From WXXI news.

This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

Our connection this hour was made when the CEO of one of the world's most powerful artificial intelligence companies delivered a warning of sorts.

Dario, I'm a day is the CEO of anthropic.

As Axios reports this morning.

Dario had just spent the day on stage touting anthropic newest AI release, cloud four.

There were already some big headlines, both good and bad.

Cloud could learn human tasks and outperform humans very quickly.

And cloud also showed a willingness to blackmail its human operators.

If the humans communicated that the AI would be taken offline.

That's bad.

Right?

Anthropic is not sure why I tried to blackmail its humans, but they are releasing it to the public anyway.

But that's not even what Amadeo is worried about.

The Axios report is astonishing to me, and listeners of this program know that I am not exactly an AI optimist.

I want to be wrong.

I'm a little concerned.

Amador is basically saying, hey, world, you better be ready for what we are about to do to you.

He told Axios that artificial intelligence could wipe out half of all entry level white collar jobs and spike unemployment to 10 or 20% within the next 1 to 5 years.

The CEO said that AI companies have to stop sugarcoating what's coming.

The possible mass elimination of jobs across tech, finance, law, consulting and other white collar professions, especially entry level jobs.

Amata said he wants to spark a little fear so that lawmakers wake up.

He says few people are paying attention to how fast AI is moving and how soon it's going to cause major disruption.

He says lawmakers either don't get it or don't believe it.

And he says workers won't realize the risks to their career paths until their careers are gone.

Here's more of what he said.

Quote, most people are unaware that this is about to happen.

It sounds crazy and people just don't believe it.

We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming.

It's a very strange set of dynamics where we're saying you should be worried about where the technology we're building is going.

End quote.

So what can be done amidst just the kind of tax on the massive income that will flow to companies who figure out how to replace human workers with AI?

That's just the start.

In the weeks to come, we will explore what is changing and what that means for all of us.

Today, we examine how higher ed is trying to prepare students to work and thrive in this world.

Now, five years ago, I was hardly a priority on higher ed campuses.

Now it's becoming mandatory coursework at the Golisano Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship in Rochester.

Students now take 12 credits of coding, analytics and AI, and the Institute will be launching a new AI and business program for students who don't want to go down this path.

Will they be left behind in the future?

Job market?

Our guest talked about the challenge of preparing students for what is fast becoming a very different world than the world that their parents or grandparents grew up in.

Let me welcome to the studio the president, to the Goldstein Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship, Ian Mortimer.

Welcome back to the program.

Thanks for being here.

Thank you very much, Evan.

And Max post is with us.

The student at the Goldstein Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship and an artificial intelligence engineer for New Vision Development Group.

Welcome.

Thank you for being with us.

Thanks for having me.

All right.

So so let me start in.

I make me less concerned.

Okay.

Make you less concerned.

Take me off the ledge here.

Okay, so a maybe a little bit of, a history lesson.

Although I do believe this is different, but we've we've we've lived through these kind of technological, scares before.

one being Y2K.

Right.

So we went through the 90s and went through this, this process where companies had to, get on to ERP systems.

And if they didn't, then Y2K was going to disrupt the supply chain and disrupt all kinds of, of of technological systems.

And two things happened as a result of that.

One, Y2K really didn't happen.

And secondly, it showed that, technology change relies on human change.

you need leadership.

You need, individuals who can lead change within organizations to, to allow technology to kind of seep through.

So that's example one.

Example two our CRM systems.

And so, you know, we have as as enterprises spent millions if not billions on the promise of having technology build closer relationships and more, affinity with our customer bases and prospects and all of that.

And the failure of those CRM implementations is north of 50%.

And it's not because the technology isn't sophisticated.

It's because people typically have resistance to change.

And so I, I'm a I believe that AI is different in a lot of ways.

I don't subscribe to this idea that it's going to just devastate, and force change the way that I think many pundits think it is, because that would require humans to change in pretty profound ways.

And I just don't see it quite yet, especially in a one year horizon, which the the gentleman who you spoke about, reference.

That seems illogical to me.

He says 1 to 5.

Yep.

one is, I think, unlikely.

Five.

I mean, the world is going to change fast within those five years, but, is it doomsday now?

I don't I don't see it that way.

And part of it, I guess, again, is just looking at the past and understanding how humans are really resistant to to widespread change at the enterprise level as well as the development level.

And we're going to have max grade the debate.

So there's the opening.

Here's here's my rebuttal.

no, we're not we're not we're not here to debate many ways.

This is going to be a long series of conversations about AI.

and I am going to try to be open to all kinds of possibilities.

diamond is not a pundit.

He's the CEO of anthropic.

He came from OpenAI, which is Sam Altman's vehicle.

And, this is a little bit more of what he said.

He said on The Good and bad from AI.

He says, imagine this cancer is cured.

The economy grows at 10% a year.

The budget is balanced.

Also, more than 20% of people can't get jobs.

That's one very possible scenario rattling in Amanda's mind.

According to Axios, that could happen within the next 5 to 10 years.

I totally agree that health care is going to be where a lot of this happens, and a lot of it is going to be predicated on preventive care rather than reactive care.

And cancer being cured would be a wonderful thing.

It will also have a huge ding on the economy.

I mean, 25% of GDP is in health care right now.

And when you think about the consequences of, preventive care taking a bite out of the reactive care apple, that's a big hit in the economy.

Yeah, I that's over my head in terms of trying to really wade in to see how realistic or the speed of which I mean, I think everything seems plausible to me.

Yeah, but it's a matter of speed.

I also, from everything I'm seeing, everything I'm reading about health care indicates that preventive.

Yes, but also the reactive care diagnosing much, much better.

It's already better.

Yeah.

it's better than it was a year ago.

I mean, I'm sure Max knows it was three years ago.

We were laughing that I would think that it's, a ruler in a picture that the ruler is indication of cancer because you were measuring something that might be a tumor.

Now, it knows not to do that.

So it's the worst it will ever be at it today.

Right now, it will only get better.

But economy wide.

The concern I have is this.

You're right to say, for the Max's of the world, who, you know, didn't have the hysteria that we had about Y2K, that was a weird several months building up there, like there's all this uncertainty.

And then I just remember on January 1st, 2000, people were like, oh, all right, cool.

That was nothing.

And the life went right on.

I mean, I was a very young man, but, life went right on for me as a college student.

Didn't even think about it.

I hear the horse and buggy industry brought up all the time of what's going to happen to them.

Well, then they just going to go work in the car industry.

The difference is the speed here and I take your point that a year seems unrealistic.

But if it's two, if it's four, if it's six, I mean, that's not a long time.

And if we're talking about a 10% job disruption, that would be enormous.

If we're talking about a 30, I mean, we could have social unrest like people have never seen.

And and that's what I'm worried about is I, I'm with you that there will be change that is harmful and there will be change that is all kinds of new opportunity.

But I don't think anything is going to happen so fast that it's not going to be snug.

It's not you're not going to take this puzzle piece out here and put it on a different part of the puzzle, and it'll fit.

I think the again, I think that for that to happen, a gigantic AI, meaning that the AI that acts on behalf of humans would have to accelerate so fast that it would essentially take over the leadership roles or the management roles that exist within the economy.

I just don't see it at this point.

Now, with that being said, you know, early adoption of a genetic AI to replace functions such as, you know, registering for your health care appointment.

Right?

You know, not to, you know, pick on that process, but that seems like a logical, you know, step to, to make that happen and make it happen more efficiently and reduce costs.

but I guess, you know, again, thinking about, you know, the many years of, of promise, technological disruption and change, it happens.

Absolutely.

I don't buy into the fact that it's going to be the flick of a switch, and we're all going to be, you know, disrupted and changed, because of someone having that, that plot.

Now, again, I think health care is the one spot where there's, you know, obviously, we're in a situation where states are becoming bankrupt because of because of Medicaid and Medicare costs.

And in that way, I think there's going to be a lot of change.

And it's going to be, you know, hopefully reducing costs and improving service.

that's a big chunk of our economy.

We're going to be talking this hour in just a moment.

We're going to get Max his story and I'm glad Ian and Max are here because we're talking about how institutes like theirs are looking at the future and trying to at least do the work to prepare students to understand that no one can predict exactly what's coming.

Not everyone is as hyperbolic as me, but they are trying to look ahead and understand that if you are not ready for change of some kind, you can get left behind here.

And and that's, you know, I mean, I can't imagine what it is like try to run higher ed right now knowing the range of predictions are so wide here in terms of the speed of what's going to change.

And how it's going to happen when you bring up a genetic.

I want to define a couple terms here Ian.

So people will hear the term agent.

And for me the simple definition is this.

And tell me if this is wrong I can augment a task meaning a human worker can use AI to do something more efficiently or better, or it can do the human task.

It can replace the human.

And in that case you're working with an AI agent.

So a genetic AI is at the level where it's no longer augmenting a human doing the work.

It's doing the work.

Instead of the human.

Is that correct?

Correct.

And it's triggering.

It's able to initiate the work based on some kind of external data point or stimulus.

Okay.

And your feeling is that because human beings are still at the top of these companies, yes, we will see some augmentation.

We may see some agent tick AI, but it's still humans running the companies.

Then answer me this part of it.

If you are the CEO of a company and you see this wave of tech coming, what is the incentive not to go as hard as you absolutely can to replace as many human beings as you can with a genetic AI?

I think that that would absolutely be the goal.

I think it's much easier said than done.

I mean, CEOs and managers and leaders, are measured on performance and technological disruption.

Innovation can cause two things.

It can cause efficiency and progress or can cause disruption and actually more inefficiency.

And we've seen this.

And again, if you look back in time in terms of ERP implementations, the the the the euphoria was we got to get all our data in one system and we get have data one system that will be more efficient.

We're more efficient.

We can do different things, we'll learn things.

And the failure rate of those was again north of 50%.

And I'm not saying that these are, you know, the same situations, but it's the same management and leadership philosophies that people are.

The mindsets of people are what need to change first.

And when mindsets of people can change and adopt these technologies and make them efficient and make them, you know, live out their promise, then you have, you know, an evolution of performance, but it's not going to happen overnight.

I mean, people just don't change like that.

But there is a leadership call right now, at least in my, perspective, that if we are going to optimize the promise of AI and optimize the promise of better service, better efficiency, lower costs, all the things that it does, then leaders, managers, workers, are going to have to change.

And that is the responsibility of education.

To your point of how do we create mindsets that are open minded, you know, rather than closed minded to, to optimize and take advantage of these?

All right.

Let me put a button on one part of what Ian said earlier about Y2K, because we've got Charlie from Seneca Falls on the phone who wants to weigh in.

Hey, Charlie, go ahead.

So I'm a retired consultant, retired in 2015.

I was alive and on the ground in the decade leading up to Y2K.

The reason Y2K turned out to be a nothing burger is for the prior decade.

But increasingly, the closer we got to 1999, there was a lot of time and money and effort spent redesigning all the old systems that were built with two digit year rather than four digit year.

So to the point of we need time to prepare.

Well, we had at least five years and closer to ten years to do all that second point relative to oh well, ERP systems fail 50% of the time, I suspect is generous of 50%, but in my experience was MRP, ERP, etc.

you can be much more successful by saying, oh, I'm going to put this new system in.

And everybody said, well, but the report is different.

I used to get a report that was horizontal.

I want my report to stay horizontal.

So people we consultants love to customize stuff like that because it's an annuity.

Yeah.

Every time there's an upgrade you have to go back and re customer much more successful to train the people.

Oh the report is now going to be vertical bad example.

But learn to use the new system and spend the money on training rather than customizing.

And people will tend to find oh this works too in fact, it works better.

So maybe I'm agreeing with your people.

Maybe in my degree there's a lot going on that and I don't know anything about, I try to avoid it every time I ask an AI question on what my success rate is, maybe 20% and the rest of it, they don't know what they're talking about.

I just prefer the right questions.

But, Charlie, thank you.

So to Charlie's point, though, about training people on the front end, this is where I want to start.

And then I really want to dig into what Alison was doing in general.

Do you and Max, just for both of you, do you feel like the rate of change with AI will be such that humans can keep up with it?

In other words, can you train students to become workers in this in this world who will be able to keep a pace of the change such that we're not black boxed out of understanding what tech is doing.

I think it's I think we can speak confidently, Lee, that we believe we're doing the right things in the short run.

I don't sure anyone can predict the long run in the long run feels like it's going to have its own set of, you know, potential rules in terms of what are the skills, what are the behaviors, what are the knowledge sets that you need to be successful in the short run?

You know, there's the acquisition of the right knowledge.

And I'll say it again, is this idea that, you have to be continuously learning and continuously evaluating and just open minded to, you know, what you knew last week, you know, maybe a little bit different than this week and that's okay.

That's cool.

but it's a systemic learning process.

It's a different mindset that, you know, certainly our parents for sure.

But even when you and I were in school, the notion of like, well, pick a career and you can do that for 40 years and then retire, you're already shaking your head over there.

Max, why are you shaking your head?

I, I simply think that technology is moving at a speed that for someone to expect to go to an institute for, say two year amount of time and to be able to get out and then live a a 50 year career, maybe more, maybe less.

Right.

With longevity is it's just not realistic, without a very specific puzzle piece, which is continuous learning.

And so that's what, we're trying to implement at the Institute, with our AI program for C-suite executives.

but yeah, that that continuous learning component is going to become something that is not only helpful as it is now, but will become something that is necessary to maintain relevance.

That's why you brought him hired.

He's he's one of the best, for sure.

So tell me.

Take me at 30,000ft and and let's get specific.

In general, how does the golf sauna Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship view your responsibility to students in regards to AI?

I think there's a couple inputs here.

One is that the the our provost, Scott Baker, designed a classroom that was not rote learning.

So we don't have any podiums.

Everything is active.

students are in the material as a part of the classroom experience.

And so by nature of that things can naturally adapt and change.

So, we, we have business tech, we launched in fall of 23. Business tech today is much different than it was a year and a half ago.

and because the content is not the focus, but the application of the content is the focus, it can morph and change, and it's just getting your hands dirty in different work.

That's keeping up with the technology is that we feel it.

Employers feel are important.

the second thing is that, we're all how do I describe this?

The there's integration within the curriculum that forces us to evaluate every iteration.

So what we're doing in business tech informs marketing what we're doing in business, tech and forms, accounting, what we're doing in business tech and forms, finance.

And so nothing is is stagnant because of the connectedness of the courses.

And it's almost like one course for two years, if that makes sense.

and then the third piece to, to be very candid with you, is that we don't have the, I'll say the burden in the, in the current state of, of proving to regional creditors that what we're doing is of high quality.

Our creditor is employers.

And, employers are saying what you're doing and how you're teaching and is how we want our employees trained.

And so we don't have the burden of having to do iterative reps, you know, trying to, prove out our quality and our quality is getting people in great jobs.

How do you know what employers want?

Because we listen to them all the time and they're they're a good example.

Is this actually my friend Max here?

Max works for a company within the campus center, boundaries within our campus center, walls.

So another benefit of having businesses in residence is that we're getting real time input in terms of what are the skills and what do you need to be successful?

Max and I want to speak for Max because he's right here, but I'm not sure Max set any goal of being an AI engineer when he walked in the door.

No, but he was exposed to the people and the opportunity without leaving the campus center.

And now he's doing work that I think, That's pretty awesome.

I want to get your story here.

Back me up a little bit.

Where are you from originally, Max?

Spencer Porte from Spencer Porte.

Okay, sir.

And you're how old?

I'm 24.

24.

So when you were 18, what did you want to do?

I wanted to start my own business.

so I started making websites for companies local in the Rochester area.

How'd that go?

It went well.

It went well.

and then I honestly, I kind of saw AI and saw, where technology was going in terms of business owners being able to, like, automatically make websites for themselves.

So I was like, you know, is this really where I want to be?

You felt the obsolescence that was coming to you.

Exactly.

Okay.

And so how did you end up at Cal Sano?

So, my mother works for a company that is, close with the school and a partner with the school.

And so she referenced me there.

I met Ian and, kind of fell in love and started taking courses there.

How many students a year are you certain now, Ian?

We have 110 students.

Current state.

Okay.

And, the program runs for how long?

we have a two year program, which is a kind of a comprehensive business and entrepreneurship program that has the embedded tech and AI in it.

And then we have a new one year program that's more focused on tech.

And I mostly for individuals who already have degrees.

So much of what you do is going to be judged relevant or not based on the students that you produce.

Yep.

And how the employers feel like they are prepared or not prepared.

Right.

So there's talk about continuous learning as Mac brings up.

That's true for you and everybody at the institute, isn't it?

It sure is.

I mean, it's sink or swim in that way.

And I once again, this is part of the theme here.

But for higher ed institutions of any kind forever, it's been like, what's your specialty?

What do you teach?

And now you want to run?

I want to run a business and entrepreneurship institute.

It is constant learning.

It's got to be extremely high pressure.

It's it's awesome pressure.

it's, you know, extreme.

Yes.

But the thing, actually, it's what's ironic to me is that, you know, we we're moving in such a fast, technical, technological age and it requires better people like, you know, the the days of being an expert on this and, sharing that wisdom or that knowledge to an industry or category or client base, and that's what you do.

that's kind of where the threats are, you know, that you spoke about earlier where I think we're finding, a right place in the development of business professionals.

Is that.

Yeah, you have to know these these skills and these tools.

And again, we iterate and we learn and we listen to employers and we have employers in our place.

And I think we got that.

The thing that we didn't know going into this that has been much more, better received by employers is that the behaviors and the attitudes and the, the personalities around business is also what we do.

Like, you can't be late if you show up late to the Institute, we turn you around.

If you don't dress like someone would dress like you're going to work, you can't come in.

And these cultural expectations and these cultural norms are creating the mindset that I think Max speaks about, that you're just you're naturally ready to go.

You have this kind of business energy to you because, you know, when you walk in the door, you're going to work and you're not going to school.

you know, metaphorically.

Yeah.

And so, Max, when did you know you said you could see where I was kind of going, but when did you know that that might be an area that you wanted to work in?

Was it at Galison?

it was, I would say that that came at Golisano.

So my I had an introduction to AI, and I saw kind of where my industry being the website creation stuff was kind of heading towards observation, with this technology.

And so, at the Institute, one of the first courses that we took was, Business Technologies.

And so we learned basic things like word and PowerPoint and, you know, how to make things look good and professional.

but one of those was AI.

And, so we, we kind of get introduced to AI.

We talk about the, the safety around it, how to interact with AI so that it's both productive.

But also we're being thoughtful about how we're interacting with it.

and, and that's kind of where I fell in love.

So let me use a famous movie quote slightly before your time to help help you explain to our audience what is it that you would say you do here?

What exactly do you do?

it's a good question.

It's from Office Space there.

Max.

Isaac.

So, within the company that I work at, it's a real estate development company, that's looking to build master plan communities.

with all sorts of tech integration.

there's a lot of difficulties around, housing and zoning issues.

so essentially, if, if we're, real estate developer, we come into a town, we say, you know, this is the perfect market for our solution, our housing solution.

And then we, go to start getting the zoning for that, that parcel that we're interested in purchasing.

that seems like that would be the hard thing.

but that is very far from the hard thing.

The hard thing is that, people don't want to see, new housing built in their area.

it affects the housing supply, which in turn slightly affects the, demand.

Sure.

Right.

And so as you affect that supply demand, market, you change the prices of what their houses are, are going for.

So, there's kind of this, this difficulty there, but people need housing.

So, one of the things that I'm working on and built was a tool where it, as I so it, it starts looking and pulling all sorts of articles and information from counties and in a particular state, finds an area that seems to be really struggling with the housing issue.

then it starts to compile this report, you know, and it may say, you know, Suzy is a teacher in the area.

You know, she wasn't able to get a home in the area because just in that town.

So expense report right in the in the town expense report.

The homes are just so, so expensive that she can't afford that on a teacher salary.

How do we address this?

And we kind of come in at the end of that report saying we can address this with our solution.

Then we send that solution to the municipality.

and then we kind of start the negotiations and things like that.

But, the eye takes care of, the sourcing of, of where there are areas in the US that are struggling most, and even doing some of on like the back end, some of our due diligence, our ROI projections are payback period projections, making sure that all that is is good.

What do you make of this kind of work in?

I think it's awesome for a couple reasons.

One is that Max just described a full, industry category in about 45 seconds.

He understood it.

From demand to delivery to infrastructure to governance.

flawlessly.

I mean, it's it's it's just really impressive to me.

the second thing is that, the work of Max would normally take 4 or 5 people, you know, months, of time to kind of pull all the levers and do all the work and aggregate all of the information to get to a successful, solution.

And Max does it, you know, using technology, using AI.

And he's incredibly efficient and he's learning a lot as a result of it.

so I think it's great.

I also, before I get back to some listener feedback, let me just ask one other thing that's been kind of on my mind here.

There's a there's a difference between whether we should or whether something is inevitable and what you do about it.

I can get hung up as I do on the way.

AI is going to displace human jobs.

It's my sense.

Tell me if I'm wrong here.

That part of your view is to say that is a tidal wave that we can't stop even if we wanted to.

And so therefore, how are we going to make sure students are prepared no matter what happens?

Is that fair?

It's very fair.

And it's unfortunate.

I mean, I just to be really transparent, I come from very, very humble means I mean, I'll know a lot of people, you know, during the next 15, 20 years that will be displaced.

I mean, but I'm not going to stop it.

You're not going to stop it.

You know, Max is not going to stop it.

The best thing that we can produce are individuals, like in Max's case, who are trying to solve a societal problem using technologies like AI to, to make things more efficient and better.

You know, again, I go back to health care.

I think there's going to be a ton of good that happens as a result of that.

You know, people will be healthier, the people will live longer, healthier, and that's a good thing.

You know, generally, you know, solving a housing problem where people, you know, don't have the opportunity to access, you know, high quality housing.

That's a good thing.

You know, we're not going to produce people as long as I'm there that are using AI and technologies to displace people just for greed or for just for economic benefit.

but we can't not recognize that, you know, the world is changing.

and so we are good people that are going to do good things.

And I think that, by the institute's ability to give students, a basic understanding of these tools, it's allowing them to sit at tables like this and have conversation like this around the topic because the, like we say, or describe it as a tidal wave that's coming that we can't really stop because that's getting, you know, funded by billions of dollars of VC funding.

But what we can do is kind of have these conversations and figure out, okay.

And so this is affecting my industry and this this in this way.

What next?

You know, what do we do with people who are displaced from these jobs.

You know, is it a going out to pasture?

Is it you know, like what what is the solution that still gives people meaning and, allows them to, to live a life that that's meaningful and fulfilling?

and I don't think that people can sit at the table and have that conversation if they don't get some, some basic understanding of the fundamental technologies and what's it what is it actually doing?

And we're going to be can I have one more point?

So one of the reasons that we developed the one year program is that, we're reaching out to companies and actually a lot of nonprofits to help them identify an employee within their employee base that they want to invest in.

And the things that Maass describes.

And the beauty of it is that Tom Golisano is picking up the majority of the costs for, for us to deliver what we deliver within one and two years.

It's like ten x what, what we charge.

And the reason being is that Tom believes in the community, and he wants to invest in the people that can drive economic opportunity.

And it's not lip service.

It's real.

it's it's one of the reasons that I'll speak for myself.

I'm so excited about this organization's role, is that we can make positive change, just at very low cost and no doubt, after our only break, I'm going to get to your phone calls.

So if you're on the line, hang there.

I've got emails to share.

And for listeners, this is a this, first time we talked about AI on this program, but really, this is going to be a series of conversations that looks at the impact of AI in different ways and asks, you know, so we'll have lawmakers on what should policy prescriptions be to make sure that we are prepared for any possible range of disruption.

What do you do with students?

That's part of the conversation today that will be taking place, especially across the summer.

We're going to talk to educators at different levels.

I know that there are people that are emailing me right now.

I already have a couple about why everyone's cheating now.

Well, not everyone is cheating, but I understand that there's pressure there as well.

So there's a lot of different ways that this will go.

And we want to continue to get your feedback.

And so when we come back to the other side of this, we'll take some of your phone calls and emails.

We're talking to Ian Mortimer, president of the Golf Science Institute for Business and Entrepreneurship.

Max Post is a student there and an artificial engineer himself who's, really helping us see what he sees in the future here.

So we'll come right back to your feedback on connections.

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This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

Let me read first Will's email, and then I'll take a couple of phone calls, and I'm going to read Will's email with this frame in mind.

Let's keep remembering right now AI is the worst it will ever be at doing the tasks it's trying to do.

It's the worst it will ever be right now.

Here's what Will says so says Evan.

I've been following AI since ChatGPT first dropped.

It's been terrifying and exciting.

I use AI to do things like write emails I don't want to write.

I also graduated college just before ChatGPT released, and now I could not imagine going to school in a post AI world where everyone is using AI to write essays and professors are constantly trying to figure out who's actually doing the work and who isn't.

I was just experimenting with Google Gemini's deep research function, and I gave it a topic.

It generated a 50 page literature review with 30 sources and an APA style bibliography in a matter of minutes.

Then I was able to generate an AI podcast based on the review it wrote, and furthermore have it generate a web page with interactive graphics.

The information was all accurate and the sources it used were all legit.

I think I can be both an incredibly powerful tool, but I also worry about people using AI to offload their critical thinking and analysis, and we end up with even more issues with media literacy and critical thinking than we already have.

that's from Wil.

And Jim, I think was making the same point earlier.

He says the widespread use of AI in cheating in college and high school.

Don't forget about that.

This is the downfall of critical thinking.

So Ian and then Max hear critical thinking.

It.

I agree with the concern that what we are inventing is something that may convince some amount of human beings that we now we don't have to read that book.

We don't have to think critically.

I don't even have to produce a podcast.

I can just do it.

I don't have to write that book.

The AI can do it.

I don't have to think deeply about this.

The AI will just tell me, is that where we're going?

I mean, like, that's that would not be a good place to go, right, Ian?

Like, you would never want students coming out of Galison and being like, well, I don't have to think critically about this.

No, it's misrepresent what they know.

Absolutely.

I think the question is, is what's the role homework?

I mean, what's the role of the lesson?

What's the role of the the classroom experience to offset these changes that are happening?

I mean, I couldn't agree more that, you know, AI allows opportunities to represent knowledge that, you don't have.

So the counter question is, well, what's learning environment have to be to maximize these great resource tools and to demonstrate learning and to just demonstrate aptitude?

I mean, it's not going to be status quo for sure.

Max, how do you see this idea about critical thing?

You strike me as a critical thinker.

Thank you.

And at the age of 24, my generation has a lot of stereotypes of, you know, kids these days, they just want a GPT to do everything for them.

are you worried about that?

I would say it's right to be worried about it, for sure.

I know even I am.

can you hear me?

You know, because I have seen students, use AI to try.

Can you hear me?

Okay, I think that the tasks.

Yeah, and assignments that they give out at the institute, at the I know Institute is, Yeah.

If you put them in the AI, you will not get an answer that is worth anything.

Oh, I had, grape juice, actually, a smoothie.

Entire problem that is presented with it with a simple assignment is is so great.

I am going to have lunch, I think probably a salad.

And, you know, copy paste the answer.

you've got friends and peers who are okay kind of in the world.

You're in in Golisano.

Then you've got friends from childhood who are not in that world.

And there I want you to think about the friends that you grew up with who are not in business and entrepreneurship.

How many have been using GPT?

How's that?

You know, in various ways in school and maybe work.

Okay.

all of my friends that are not, attending the institute, but they are in the world of business, do use it.

Very much so, like, disproportionately to those who are not in business, and those who are not in business, I think they see it as a toy, more so than something that they know how to really use.

And I think that's also a very important point to what they offer at the institute is, if you don't get some training, get some hands on, get some how to, it could be seen as a toy and not knowing how to use it.

There was a good, Kevin Sirieix, who is, a local.

I, he lives locally.

He's a global AI expert.

He was in the campus center last week, and we were having a conversation, and he said something that I think is very valuable and that, you know, before Excel, you know, we did math longhand, and math was hated.

It was an awful task.

And you were unless you had the ability to, do the math.

You you held the keys to the kingdom.

Are you?

Now with Excel and the advent of Excel, it's actually exploded.

The use of math.

Math is now used, in all kinds of applications across all different industries, because it took the the mechanics of math out of the, the, the benefit of math, and it actually blew up the financial industry, according to him that, you know, before Excel, you know, people were not that interested in finance and people were not that interested in accounting.

And it actually grew a category because of its efficiency and power.

But society wide, you would teach before even the calculator.

You teach students up through the age of adulthood, some level of understanding of how to operate math, and then all of a sudden you've got these tools, these tech tools, and you don't need to.

So what you're talking about is actually taking a different leap forward happens with a very narrow set of actual thinking humans who are in that world.

Most of the rest of us are like, well, I was promised there'd be no math and then never half.

So I'm not thinking critically about math.

That's fine, because I don't have to.

There's a sort of small subset, and that's logical.

I don't think that's a bad outcome per se.

If we extend that to critical thinking in different ways, being able to compose sentences well, being able to to express yourself effectively and not rely on tech, I think that would be a different outcome than math, and I think it'd be very bad.

I think the other thing I would offer is that I worked in, enrollment in admissions for 25 years.

the, the, the lack of progression in writing before I and before, you know, this, this is not a new thing.

Spell it.

Let's get all the T here.

Well, no, I mean, I think writing is was just valued long before a guy.

Okay.

And the sentence structure was just valued long before I.

And concise, clear writing was this value long before this.

So I wouldn't point to that as a evidence.

sample of of I's consequence.

Okay.

let me get to your phone, because some have been waiting here.

Don.

And he's Rochester.

Hi, Don.

Go ahead.

Good afternoon.

Thank you for taking my call.

I want to relate something that happened to me, almost 30 years ago when I worked at Saint Mary's Hospital.

They were, they they were having a merger with, was called Partners Hospital at the time, and everybody knew they were going to be layoffs as a result of this.

And we had a supervisor that was she was like running around like a chicken with her head cut off, was saying all these things.

And finally she made the comment that, well, General Motors is employing robots to make automobiles.

And I said to her, but Robert, hey, great.

Thank you.

My point is, is that you can have all this advanced technology that you want, but unless you take over human, creativity, if it takes over human labor, nobody's going to be buying what's being produced because they're not going to be able to afford it.

I'm hoping I may, maybe I'm hoping that you will have a 10 or 20% unemployment rate.

Then maybe people will rise up and fight back.

We need to get this under control.

If we don't, if I just not agree to common sense regulation, then it's taken over by the government and run for the benefit of the people.

Well, let me just jump in then.

Sarah in Rochester called in to say that the new bill, that passed by one vote in Congress, contains language about restricting AI regulation for ten years in this country.

I mean, you probably can see a lot of legislation.

My guess is, any legislation passing today regarding I could change next year, tomorrow or next week.

Next decade.

but certainly this is an administration that is saying we've got to take the regulation away from AI and we've got to let it go.

you know, go for it.

And I think they're worried about losing to China.

I get that there's a competitive aspect.

and there's a lot of pressure there.

Don is just saying, you know, maybe it'll be good of 20% of the populations out of work because of this.

Then we'll wake up.

I don't know that that would be good done.

But, but I also don't know how to stop it if that's going to happen.

It's kind of part of the point.

I mean, I, I want as many people to be prepared and get on board and be ready to adapt.

Right, right.

And and we all have to be ready for some kind of change when I'm not predicting 20% of I'm predicting 30, I'm not predicting five.

But some kind of change is inevitable in some way.

I couldn't agree more.

Yeah.

Okay.

Done.

Thank you I appreciate that.

this is Becky and Becky.

I'm going to read your email, and you are hereby invited on the talk show this summer.

Come talk to us.

She says I am a teacher for the Rochester City School District.

I'm part of the district's.

I cohort, basically teaching teachers how to use AI in the classroom, how to use AI with our students, and how to facilitate digital learning.

I was excited to be part of this cohort because I had already been using AI to, to help me with my master's degree work as an ESP ed teacher.

AI has taken all, a lot of the busy work off my plate, allowing me to truly differentiate my lessons for the variety of students I have in my classroom.

I'm a big fan of AI and part of pushing it forward in the Rochester City School District.

All right, Becky, you're well welcome on this program.

Please email us back or we'll send you a note because, K through 12 is going to be teaching this two.

Right guys.

Yeah.

It can't just be at the Institute.

No.

Well no.

Absolutely wouldn't have space.

But the we have space but not for that many people.

Yeah.

but, I guess, you know, in hearing you read Becky's email to me, that was all about mindset.

I mean, Becky saw what was coming.

Becky saw that, you know, education needed to evolve.

Becky saw a fixed amount of time on her plate to have a bigger impact on students.

And, you know, she's taking advantage of what's in front of her.

So thank you, Becky.

Yeah, I mean, k-through-12 I mean, if you're going to design the keys to the next generation's K through 12 Castle Max, I got to be part of it, right?

Absolutely.

Yeah.

I mean, any amount of, technology acumen you can give students in a world with this, this rapidly changing stuff is, is going to be helpful.

How about this email?

Jim says I use it all the time.

I work on giving presentations of various subjects.

It is amazing.

I'm learning things I didn't know that I didn't know.

By the way, I am 88 years old.

Awesome.

That's awesome.

That's from Jim.

I don't know that Jane's going to agree.

Hello, Jane.

Go ahead.

Hello.

How are you doing?

Just fine.

Well, we seem to be skipping ahead of ourselves.

I remember the last time I listened to one of these programs.

and they were very, much stating that.

Don't worry about this.

This is going to be way in the future, and we will have time to put up guardrails.

So all you little people who are upset, just don't worry about it.

You know, they're taking care of us, but, I just I still don't that.

And, I'm a very left blind person, a very ripe brain person.

and some people just talk to it like they do, James and this sort of thing.

And, just it just turns me completely off.

But they did say, you know, so the bottom line is that we're going to have time to think about this and that we're not anymore.

Yeah.

No, no, we're throwing it out the window.

And whatever happens, it happens.

Right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, it's good talking to you.

Thank you.

Jane, thank you for the phone call.

So, I mean, I mean, if we go back to where we started, I'm.

And they said that they put out cloud for after it tried to blackmail a human by talking about an extramarital affair, trying to after the human indicated that the I was going to be taken offline, like that's like that really happened.

And they're like, well, let's let's put it out there.

But, you know, can I speak to.

Yes, I think that that, that gentleman is he's the CEO of cloud.

Yeah.

No, no, he's CEO of Anthropic Anthropic.

But I mean, it's it's a lab like.

So we could have a, we create a laboratory and have something come out of that lab if we wanted to.

I mean, I just don't think that that's a common reality of, a genetic chronology.

Okay.

That's my Ian's here just to talk me down.

I mean, here's Melanie writing.

Do you think we're setting ourselves up for disaster in the event computer systems crash or are hacked?

I feel like things are moving so quickly, and the repercussions of not having knowledge of what to do regarding AI will be detrimental.

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

I think this is terrible, Melanie.

I think I'm the alarmist.

I want to be the guy who I look back and be like, I cannot, but I'm embarrassed with what I was saying.

I want to be embarrassed.

I want to be the guy who was like, I was over the top and look how look how good the world is and how silly I looked in 2025.

I want that to be me.

I don't think that that's going to happen.

I mean, there's parts of it's this complicated.

There's this is not a one size or one theme fits all topic.

I mean, I just, you know, some people think that there's going to be a myopic view and other people think it's, you know, going to be the end.

I mean, it's just it's really, really difficult to understand.

But I think the the approach that we're trying to take is, you know, bite what you can chew and learn as you go and take advantage of the opportunities, you know, for helping yourself and helping others from a business perspective as you go and, you know, control what you can control, you're going to have more demand for students coming in here.

I mean, you don't have that many slots here, do you?

we have 100 openings for fall.

That's that's it?

Yes.

For this fall.

Are you going to grow?

Yeah.

Tom is, built the enterprise for 400, in Rochester.

And then we're looking at some other locations.

Okay, but for now, a hundred a year, up to 400.

Steady state.

Yeah.

Okay.

Thank you for when you come back and keep talking us about.

Keep talking to me down here.

No.

Absolutely love being there.

You know that.

And, Max, listen, I am really not only impressed by you, but encouraged in many ways.

I appreciate the way that you're thinking about this.

the way that you're approaching it, I. I'm making fun of myself for being the sky is falling guy.

I get it, I get it.

I want to live in a world without cancer.

I want to live in a world where a lot of these big problems with climate change get solved.

I want that, and I'm glad people like you are going to be there, at the forefront of it.

Teaching older people like me what to do.

So thank you for being here, guys.

Thank you.

That's, we're going to keep talking to Max, too.

They're both going to be welcome back here.

If you work in higher ed, I understand Golisano is not the only one teaching this, I get it.

if you work in K through 12, if you want to talk, I this summer, we're going to talk a lot about this in a lot of different ways.

Send us an email connections at cyborg.

Make sure it's a human, not a bot.

Sending it.

We're coming right back.

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