With his recent executive order promoting artificial intelligence in public education, President Donald Trump has given parents a gift: a chance to reflect on the role that AI should play in the lives of children.
There are countless reasons to worry about the content children have access to through their phones. In a matter of moments, children can scroll from the good to the bad to the terrible. They are being flooded with information, images and videos, and too many are becoming lost in this new digital world.
While AI tools can help organize the flood of content coming at children, AI cannot determine what we should value. Worse, because our tools are getting so good at so many tasks, we start thinking they can do all tasks. In the process, the spiritual, moral and intellectual muscles necessary for a life of character shrink from lack of use.
Building a life of character is challenging under the best of circumstances. Awash in content designed to entertain and distract, we are making this work nearly impossible for the next generation.
To foster meaning and purpose, parents need to help their children reflect on the highest good, which isn’t always readily apparent.
In “The Nicomachean Ethics,” Aristotle argues that humans often confuse secondary goods with the highest good. For example, many of us pursue money as if it is the highest good. But Aristotle suggests that we pursue money because it gives us access to other things: freedom from want and freedom to pursue life projects. It is figuring out these life projects, not the pursuit of money alone, that matters.
AI can help us pursue many goods, but it cannot help us determine which life projects are worth our time and energy. Rather than pushing children into one more activity, and rather than giving them access to more distractions through their phones, parents must encourage their children to reflect on purpose.
The main way to facilitate this reflection is giving our children access to the wisdom of the past. Author and educator Luke Burgis, in his article “The Three-City Problem of Modern Life,” argues that we can understand our lives at the intersection of three metaphorical cities: Athens, Jerusalem and Silicon Valley.
Young people are digital natives, literate in the languages of Silicon Valley. But they are often illiterate when it comes to the languages of Athens and Jerusalem: Children often don’t value the ideals of free inquiry (Athens) or understand the power of religious vision (Jerusalem). This is why so many of them are underwater, indiscriminately scrolling through content, often unaware of how they are being influenced.
Smartphones and algorithms manipulate children to think and feel in ways that advertisers and other special-interest groups want them to think and feel. This isn’t in the best interest of our children. When they have access to the great minds of Athens, they learn that discerning truth is a life’s work. Other people, and even AI, can assist us in this work, but living in truth is not something we can outsource.
Similarly, the wisdom of Jerusalem reminds us that we are each bearers of infinite worth. So much of what our children consume through their phones is degrading. It lowers their estimation of themselves and others. It coarsens perception, making it less likely that a child will treat themselves and others as bearers of unlimited value.
Even as we build AI literacy in schools, children need to understand how the greatest minds of the past made sense of leading a human life. This doesn’t come through AI summaries. It comes from going to the source and wrestling with the same issues humans have wrestled with for thousands of years.
Parents must facilitate this wrestling with purpose and meaning for their children. They need to give children anchors in the values of Athens and Jerusalem so that they can build the character they will need to navigate our digital world with wisdom and compassion.
The president’s executive order offers school communities an ideal opportunity to reflect on how to use AI tools effectively and efficiently to promote student learning while graduating AI-literate citizens. Parents are similarly obligated to reflect on how to best prepare our children to face our rapidly changing world. The timeless values of Athens and Jerusalem offer a much-needed life raft children can use to navigate the flood of content constantly coming at them.
Jeff Frank is a philosopher of education and chair of the education department at St. Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y.