcut taken, goal missed.
For us at the German University of Digital Science, this is more than just a good laugh on the sidelines. For us, digital teaching does not mean taking the thinking off the students’ hands, but using AI in such a way that they can delve deeper into the topic and not simply click past it.
Chieng’s conclusion “substance versus shallow knowledge, mastery versus faking it” could almost be hung as a guiding principle over our teaching model. However, without the space Terminator rescue mission at the end…
Mike Friedrichsen/ eyesonbrasil
