Hey! Just warning, some of this is going to be a bit of a rant/vent because I had a pretty...draining day today but I do have some positive news at the end. I like to try to find something positive even when I'm having a bad day!
I'm....really noticing the effects of just AI, and being on the phone all the time has on people in my lab section of my class... It's demoralizing, and it's harming my enjoyment of the class as well.
For context, there's a rule that if there's only one student in the lab, the lab has to close for safety reasons (teacher needs multiple students around in case an emergency occurs, can't just have a student alone) and there's a major problem with the students in my class just typing all the lab questions, and things they need into ChatGPT and then leaving super early... I've been unable to get the data I need for 2 labs now because of it, the teacher calls it out but just nothing is done about it, and it's really...dystopian honestly.
It's just like no one is actually interested and wants to actually do work, they just want it done for them, and I just don't understand. Why has this become so incredibly normalized, why can't they find the joy in it, I'd think students taking a bioscience class would care a bit more about how much ai affects the environment AT LEAST, not to mention all the moral things wrong with it, and using it to cheat through class...
It drove me crazy, we were using microscopes today, and I was so excited and instead of doing the work and looking at the slides, they just typed the cells into chatgpt they were supposed to be looking at, told it to generate a drawing of it and label the parts they needed, and complained the whole class about how boring it was, and how was this relevant and useful?
Sorry for getting a bit annoyed but, how is this NOT relevant? We literally were examining a human sperm cell as one of the slides, I don't understand how that's not absolutely fascinating, and so cool, I mean that's part of what we all came from??? How is that not "relevant" or interesting... I feel like I'm the only one who finds this stuff interesting and super cool and I just feel really demoralized today. I hate how normalized this has become, just not caring about anything and wanting a robot to do it all for you, when you could be learning stuff that's genuinely fascinating, and just. Man.
Anyways!! On positive news!!
I made some signs yesterday because yard services come around our neighborhood on Wednesdays and I wanted them to be careful around my sprouts today and!! I came home!! And they were careful, none of them had been mowed over!!
I was so worried about it, because technicallyyyy I am kind of planting where I'm well, not supposed to be planting, but it seems they understood that the area could use some more greenery and seemed really careful not to run them over which was really, really sweet.
They did however get caterpillar munched.... I'm trying some vinegar and water to repel the caterpillars, because they seem to definitely have a taste for my sunflowers! I try not to use insecticide on caterpillars, because 1. they're adorable, and 2. they grow into butterflies which are really good for pollinating and just absolutely beautiful.
Hopefully repelling them works, because I don't want them to take too many munches and kill them, but I don't want to kill the caterpillars either...
I hope everyone has a nice day <3
