Your Brain on ChatGPT: Accumulation
of Cognitive Debt when Using an AI
Assistant for Essay Writing Task https://arxiv.org/pdf/2506.08872

Fascinating paper. It's long, 200 pages; you can read the intro and the Discussion section and get much out of it already though, but they do their homework.

Effects of LLM usage on memory retention and task execution:

- LLM users do get judged well by human and LLM judges for their essays
- Can't remember them
- Low cognitive activation
- Essays are mostly the same

New study on the effects of LLM use (in this case on essay writing):

https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.08872

Quote:

"LLM users also struggled to accurately quote their own work. While LLMs offer immediate convenience, our findings highlight potential cognitive costs. Over four months, LLM users consistently underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioral levels. These results raise concerns about the long-term educational implications of LLM reliance and underscore the need for deeper inquiry into AI's role in learning."

The interesting thing is: People who used search engines (to find sources etc) did not show similar issues. This is an important antidote against the belief that LLM-based tools are just like search engines. Which they are not. They are massively degrading their users' mental abilities and development. Which is why these systems have absolutely no place even _near_ any school or university.

https://hails.org/@hailey/114691651497761523

Does anyone have experience with a long-term-temporary overseas move? By which I mean, living for 6-12 months in a different country primarily for the sake of living in a different country. We’re thinking of doing that maybe late 2026. Younger kid will be mid-high-school age, older kid will be finishing uni (and may not join us). Thinking maybe Ireland? Maybe France? Maybe… somewhere else we haven’t thought of? Partner and kids have Irish citizenship, I don’t (but married so should have access to whatever spouse-residency kind of visa is on offer). I also have US and Canadian citizenship, but North America is not under consideration for presumably-obvious reasons. Normally we live in Australia.

Younger kid will need to attend school, but I’m not really sure how those transitions work - may end up a year behind on returning? I’ll have paid leave from my job for most of a year, but I might look to some sort of work if I can. Partner not sure what they plan to do - maybe museum work, maybe work on further developing pottery skills, maybe study, maybe a combo?

As you can see, the plan is not well-developed… we only just realised it could be a possibility. Any thoughts, suggestions, recommendations (also boosts) would be most welcome!

Here's the problem.

Recent growth on mastodon.social is greater than the growth rate of November 2022.

But growth on other servers, like mstdn.social, has flatlined.

This has been confirmed to me by numerous Mastodon server admins.

Very concerning!

@fediversenews