The question
Where is the line between using a tool and not doing the work?
Scenarios — allowed, not allowed, or “it depends”?
- Asking an AI to explain photosynthesis in simpler words
- Asking it to write your lab conclusion
- Asking it to check your arithmetic
- Asking it to find sources on climate impacts in Nunavut
- Asking it to rewrite your paragraph more clearly
- Asking it to generate data because your lab failed
Number 6 is unambiguous. The rest are worth arguing about.
My position, for the record
Tools that help you understand are welcome. Tools that replace your thinking defeat the purpose of being here. Scenario 1 helps you think; scenario 2 skips it entirely. Scenario 5 sits in the middle, and depends on whether you could have written it yourself.
Whatever you use, say so and say how. See Finding and Citing Sources.
The practical problem
AI systems produce confident, fluent, wrong answers — including invented citations that look completely real. Checking is not optional. In this class, an unchecked citation is treated the same as a made-up one.
Curriculum connection
A2.2
describe how scientific innovations and emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence systems, impact society and careers
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