Living by Proxy in the Age of AI

As the fall semester approaches, professors are wondering how they should respond to the use of AI, especially ChatGPT, both in and outside the classroom. I have been mulling over this question since OpenAI launched the chatbot last November. Like many, I felt frustrated and confused. Should I ignore the new technology? Ban it? Should I punish students for using it? I concluded that I wasn’t going to waste time disciplining students who resort, or may have resorted, to AI. The algorithm that is supposed to detect cheating is not entirely reliable, at least not yet, and it can be difficult in some cases to identify whether a text is written by ChatGPT. As such, it seems impractical to enforce certain policies at this time. But this does not mean that students who cheat will not suffer the consequences of their actions.