UNIVERSITY REVOLUTION: Artificial Intelligence and the Transformation of Learning, AI...ugh

UNIVERSITY REVOLUTION: Artificial Intelligence and the Transformation of Learning
KEVIN P. HALLINAN
Self-publisher (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$9.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3* of five

The Publisher Says: AI is reshaping education—are universities ready to evolve? The future of education is here, and AI is changing the way we teach, learn, and measure understanding.

Higher education stands at a turning point. AI is transforming classrooms, offering personalized learning, expanding access to knowledge, and reshaping the role of educators.

As AI advances, universities cling to outdated models instead of embracing its potential to improve education. A system built for today’s learners would use AI to strengthen learning, not replace it.

In University Revolution, Dr. Kevin Hallinan explores how AI is already transforming learning at every level, from early education to higher education and beyond.

AI isn’t something to fear—it’s a chance to rethink how we connect with students, support teachers, and prepare learners for a changing world. This shift is already underway. Whether you’re a teacher, administrator, parent, or student, this book offers valuable insights into the future of education.

If you enjoyed Brave New Words by Salman Khan {another rah-rah-AI tome, non-affiliate Amazon link}, don’t miss this timely and thought-provoking exploration of AI’s role in shaping the future of learning. The classroom is evolving—are we evolving with it?

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My Review: The author's Amazon bio, clearly sourced from here:

Dr. Kevin Hallinan is Emeritus Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Dayton and Director of Impact Mining at Synota.io, where he advances solar micro-grids and AI-driven eduction in sub-Saharan Africa. A NASA researcher early in his career, he later founded UD's ETHOS program and Renewable and Clean Energy Program, focusing on engineering for social impact. Known for pioneering transdisciplinary learning, his recent work explores big data, machine learning, and the role of AI in education. This book reflects his ongoing experiments with equitable AI. All proceeds support the AI 4 All movement.

His website, linked from University of Dayton's page for him (linked above) contains a tab entitled "My AI Agents."

This gent is a true believer. I don't agree with him on the uses of AI in education. Work harder for it than you've ever worked in your life is more my speed. However, he is aware of problems that normies have with AI's developers' theft of intellectual property enough to have an AI Agent called "Ethical AI Mentor". I myownself do not believe such a concept carries any meaning whatsoever until all AI developers assign all...100%...of all past and future income from any and all sources, personal or professional, to a reparations fund that fully supports artists, journalists, writers, actors, and ad-copy-writing hacks...but zero for executives, investors, or other capitalists...the world over, to the AI thieves' desired standard of living while they subsist in The Felonious Yam's Salvadoran prisons with no internet access.

That being up there with guillotines for billionaires in the likelihood sweeps, realistic acceptance of the way LLMs are going to be used demands understanding what the plan is for that use.

There isn't one. There's about a hundred. Flood the field, boys, pick their pockets while they're whirling around in confusion!

Making yourself aware of the parameters of the grift and what a possible decent case for use and development of it is can very profitably start here. This gent clearly thinks there's a case for moving ahead in this direction, believing the owners of AI will actually allow fair and equitable access to the technology, and allow it to close massive advantage gaps that it could undeniably do. That being the same kind of naïve thinking that gave us engagement maximization algorithms back in the "internet can be good" era, I'm confident crushing regulatory burdens and confiscatory levels of taxation around the globe are clearly going to be required to stop this hideous future from coming to be.

As that would require actual forethought and cooperation among nations, I suppose the thieves are safe. I refer you the the UN for an example of what this concept looks like.

Being a tiny, trivially easy to swat nobody, I expect to be targeted and punished for daring not to be on board with this crap. If I vanish, you'll know why.

SUPREMACY: AI, ChatGPT, and the Race that Will Change the World, but will it be for the better?

SUPREMACY: AI, ChatGPT, and the Race that Will Change the World
PARMY OLSON
St. Martin's Press
$30.00 harcover, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: In November of 2022, a webpage was posted online with a simple text box. It was an AI chatbot called ChatGPT, and was unlike any app people had used before. It was more human than a customer service agent, more convenient than a Google search. Behind the scenes, battles for control and prestige between the world’s two leading AI firms, OpenAI and DeepMind, who now steers Google's AI efforts, has remained elusive—until now.

In Supremacy, Olson, tech writer at Bloomberg, tells the astonishing story of the battle between these two AI firms, their struggles to use their tech for good, and the hazardous direction they could go as they serve two tech monopolies whose power is unprecedented in history. The story focuses on the continuing rivalry of two key CEOs at the center of it all, who cultivated a religion around their mission to build god-like super intelligent machines: Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, and Demis Hassabis, the CEO of DeepMind.

Supremacy sharply alerts readers to the real threat of artificial intelligence that its top creators are ignoring: the profit-driven spread of flawed and biased technology into industries, education, media and more. With exclusive access to a network of high-ranking sources, Parmy Olson uses her 13 years of experience covering technology to bring to light the exploitation of the greatest invention in human history, and how it will impact us all.

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My Review: I urge you to read this book. It does not matter what your politics are, It especially does not matter if you care even a scintilla about technology. This is not a book about the way these...people, I must be polite...are making their dream of an AGI happen, it's about the people doing it, the people giving them the money to do it, and how all of those pieces are failing to do a good job for Humanity. It's important to know what is happening, you are already getting "AI-assisted" stuff advertised to you and no smallest advisory, still less a warning, about what that means.

I strongly urge you to read this book. Before the election if possible, but soon no matter what.

Please.

CONFESSIONS OF AN ECONOMIC HIT MAN (3rd edition)...still infuriating after twenty years, maybe even more

CONFESSIONS OF AN ECONOMIC HIT MAN (3rd edition)
JOHN PERKINS
Berrett-Koehler Publishers
$21.95 trade paper, available now

Rating: 5* of five

The Publisher Says: The riveting third edition of this New York Times bestselling title expands its focus to China, exposes corruption on an international scale, and offers much-needed solutions.

Extensively updated, this edition features twelve new chapters, including a new introduction, preface, and study guide. The book brings the story of economic hit men (EHMs) up-to-date and focuses on China’s EHM strategy.

EHMs are highly paid professionals who use development loans to cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars and force them to serve US interests. Former economic hit man John Perkins gives an insider view into this system. With a truly global perspective, this book offers powerful revelations on extremely timely elements, including the third economic hit man wave that is sweeping the world and the way China optimizes US EHM models to make them a more dominating force. China’s strategy is even more dangerous since it’s successful at enticing lower income nations.
Perkins also reveals how we can transform what he calls a failing Death Economy into a Life Economy. He encourages China’s leaders to apply the Confucian ideal of serving the family to the global community to end the EHM strategy. The book ultimately provides a source of hope and inspires readers to participate in a new era of global cooperation.

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My Review: When I read the first edition back in 2004, it was an eye-opener. Remember that those were the Cheney years, where the forces of business skulduggery were very much ascendant. Their plan was, and is, to do the maximum amount of economic damage in order to impoverish and control the working people around the world with insecurity, debt slavery, and social Othering to build xenophobia and mistrust.

It suits China to go big on these proven strategies because there are so very many Chinese people...but like the Western economies, they figured without the population collapse their old people living longer and having fewer babies while they still can making the existing plans increasingly unworkable. Global climate change is not helping them, or their plans.

No need to cry for the failure to get immediate control has had on the awful people who think only of their own short-term profits,though...the plans have changed enough to make a whole new level of economic misery possible.

Reading this book was intensely angering all over again, as John Perkins uses his insider knowledge to explain the new goals and tactics to reach them. I thought humans were awful before I read the first edition. After reading the third, with its laser focus on the newest practitioners of manipulative business shenanigans, I was ready to stow away on the next SpaceX rocket. I do not care where it is going. As long as it is away from the kind of horrible, amoral, truly sociopathic scum that run things in the ways that John Perkins reveals.

However.

The John Perkins-revealed point is, now that we know, and can see, the manipulations and behaviors being deployed against our Body Politic, we can take action. Call it out, call your congressional district office, call the White House...anyone who HAS to listen...and make it clear that you want to see substantive change in the way business is regulated. Make it clear you want to see your government stand up and fight against the looting of the treasury and the planet both. Then go to the polls and VOTE THEM OUT. You still have that power, and it scares Them leaky, and they are trying to take the vote away from you. Stay active, or accept the much, much worse world the Economic Royalists are trying to cram down your throat.