Generative Artificial Intelligence, almost every student is familiar with it. However, few know the real harm it causes. The damage is so significant that it should be strictly monetized when used. There are three main reasons why people should stop using AI: it harms cognitive skills, it harms the environment and, lastly, it causes job displacement.
According to an article in Time magazine, ChatGPT users had lower brain engagement and also got lazier the more AI they used. A study reported on in the article used EEGs to record writers’ brain activity. Writers were put into three groups, and the study found that the one using ChatGPT had the “lowest brain engagement” and “consistently underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioral levels.
The study followed students over the course of several months. The ChatGPT users got lazier with each subsequent essay, often resorting to copy-and-paste by the end of the study.
Many students may read this and think that since it hasn’t impacted them, they shouldn’t care. Well, try and write an essay or do a paper without AI. See how many times it’s tempting. This will show the impact more than any research study ever could.
Secondly, the amount of water used to cool the data centers, along with the carbon footprint they leave, is adding to the crisis we are already facing with the depletion of the ozone layer and global warming. According to Enciorbites, “the training process for one of the most popular AI models, GPT-3, uses up to 5.4 million liters of clean freshwater in cooling servers and produces electricity alone. For scale, this number is roughly equivalent to the amount of drinking water used by 27,000 people in a day.¨
Using up water like this may not seem harmful because of the water cycle, right? Wrong, the water used for cooling later becomes polluted, and it accelerates the water crisis.
¨Fresh water is a precious and limited resource on our planet. Out of all the Earth’s water, only 3% is fresh, and of that, a significant 2.5% is locked away in glaciers and polar ice caps, making it inaccessible.¨ said written by Ana Pinheiro Privette, on illinois.edu.
Lastly, as if all of that isn’t bad enough, AI is taking people’s jobs. The statistics on AI-related job losses are alarming for recent graduates. Research from SignalFire shows that in 2024, major tech companies hired 25% fewer new graduates compared to 2023. This was not just a temporary hiring slowdown. It means these jobs have been eliminated.
It may seem like AI won’t come for jobs until long into the future, but that’s just not true. It’s happening right now. Students in college are going to have a harder time getting jobs due to AI. Companies are going to favor AI workers over real ones because robots do not get paid.
The harms of generative artificial intelligence severely outweigh the benefits. The impact it leaves on the brain, the environment, and jobs is so extreme that AI should be significantly reduced. Just because the harms of artificial intelligence aren’t widely known doesn’t make them any less true. The next time AI is seen, remember the effects.
