00:00:29 · Po-Shen Loh
[00:00:29] S2: Soon after ChatGPT came out, I started traveling around the country telling people, oh, no. There's this new thing people are going to need to learn to be more creative because that's the only thing that the AI can't do. I don't say that anymore because now I've seen that the AI can actually come up with lots and lots of ideas. Last year, the International Math Olympiad problems, four of them were solved by Google's artificial intelligence. The International Math Olympiad has six questions, and all six of the questions are very, very original. They are so original that when the national coaches meet, they all look at the problems, and they all try to make sure nothing too similar to those problems has ever appeared in any contest or anywhere in the world before. The questions are supposed to be really original. But nevertheless, the artificial intelligence was able to come up with solutions to four out of six, which is more than I can do. The creativity in the AI can probably surpass what we can do too. The only unique thing about human intelligence is that we hopefully care that humans still exist. I'm Po-Shen Loh. I'm a mathematician who likes to solve real world problems. In real life, I'm a math professor at Carnegie Mellon University, but I'm also a social entrepreneur where I've been running my own educational solution which tries to make the world a more thoughtful place. In schools, one of the biggest places where students are using AI to cheat on their homework is for their writing. This, unfortunately, could make a huge problem for human civilization because you just have to think, what is that AI anyway? It's a large language model. How is that AI so good? It's because it's good at language. It's good at looking at the patterns of words that often appear. If many kids lose this ability, we'll get many kids who grow up and aren't able to think logically. All they're able to do is just take whatever anyone else gives them. They'll just be dependent. If you're already grown up and you already have that skill, and you're using the AI to achieve that task because that's for your job, great. Okay. You're using it to do a job. But if you're in school, why are you doing that writing? It's not because the writing you make is going to make money directly. No. No. That writing is actually part of your own learning.
00:02:50 · Po-Shen Loh
Using AI to do your writing homework in school is like saying, I'm not gonna run a mile for exercise. I'm gonna drive my car one mile for exercise. How much exercise you get? You get none. You're gonna grow up, and you're not gonna be able to be as physically fit. Similar thing here with mentally fit. And just this observation that the power of the large language model is the L, the language. That's why we need to really make sure that all of our kids, if any of you are watching this and your students, this is why you need to be really really good with language. For the next generation, all of these skills like reading and writing, communication, logic, these are all going to be very important, because these are how you develop a good way to think. I was explaining to people the reason why we do this math is not because eventually we have to do algebra, but the reason is because eventually this just makes you smarter, so you're able to go and think through situations you haven't seen before and figure them out. I interview lots and lots of high school students who want to work with me. And during the interview, the way that I interview for intelligence is I ask them questions, usually math questions because those are analytical, and I ask them questions until it's very clear from their body language that they have never seen this question before. Because usually if you're doing math questions and you've seen it before, you have a certain look of confidence in your eyes. But I wait until it's really clear that they have never seen this before, and then I wanna see how you think. Actually, because you've never seen that question before.
00:04:30 · S0, S3, S4
Ad[00:04:30] S0: This episode is brought to you by Indeed. You're ready to level up your business, but the pressure to find the right person to make that happen is intense. Indeed sponsored jobs can help carry the load. It boosts your job post to help it reach quality talent fast. Cut through the chaos with Indeed sponsored jobs. Get a $75 sponsored job credit at indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring now? Then this is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs. Ad[00:05:00] S3: As AI infrastructure scales, deployment time shouldn't. At s a twenty six in Chicago, Gigabyte is showing their latest innovations, including a modular data center design that drastically cuts deployment time. And also on display, RackScale NVIDIA based solutions built to succeed in the era of agentic AI. From a single server to an entire AI factory, Gigabyte has you covered. Visit us at Booth 2229 at S C 26 November seventeenth to nineteenth. We can't wait to see you there. Ad[00:05:28] S4: USAA knows dynamic duos can save the day like superheroes and sidekicks or auto and home insurance. With USAA, you can bundle your auto and home and save up to 10%. Tap the banner to learn more and get a quote at usaa.com/bundle. Restrictions apply.
00:05:43 · Po-Shen Loh
[00:05:43] S2: The expectation is that you won't solve it. And so then I start to give hints. Those hints are usually ideas that they wouldn't have encountered before in school. And then I want to see how quickly can you synthesize these new hints, these new ways of thinking, synthesize them into a solution for a problem we have never seen before. Actually, that's also creativity. So that's one particular piece, but going forward, I think that one of the skills that people will really need is that aspect of actually wanting to create value and delight in other people. Why do I say this? I say this because for many many years, humans were the top species, the most capable things on this planet. Soon it will not be that case. Soon, you're gonna have to work together to survive. The only way to get other people to want to team up with you is for you to authentically and deeply be a person who is motivated by creating value in the other. If you are not that way, you are a bad partner, and people will not want to go and team with you. If they don't team with you, you will die. You will lose opportunity because eventually, all of these kinds of jobs you can use AIs to do. Then why would anyone want to employ you? Why would anyone want to have you as someone on their team? Presumably only because they somehow felt like you are going to create some value, and they they like that vibe. They like you. I think what we really need is to get more and more people who are figuring out what the real problem to solve is, but unfortunately, sometimes when kids just think about problems, they don't realize that the way that you solve a problem is through empathy and through relating to other people. Why? Because you can't solve a problem unless you can visualize it through their eyes. I do spend a significant amount of my life working towards the goal of being better at simulating the world. I also use AI for that. I think... Well, I'll give one exact example. I was just in Nashville, Tennessee last week, and I just saw a really, I thought, very, very talented singer in one of the bars there. Wow. She's good. And I just got curious. How hard is it to be able to get a performing spot on Broadway in Nashville? So I asked AI, And I was actually not just interested in AI. Tell me about the design. I wanna see the links. You know? Tell me more.
00:08:07 · Po-Shen Loh
What is the background of this particular place that she's performing at? Right? I I will make my own conclusions based on knowing, oh, oh, oh, I see. So there's all of these different people who would wanna do this thing. Right? So if you're one of the people who got picked to do it at this prime time, oh, this makes logical sense. See, I'm using the AI to build the logic inside my brain for understanding country music performance. And why was I trying to understand? Honestly, it's because these days I also work with professional entertainers. So I'm also myself, always scouting. The big heart of this is I wasn't using the AI to write the report for me. I was using AI to make myself better at that particular goal. Being able to simulate the world is the superpower that makes someone able to be a successful entrepreneur. Simulating the world allows you to imagine a product or imagine a strategy and then play it forward in your head. What would happen if I did this? A long time ago when I started with education, I was actually just thinking about how to help people do math problems. Today, when I think back to that time, I think I was probably a solution looking for a problem, in the sense that somehow I thought it would be very important for people to be good at math. But then things that happened later in my life as I became the national coach of the US Olympic math team, I saw situations where there were so many so clever, so capable people who were still so depressed. And furthermore, after they graduated from high school, they even
00:09:44 · S0, S1
Ad[00:09:44] S0: This episode is brought to you by Indeed. You're ready to level up your business, but the pressure to find the right person to make that happen is intense. Indeed sponsored jobs can help carry the load. It boosts your job post to help it reach quality talent fast. Cut through the chaos with Indeed sponsored jobs. Get a $75 sponsored job credit at indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Ad[00:10:07] S1: Hiring now? Then this is Ad[00:10:09] S0: a job for Indeed sponsored jobs.