mastodon 4.8.0-nightly.2026-10-06Mostly complete digital works at http://rheingold.com and https://patreon.com/howardrheingold -- I wrote books about tools for thought, virtual communities, virtual reality, smart mobs, taught classes at UC Berkeley & Stanford on digital journalism, social media issues, social media literacies. Now I make art. I'm interested in all of the above & like to follow knowledgeable ppl about current events, science, humor, community. #technology #onlinecommunities #art #socialmedia #learning #edutech
The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Human Thought
#AI #thought #thinking #technology
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.16628
tl;dr not so good
Here lies a nearly-complete archive of Whole Earth publications, a series of journals and magazines descended from the Whole Earth Catalog, published by Stewart Brand and the POINT Foundation between 1968 and 2002. They are made available here for scholarship, education, and research purposes.
Yes, I post links to research about negative effects of #AI. I am an enthusiastic AI user, but not uncritical, and as I have written recently, it is possible to use AI and preserve cognitive hygiene -- but it requires knowledge and work.
I think this is one of the most important things I've ever written.
Thinking about thinking about #thinking
cognitive hygiene for 5 year olds
I recently read that millennials (the students I taught!) might be the last generation to be able to #think and write without using #AI. So I gave #chatGPT the following prompt:
"generate a literature review with links to sources and an extensive executive summary of peer reviewed research regarding the possibility that using large language models diminishes the human ability to think well"
My write-up is here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/is-ai-eroding-153932626
PDF of story used to teach my 5 year old grandson metacognition
rheingold.com/ToddlerMetacognition.pdf
I am trying to teach my 5 year old grandson to think for himself in this age of #ai chatbots. I have literature reviews around the question of whether ai diminishes #thinking ability (yes) and what to do about it ( #metacognition is one prophylactic). Here is a very short story suitable for a 5 year old. #learning
https://rheingold.com/ThinkingCurriculum.zip should work now
For 5 years, I taught an online course on intro to #cooperation studies: what we are learning from converging biological, evolutionary, psychological, sociological, economic, computational, political inquiries into how humans and other critters get things done together. I've compiled the videoconferences, lectures, syllabus in a free pdf
