> A class of schoolchildren here in Paris was sitting a test when a pupil dropped his phone. The kids had handed in their phones on entering the classroom, but this boy had a second one. It is claimed the supervisors let him pick it up and continue using ChatGPT to answer questions. French rules say he should have been banned from taking the baccalauréat, the final school exams. The school fears that if it did that, it would have to bar half the class. This is education in the age of artificial intelligence.

It really feels like this anecdote, especially as it is the opening paragraph, requires a source.

So what if half the classed were barred? What are school and exams for anyway, if you’re just going to let everyone cheat and pass?

There is an old Egyptian tale of Theuth, the inventor of writing, showing his invention to the god Thamus, who told him that he would only spoil men’s memories and take away their understandings. From this tale, of which young Athens will probably make fun, may be gathered the lesson that writing is inferior to speech. For it is like a picture, which can give no answer to a question, and has only a deceitful likeness of a living creature. It has no power of adaptation, but uses the same words for all. It is not a legitimate son of knowledge, but a bastard —- Plato, Phaedrus

Beginning with writing. Or not.