We control technology. It does not control us.

PantherNOW Editorial Board

Most of us procrastinate on our assignments until the last hour it’s due. You can either submit a poorly-written paper or do nothing. Either way, you would later suffer the consequences of a bad grade. 

But, thanks to ChatGPT, you only submit a prompt and marvel at the powers of the chatbot as it does your assignment for you. 

The world of artificial intelligence lured young college students with the prospect of completing their arduous homework. College professors, however, foresee the vanishment of critical thinking in writing and other skills. We recognize its growing importance in the lives of many students, but we caution against overreliance. 

In that regard, the chatbot fills a need we cannot ignore. Writing can be a challenge for some – Understandably, people resort to all forms of assistance to perform what they lack.

Technology makes our lives easier, as it removes the fear of mistakes. Grammarly, another form of AI, is a writing assistant that points out grammatical errors and suggests alternatives to make our texts concise. ChatGPT, on the other hand, does your assignment outright. 

Based on the number of fake citations reported by its users, it’s clear the chatbot only writes the result of your prompt and cannot go deeper than that. 

ChatGPT won’t doom writing as an activity. Research by two economics students at MIT found that it can turn bad writers into better ones. However, even then, you must be cautious as it can generate a string of inaccuracies. 

As the engine undergoes further sophistication, we must understand that this may deteriorate our writing capabilities. We may not be able to explore these parts of our imagination because the excessive use of AI weakens our creativity. It’s vital to remember that essays and other writing assignments shape and cultivate our skills in the workforce.

Additionally, there exist tools that detect ChatGPT text. 

As we cross this new frontier, we must resist the urge to use the chatbot. 

In the future, many industries will use the engine, which may encourage workers to rely on it. And eventually, AI will be the preferred tool, and we’ll be replaced because of it.

We shouldn’t use ChatGPT for the bulk of our work. This machine should polish our skills, not substitute them. 

Though these statements may seem apocalyptic, they are reminders that we rule technologies. They do not control us.