Who Is Responsible When Artificial Intelligence Makes the Decision?

As artificial intelligence becomes more involved in healthcare, education, finance, employment, transportation, and public policy, two ethical concerns rise above the rest: responsibility and transparency.

Who is responsible when an artificial intelligence system causes harm? Who is included in the “we” that is expected to answer for its decisions? These questions become increasingly difficult when an outcome is produced by an algorithm that few people can fully understand.

Responsibility for consequences

Responsibility for artificial intelligence should be shared among the people and organizations that design, deploy, manage, and use it.

It is no longer sufficient for an engineer to say, “I only created the algorithm. I am not responsible for what it decided.” Developers have a vested interest in the outcomes their systems produce. The same is true for executives who approve their use, organizations that implement them, and professionals who rely on their recommendations.

Artificial intelligence may generate an output, but humans decide:

  • What data are used
  • What goals the system is designed to pursue
  • Where the technology is deployed
  • How much authority it receives
  • Whether its decisions are reviewed
  • What happens when it fails

Responsibility should therefore follow the entire lifecycle of the system rather than being assigned only after something goes wrong.

The story of Frankenstein is relevant here. The warning is not simply about creating powerful technology. It is about creating something and then abandoning responsibility for what it becomes. We should not leave technology to its own devices and then act surprised when the consequences extend beyond our intentions.

The need for transparency

The second major concern is transparency.

How can people be held accountable for decisions made by an algorithm they cannot possibly understand? If an artificial intelligence system denies someone a job, recommends a medical treatment, flags a student for intervention, or determines access to a financial service, the affected person should have some way to understand how that conclusion was reached.

This does not mean every user must be able to read the source code. It does mean there should be meaningful access to the system’s reasoning, limitations, data sources, and decision criteria.

The so-called “black box” cannot remain completely closed when its decisions affect people’s lives.

Transparency should include:

  • Clear explanations of how the system is used
  • Disclosure of known limitations and risks
  • Documentation of the data used to train it
  • Opportunities for human review
  • A process for challenging harmful or incorrect decisions
  • Independent auditing and oversight

Without transparency, accountability becomes little more than an abstract promise.

Educating the technology we create

Education and learning are also essential.

Artificial intelligence is created by humans, trained on human-produced data, and shaped by human priorities. We must therefore “educate the algorithms” before trusting them to influence human lives.

The goal should not be to create something powerful and then become afraid of what it can do. The goal should be to design systems intentionally, teach them through carefully selected data, test them under diverse conditions, and continue evaluating them after deployment.

Human beings are already technological beings. Our lives, decisions, relationships, and institutions are intertwined with technology. Because of that, we must consider the social impact of artificial intelligence during the design process, not after the system has already been released.

How should these issues be addressed locally?

Artificial intelligence is a global issue, but local governments and institutions still have an important role.

In the United States, regulation should establish minimum standards for:

  • Safety
  • Privacy
  • Explainability
  • Human oversight
  • Bias testing
  • Data governance
  • Accountability when harm occurs

Organizations should also create internal review structures before deploying artificial intelligence. A school, hospital, company, or government agency should not adopt a system simply because it is efficient or innovative. It should first determine whether the technology is appropriate, reliable, fair, and aligned with the needs of the people it serves.

Local implementation should also include education for employees and the public. People need to understand what the technology can do, what it cannot do, and when human judgment must take priority.

How should these issues be addressed globally?

Artificial intelligence cannot be regulated effectively by only a few wealthy or technologically advanced countries.

Countries with the largest economies may have the most influence, but the consequences of artificial intelligence will cross borders. Systems developed in one country may use data from another, affect global labor markets, influence elections, alter food production, or shape access to healthcare.

An international consortium should help develop shared standards and provide representation for countries with different economic, cultural, and technological circumstances.

Global cooperation should focus on areas such as:

  • Human rights
  • Data protection
  • Military uses of artificial intelligence
  • Cross-border accountability
  • Environmental impact
  • Access to beneficial technologies
  • Standards for high-risk systems

The purpose would not be to eliminate innovation. It would be to ensure that innovation does not outpace responsibility.

Where artificial intelligence can serve the common good

Three areas stand out as opportunities for responsible global application:

Healthcare

Artificial intelligence can assist with diagnosis, pattern recognition, treatment planning, and the distribution of medical resources. Used carefully, it may help improve access and reduce preventable errors.

Energy

Artificial intelligence can help reduce waste, balance energy grids, improve efficiency, and support the transition toward cleaner energy sources.

Agriculture

Artificial intelligence can support farmers through crop monitoring, weather analysis, soil assessment, irrigation planning, and early detection of pests or disease.

These applications could help people live longer, reduce environmental damage, and produce enough food to support future generations. However, those benefits depend on how the systems are designed, who controls them, and whether the people affected have a voice.

Final thought

Artificial intelligence should not be treated as an independent force that simply appeared and began making decisions on its own. It is a human creation, shaped by human choices and embedded within human institutions.

That means responsibility cannot be delegated entirely to the algorithm.

The central ethical challenge is not whether artificial intelligence will continue to develop. It will. The challenge is whether humans will remain willing to explain, supervise, regulate, and take responsibility for what they create.

The 9 Commandments

On Empowerment

In our technologically advanced society, where “give me now” is the predominant mindset, children do not understand the value of patience, dedication and the antiquity involved in getting where we are as a nation. History is often a glazed eye subject for them while not understanding the importance in lessons learned. To youth, anything they desire is but a computer click away… This does not fully invoke the thought process nor mental capabilities they are capable of. To unplug, step back and think. To introspect on life, history, and advancement. By inventing a “click here” society, the microwave generation exists solely in the present. Not concerned with past mistakes and successes, only worrying and concerning themselves with the face of today. Then, their future becomes their present and they are left bewildered and untrained on how to manage. My goal is to invoke this thought mechanism that has been replaced with http://www.insert-your-website-here.com. THINK young people and learn from history! On this, I call Empowerment.

On Knowledge

I refer to this concept as a state of mind because the precursor to knowledge is a love of learning. The core of our Human is an innate desire to seek out information. This should be considered a never-ending pursuit of bettering oneself and not a stagnant state of being. Man must continue to learn, to expand his boundaries, diversify his thought and, once he acknowledges his limitations on a particular subject, continue to seek out that which he does not know. The material one seeks is subjective yet the striving for knowledge is relative to us all. Our pursuit of something leads us to determine the course of our existence. Thus, bringing me back to my above-stated topic. This pursuit is knowledge. Knowledge from experience, life, education, friendship, desires, wants, needs, morality, books, etc. The list is endless because what we are each seeking is individual to us. One must learn to seek out his knowledge, to grasp it and continue with his search for more. On this, I call Knowledge.

On Reading

Truly my first love. I distinctly remember the excitement I felt when opening a new book by one of my favorite authors, or any author for that matter. The crisp edges of a page, the sharp spine that had yet to be broken; all gave rise to a thrilling sense of wonder at what I was about to discover. The sentence structure, semantics and plot all provided my young mind with a background for my imagination to take hold. As time progressed, this thirst for reading did not diminish. I read more, diversified my library while pressing upon my peers the importance of this outdated mode. In hindsight, I can honestly say that the act of reading enabled my conviction to become more rounded, my communication skills to become more precise; thus leading to an ability to hold a conversation within any age group on any number of topics. So, give it a shot… Turn off the TV, step away from Facebook and find a book that captures your attention. It will require thinking but I am confident that your imagination will be fueled by an undying fire. (All while bringing a smile to your countenance). On this, I call Reading

On Art

Full disclosure, I am not an artist. I merely slapstick paint or push a pen around and hope for the best. However, this simple act of artistic expression, or creating something from naught, allows the individual to express his/her innermost. Picasso stated that, “the purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.” I concur with his stance even though his art is above my head. All too often the grind of life, jobs, responsibilities, and care-giving stifle the true creative species that we are. Our nature is geared toward solving problems in an ever-changing environment. By taking a moment to pause, contemplate and create, we effectively give a voice to our disposition. The calculated creation of technology is put on hold while we explore the workings of our mind and soul. The therapy this act provides is a welcome respite that can lead to moments of self-satisfaction and peace. This aim at artistic expression is not to appease others but to introspect on the values and virtues that one, sometimes unknowingly, hold dear. Moreover, if all else fails in this endeavor, at least you have paused to think while examining your soul. On this, I call Art.

On Ethics

This branch of Philosophy has been debated, expounded and developed throughout the ages. The values of an individual need be found within his person. Largely, however, it is the mindset of a group that the individual ends up acquiring. Whatever the group may value or hold dear, then these ideas are passed on to the individual, the next generation and so on. In order to check the group, the individual must take a step back, introspect and find what his values, morals and thoughts are. If not, a collectivist mindset will continue to press on without a check & balance system. (History can attest to what I am stating; see 1940’s European group-thought mindset.) One must learn to think for himself and use his intellect, reason and reality to determine his stance on life. Only then can the individual truly and without bias state his ethical code. Only then can a telling life be led; one that is conscious, driven and not pushed along without establishing itself. On this, I call Ethics.

On Self-Respect

By the very fact that we exist, it should behoove the individual to respect his person. This respect, that each individual need to learn for himself, can only be achieved once we learn to accept and love the person we are. Once done, the individual’s actions, thoughts and work will follow suit in like manner. However, we see it throughout history as well as our present time that man struggles with this concept. His production and time spent is the perception on which self-respect is to be measured. We are limited to a finite amount of time on Earth; then, as if we were not even here, time continues and the man is forgotten. Yet, his efforts and his work can live immortal if produced in the manner of his abilities. Meaning, the respect in which we endow ourselves is key to the productivity produced. A wasteful attitude will destroy any chance of leaving a mark, and thus any chance of obtaining self-respect. Once we learn to respect our own person then are we able to truly respect others. On this, I call Self-Respect.

On Self-Discipline

We learn from an early age that while our parents or caregivers are there for our well-being, they cannot be there to guide you at all points in your life. It is up to the individual to take responsibility for their actions, thoughts and ideas if they are to live a meaningful life. Discipline is a necessary component to achieve this sense. Every day you are faced with challenges and questions on how you want to live your life: Do I get up today? Will I be productive or lazy? Am I to take care of the one body I possess? (A small sample size of questions yet the point is made in such.) Our ability to face reality and move forward is self-discipline. To better oneself, one must have this state of mind. Nothing is promised to our Human hence our need to form our thoughts and choose the direction in which we want to discover. Nothing is life that is worth something, comes easy. As a result, you will have to do things in life that you do not want to do. Nevertheless, you do them because the path to betterment begins with action. On this, I call Self-Discipline.

On Motivation

To be sure, one must take unconditional advantage when this state of mind is upon you. The energy it provides is liken to a transcendental experience. It arrives at varying times unless one is able to harness it permanently. By this, I mean one has to have a focus that is undeterred and unrelenting in itself and absolute in its drive. Man has studied this trait in earnest and many a self-help has been written on it; yet, as evident when one looks around, it is still a mystery to many. I do not have an answer as to why this occurs… By writing on this topic, I merely want to bring attention to it. This trait of being walks closely with the following: ambition, determination and resolve. To possess all these traits would be the result of a paramount, powerful individual. An individual who understands himself, his environment and what must be done to change or manipulate the situation. Regardless of the direction the individual pursues, having a motivating drive will surely lead them to their goal. Grasp this state and never let go. On this, I call Motivation.

On Elation

The state in which all would like to permanently dwell. However, this uplifting and joyous emotion is often short lived as reality enters the equation. Most find this state of being from an external stimuli; as a result, they require more and more incentives to hold on to it. With the constant advancement of our society, our Human is bombarded with images and ideas on how we should be. A never-ending deluge of dejection is often the result of this barrage… How & Why are most common beginnings to questions in which no answer can be derived. The key to this epidemic is found in oneself. The blissful awareness that I am the harbor and ship of my thoughts and thus I control my state of emotion. As a result, one will then step back and see the rat maze in which we are shrouded. To look above and beyond and find the wheel that is our Turning; which, when discovered, leads to a peaceful reckoning. This highly important moment is the beginning to finding our calling, purpose and hope in humanity. On this, I call Elation.

Has Technology Improved the Way We Communicate, or Changed What Communication Means?

During my undergraduate years at the University of Central Arkansas, where I minored in philosophy, I encountered a wide range of readings that challenged how I understood society, power, and human behavior. Martin Heidegger’s The Question Concerning Technology was one of the works that stayed with me, much like Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish.

I cannot claim to remember every book or classroom discussion from that period. I was young and often more interested in women and alcohol than enlightenment. Even so, Heidegger’s ideas remained with me.

His writing can be difficult to work through, but there is truth in his argument. Heidegger challenges the idea that technology is merely a neutral tool or a simple means to an end. Technology also shapes how we understand the world. It influences how we view people, nature, information, and even time, often reducing them to resources that can be organized, stored, measured, and used.

This leads to a larger question: has technology truly improved human communication, or has it changed the meaning and quality of communication in ways we do not yet fully understand?

More connected, but not always closer

Technology has advanced to the point where the world can feel as small or as large as we need it to be. Gone are the days when letters and telephone calls were the primary ways to communicate with someone who did not live nearby. We can now use FaceTime, Zoom, Google Meet, messaging platforms, social media, and countless other tools to connect almost instantly.

These technologies can bring us closer together, but perhaps only in an incomplete sense.

We are more connected than ever, yet that connection does not always produce more meaningful communication. In some cases, the physical and emotional distance created by a screen makes people less direct, less thoughtful, and less accountable. A keyboard can become a weapon for someone who would never speak the same way during a face-to-face conversation.

Technology gives us the ability to project versions of ourselves that may not reflect who we really are. We can carefully select our words, images, opinions, and identities. This leads me to wonder whether we are truly being understood or simply presenting a constructed version of ourselves that is easier to share.

Technology can connect us while also acting as a buffer between us and reality.

Access and the widening divide

Our dependence on digital communication also creates another problem. Those who lack reliable devices, internet access, digital skills, or technical support are placed at a disadvantage.

As education, employment, government services, and social interaction continue moving online, the digital divide becomes more than a matter of convenience. It affects whether people can participate fully in society.

Technology may increase connection for many while increasing isolation for others. A communication tool is only useful when people have both access to it and the knowledge needed to use it effectively.

Technology and education

The influence of technology is especially clear in education.

When in-person teaching was no longer possible, technology allowed schools and universities to continue offering instruction. Without learning management systems, videoconferencing, digital resources, and online communication tools, educational interaction could have become far more limited.

Online learning creates real opportunities. It can reach learners across geographic distances, provide greater scheduling flexibility, and support students who may feel uncomfortable participating in a traditional classroom. Some socially inhibited students may contribute more readily in a discussion board or online meeting because the technology provides a degree of emotional distance.

At the same time, that distance can reduce the spontaneous collaboration that happens when students learn in the same physical space. Informal conversations, immediate questions, body language, and peer interaction all contribute to learning. These elements are more difficult to reproduce online.

The question is therefore not whether technology is good or bad for education. The more useful question is whether the learning experience has been intentionally designed for the environment in which it is delivered.

Changing the course without changing the design

Technology has created a major shift in what students expect from a course. Learners increasingly expect content to be accessible digitally, even when the course was originally designed around face-to-face instruction.

The problem occurs when educators move existing material online without reconsidering the instructional design. A lecture recorded and uploaded is not automatically an effective online lesson. An in-person activity placed into a discussion board may not create the same learning experience.

Teachers may be required to adjust quickly, often without enough time, training, or feedback. They may deliver the same content through a different medium while continuing to use assessment methods designed for the original environment.

This can distort how student learning is measured. If the course design, delivery method, and assessment strategy are no longer aligned, then the results may not accurately reflect what students know or can do.

Rather than simply lowering or changing standards, we should reconsider how those standards are demonstrated in a digital learning environment.

What convenience has done to language

Technology has also changed the way we use language.

Text messaging and social media have reduced the need for formal or extended communication in many everyday situations. Acronyms, abbreviations, reaction images, and emojis allow people to express ideas quickly. In some ways, this resembles a return to visual forms of communication such as hieroglyphics or cuneiform.

This does not necessarily mean that language is deteriorating. Communication has always evolved alongside culture and technology. New symbols and shortcuts can carry complex meanings within a particular community.

Still, convenience comes with a cost.

We may be losing some of our willingness to think deeply, explain carefully, and describe ideas with precision. It is easier to send a brief reaction than to form a thoughtful response. It is easier to signal agreement or disagreement than to explain the reasoning behind either one.

We may have traded some linguistic complexity for speed, access, and convenience.

Whether that trade is right or wrong is difficult to determine. It has expanded our capacity to communicate while potentially weakening some of the habits required for careful thought.

Technology is not merely a tool

Heidegger warned against treating technology as nothing more than an instrument under human control. He wrote, “So long as we represent technology as an instrument, we remain held fast in the will to master it.”

That statement remains relevant because technology does not simply help us communicate. It shapes our expectations about communication. It influences how quickly we expect responses, how much attention we give others, how we present ourselves, and how we decide what deserves to be said.

We may believe that we are simply using technology, while technology is also shaping the ways in which we think, relate, learn, and speak.

A final thought

Technology is a gift in that it allows people to communicate across distances, maintain relationships, continue learning, and access information at a scale that previous generations could not have imagined.

It also creates distance, encourages performance, increases inequality, and can reduce complex ideas to quick reactions.

The issue is not whether we should accept or reject technology. It is whether we can remain aware of what it makes possible, what it changes, and what may be lost when convenience becomes the primary measure of communication.

The more important question may be this: Are we using technology to communicate more meaningfully, or are we allowing it to redefine meaningful communication for us?

What Does It Mean to Know?

Who we are is revealed not only through what we say about ourselves, but through how we act. Oets Kolk Bouwsma once wrote that a person’s life shows what that person truly thinks of themselves. He made a similar observation about Socrates, noting that Socrates both spoke highly and acted highly, while others spoke highly but acted lowly, and some both spoke and acted lowly.

Bouwsma did not address a fourth possibility: those who speak modestly or even poorly of themselves, yet consistently act with courage, integrity, and generosity.

This raises a broader question about education. Is one of its purposes to help people not only think and speak well, but also act in ways that reflect wisdom, character, and responsibility? And if so, how do we recognize the difference between speaking highly, acting highly, and merely appearing to do either? These questions lead me to consider examples of all four categories and, more importantly, to ask where I locate myself within them.

Who am I encompasses everything I have been, am currently, and what I seek to be. It’s a layered explanation and one that requires an in-depth examination of my soul, as well as a healthy dose of self-assessment and honesty (both of which can be difficult pills to swallow). I come from great parents who did their best in doing what they thought was right for me. Who can fault someone for that? Well, I did for much of my youth… The reasons were personal and justified yet they were directed at the wrong people. It’s a long and personal story so I won’t go into detail. However, the situations I later found myself in, or the bad decisions I made, can be traced to my inability to forgive, and move on. It took a lot of failures, heartache, ruined relationships, and burnt bridges, to finally push past my ineptitude and accept myself for the flawed human that I am.


So, what did I learn from being a people-pleasing, pleasure-seeking, and mind-altered young adult? What made me finally mature and stop wasting the potential I was gifted with? In truth, it’s hard to pin it on one specific thing… However, and I believe most people who have been in my position will say the same thing, it was a process that did not happen overnight. It required me to cut out portions of my life that were rotted while rebuilding my character and integrity. And believe me, that is a long, hard road… Fortunately, I am on the other side of it now and can think on my journey with perspective. Yes, I made it harder than it was ever intended to be, and I learned that I am my own worst enemy, but I’m still here…


So, if Bouwsma is correct when he states that our lives show what we think of ourselves, then I didn’t place too high a premium on mine at one time. Oh sure, I did well in school and read every book I could get my hands on; was loved by many and followed by a lot, but I chose to feed my inner wicked wolf and it feasted. So, I would say that I spoke highly but acted lowly during that point in my life. Also, since we are being honest with one another, there were moments sprinkled throughout that time when I also spoke and acted lowly. I used words as daggers and flung them at those who did not deserve my poisoned, silver tongue. I chose to apply pressure to the most tender of spots because I knew it would hurt and I wanted someone to feel the way I felt. Pretty low, huh? I know…


Lastly, Oet’s final category of speaking lowly while acting highly is one in which I would find myself when my guilty conscience would prevail. What do you mean, Lance? Well, following the moments when I would lash out or speak and act lowly, I would feel intense guilt knowing that I was wrong in my actions. I would speak lowly to and of myself while reaching out to those I wronged in hopes of righting my errors. “I am so sorry for acting the way I did, could you ever forgive me,” became an all too often line for me. I didn’t deserve to be forgiven during those moments. That would have been too easy. The Lessons of Life would not have been as firmly rooted as they are now, and I wouldn’t have appreciated the meaning of “I forgive you.”


So, here I am. In sharing a bit about myself, I hope you can appreciate how thankful I am to be where I am today. It’s an ugly picture but fortunately we have stripped bare the topcoat of paint, grinded through the primer, and are staring at the naked realization that there is “nowhere else to go but up from here.” Teddy Roosevelt’s foreign policy motto of “speak softly but carry a big stick” comes to mind when I think on where I am now. In speaking softly, I am seeking to let my actions and written words be my voice. In past times, I would say one thing while doing another; or my left-hand wasn’t aware of the right’s location (you get the point).

This is where I find myself presently. Rather than talking, I am doing. Rather than wishing for something to happen, I am building for my future. And yes, I do speak highly (and with more conviction than in past moments). The difference now is that my inner good wolf is being nurtured and fed. I am aligned in terms of who I am, where I want to go, and the process it takes to achieve my ambitions. So, if speaking highly and acting highly is the gold standard, then I have run the gambit trying to obtain it.

View O.K. Bouwsma’s Papers

Paradigms

In The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn introduced the idea of a paradigm as a dominant framework that shapes how a field understands problems, evaluates evidence, and determines what counts as legitimate knowledge. Newtonian mechanics is one of the clearest examples. It guided scientific thought for centuries before Einstein’s theory of relativity revealed its limitations and introduced a new way of understanding motion, space, and time.

This leads to an important question for education: Are there theories of learning and teaching that function as paradigms in the same way?

Educational theory has certainly been shaped by influential frameworks such as behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism, and connectivism. Each has offered a different explanation of how people learn, what role the teacher should play, and how instruction should be designed. Yet education may be less likely than the physical sciences to settle around one dominant paradigm because learning is influenced by human experience, culture, context, motivation, technology, and social interaction.

This question invites me to consider whether educational theories replace one another through true paradigm shifts or whether they accumulate, overlap, and remain useful under different conditions.

Thinking on this question reminded me of two of our prior readings, Meno and How We Think. In Meno, Socrates and Meno are trying to settle on a satisfactory definition of virtue. Throughout the dialogue, many avenues are explored as to its potential meaning, yet a clear-cut answer is never given. We are left with Socrates saying that “virtue appears to be present in those of us who may possess it as a gift from the gods” (Meno, 1976, p.32). His conversational style with Meno, and the rationalist method in which he approached his reasoning, was a major school of thought in 350 BC. According to Edgar (2012), “Recitation literacy was prevalent because it was a common belief that the mind was a gift from God and not to be questioned. Although scientific understandings of the mind have been postulated for centuries, it was not until the 19th century that scientific understanding of the mind started forming” (p. 1). Humans learned to read, to write, and memorize facts (mental discipline in its simplest form). Cue John Dewey and How We Think. I admit, it was not easy reading for me. In truth, I listened to much of it (thanks technology!). Still, I was able to appreciate his work and picked up a few nuggets of gold along the way; namely, reflective thought and how each idea builds on the other to form a belief. Simple enough. We do this daily, yet Dewey laid it out on paper for all to see.

It also sounds like the seedlings of Constructivism. We each have our experiences and our realities for thinking the way we do, right? So, my coloring of an event or new idea might not take the same hue as your coloring. Or my thoughts and beliefs might not be grounded with the same glue as yours. And that’s okay. In fact, it’s as it should be. Prior to this shift in theory, Edgar (2012, p. 2) states:

Schools in the 19th century were for preparing students for entrance into college. Those individuals who were not college bound mostly entered the workforce prior to completion of high school. Families needed children to work and to support the family unit, and education beyond “necessary” skills such as being able to read and write was viewed by the common person as a frivolous novelty for the rich.

And in stepped the 20th century with its bipolar nature and off we went. Wars and depressions walked jointly with civil rights and technological advancements (and we reacted accordingly). New demands in the form of military aircraft and space shuttles created a need for more complex forms of learning. Think you can beat us to the moon, Russia? Get bent. We will put a man on the moon. In fact, we will make a computer small enough to carry while creating a platform on which to connect it to the world. How’s that for complex thought? The needs of the time called our brains to action and we responded accordingly. And so, behaviorism, and its forms of conditioning, gave way to cognitive theories which led us to Constructivism and where we are now in our current information overload era.

So, what now? Where are we in terms of education and how we receive and dispense with it? Seems we are at a crossroad in terms of our relationship with technology and just how far we are willing to use it before the master becomes the servant (or are we already there?).

To quote myself in an upcoming revised draft (and excuse me while I knock the dirt of my shoulder):

In speaking on education, and the environment in which we live today, the teacher is a central figure whose role has the potential to steer students down many a career path. Speaking from my own experience, my kindergarten, first grade, and third grade teacher, each made an indelible mark on my life. All three played the role of a second mother while guiding my mind towards a love for learning (this being in the early 90’s). She would teach, write on a chalkboard, engage our mind in various hands-on activities, and move about the class to see if we were progressing in our skills. Sound familiar? Then, through our human ingenuity, computers became portable, phones became mobile, and we each caught a wave while surfing the web. Instant gratification became the name of the game as we hooked our brains to a technological nirvana. As a result, the onus seemed to shift as the instructor was no longer strictly a dispenser of information. In truth, we divorced tradition, married with technology, and allowed the instructor to assume the role of a guiding facilitator and mediator. The days of lecturing the student and being the sole source from which to obtain information was replaced with a newer, younger model (and wasn’t she something, wow!).

 My advice? Buckle up baby because this paradigm has already shifted.

Alignment is All You Need

In a 2016 interview, Charles Fadel, the Center for Curriculum Redesign founder, stated “from the times of Socrates and Confucius, it has been obvious that what makes people successful in life is not only what they know and how skillfully they use their knowledge, but also how they behave and engage in the world. In other words, their character” (Rubin, 2017, p. 18). In my previous work as an Educational Specialist, I had the privilege of collaborating with a group of 100 middle-school students from low-income and first-generation backgrounds. These individuals had been identified as having the potential to excel in college yet required additional support to fully realize their capabilities. Through this experience, I gained a deep appreciation for the unique challenges that these students face and the importance of providing targeted resources and guidance to help them succeed. As it relates to this article, I would like to share a learning activity that was highly popular among the students. This activity provided them with an evidentiary roadmap based on their self-identified personality traits and paired their responses via a career interest survey.

The learning activity that was created has its roots in several different areas that I had previously explored while working with middle and high school students. The title of the activity, The Road to Character, shares the same name as the book by David Brooks. In it, Brooks describes the two Adams, Adam I and Adam II, and how each represents human nature. Adam I is career driven, while Adam II seeks to find inner peace. Brookes provides biographical sketches of important figures throughout our human history and how each overcame personal failures and/or weaknesses to then obtain greatness. In essence, each example was humbled by life before continuing along the path to good character and transformation. After my initial reading of the book several years ago, I immediately went out and purchased a hardback first edition. I loved the style in which it was written and felt the message throughout the book was highly important for young people to grasp at an early age.

Cue the next phase and how I translated it for middle school students. For 7th graders, I had them complete a Personal Values Identification form in which they picked their five most important values and why they chose them. From there, they would then complete a basic Holland Code test in which potential job seekers are divided into six personality types: Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, and Conventional. I would then choose their highest three scores to determine their Holland code (SIR, AIC, ESI, etc.), and would then match that score with career fields that align with their code. My “food for thought” question was: Are your values and personality aligned with your career interests? Only you can know and decide.

For 8th graders, we went a step further and built upon the results obtained from the prior year. The students would complete a Career Clusters Interest Survey that asked them to choose: 1) the activities they liked doing, 2) personal qualities that described them, and 3) school subjects they liked. The survey was arranged in 16 boxes with each box correlating to a different Career Cluster. So, for example, if a student circled 10 activities, qualities, and school subjects within a particular box (and that box was the highest score), I would then align it with a career field (Business Admin & Management, Human Services, IT, etc.). At this point, I would access the Occupational Outlook Handbook (OOH) and compile a portfolio for the student detailing the job summary, work environment, educational requirements, future job outlook, similar occupations, etc. My goal for these activities was to put tangible data into their hands at a young age so they could have a specific reason to focus on their education.

The 8th graders who completed the assessment graduated in May 2021. Had I stayed within that career, some follow-up questions I would have asked them would be:

  • Are your career interests still the same as when the assessment was completed?
  • What solidified your career choice or caused you to change it?
  • What career resources would you have added to your high school career?
  • Were you able to do any job shadowing?
  • Do you feel like you have a good starting point to start your post-secondary education?

My thoughts were that the information garnered from these questions would allow educators to focus on what works, and what needs improvement. What better way to gain this information than from those who recently went through the process? Also, with these students largely being LIFG students, we have the potential for generational change by impacting educational and career decisions.

By aligning personal values and character traits with potential career paths, students can gain a deeper understanding of themselves and their goals, potentially leading to a greater sense of fulfillment and happiness in life. Remembering my own days in middle school, it felt at times that I was simply going through the motions of attending school without fully realizing what I was working towards. If we as educators can provide tangible and relevant data as it relates to the often-heard question of “why do we have to learn this?”, then it is my opinion that students will begin to shift their mindset to that of a determined and self-motivated individual working towards a defined goal.

In providing this assignment, my hopes were that LIFG students would see a blueprint for how to obtain their desired career and potentially impact their family dynamics by being the first to attend and graduate college. I hope you find this activity as rewarding as I did. In closing, let’s remember our true purpose as educators in that we are helping mold the next generation by promoting independent thinking and inspiring a love for learning. While challenging at times, the reward is a citizen capable of contribution, self-preservation, and the ability to think for themselves.

Learning to Be

In looking at our current educational institutions, the majority are structured to teach to specific outcomes (i.e., teaching to the test), as this methodology was applicable to the Industrial Age. Basic literacy and numeracy were taught as essential requirements for working in factories and military service. As nations further modernized, public education systems still taught rote knowledge while emphasizing higher education institutions for those who wanted a specific skillset on which to base a career. As we further questioned our human ignorance and admitted that our prior information systems (religion, state, economy) were not sufficient to account for the wonders of modern medicine, space exploration, and computing systems, we sought to provide worldwide access to information highways via the Internet and proliferate globalization through technology and trade. Microprocessors, mobile phones, automation, and social networking condensed, connected, and concentrated our man-made systems into a technological hub that unlocked the power of the algorithm. No longer were decision-making capabilities relegated to the realm of flesh and blood, nay, we successfully offloaded this powerful mechanism to machine learning that produced incredible results built on probabilities and statistics. Why make an educated guess when mathematics can provide pattern-based predictions? Why depend on heuristics when specificity is but a computer calculation away?

As computing systems scaled up via mass amounts of data and energy, we learned that the neural nets on which our human brain operates can be applied to artificial intelligence (AI) systems that resulted in their current generative abilities. Prior to this breakthrough in deep learning, our current sense of AI capabilities was confined to narrow systems that excelled in a specific domain (ex., Deep Blue, AlexNet, AlphaGo, etc.). As witnessed by the generative pre-trained transformer (GPT) models that launched in 2022 for public use, large language models (LLM’s) versatility created renewed interest and speculation concerning AI and how to best apply it to our vast range of systems. In true “cart before the horse” fashion, this advanced technology was deployed at scale before we fully understood its potential risks or prepared world governance structures for the ethical frameworks needed to ensure Gen-AI’s creator (humans) were not displaced in a changing society. And what of the data used to train these advanced models? Or, better yet, who owns AI-generated content and who is responsible if these models produce harmful content that negatively impacts a human? We are not even certain how they work! While not a complete black box, at best it’s opaque as this is the nature of reinforcement learning techniques used to train billion-parameter datasets. It’s akin to discovering fire the second time around; life changing, yet destructive if uncontrolled and misunderstood.

If we look at our current educational landscape, as this think piece is particularly concerned, we see a patchwork of responses from various institutions as it relates to implementing Gen-AI. This result is exactly as expected when presented with a novel technology that potentially disrupts the learning process. We didn’t know how to best implement it within our established systems, so many teachers were left reacting as students were all too eager to apply their generative abilities to coursework.  Currently, we see newer and more advanced AI models being developed, deployed, and open-sourced for all to use. What began as an innovative technology for those in the IT sphere has now garnered the attention of nations as evidenced by the US announcing a “private sector investment of up to $500 billion to fund infrastructure for artificial intelligence, aiming to outpace rival nations in the business-critical technology” (Reuters). This investment signaled to the rest of the world that an AI race is in progress and those who wield its true potential (Artificial General Intelligence; AGI) first, are likely to reap unprecedented benefits if aligned with our human values.

AGI, as defined by Geoffrey Hinton, uses the term to mean “AI that is at least as good as humans at nearly all of the cognitive things that humans do” (AP News). This ideal has long been the goal of computer scientists and one that seems like a potential reality soon. Leopold Aschenbrenner, a former OpenAI employee and author of Situational Awareness: The Decade Ahead, stresses the importance of aligning AI systems prior to an AGI system automating the research process, thus creating superintelligent systems that dwarf our human ingenuity. While his work is beyond the scope of this article, the process of automating research is underway as a recently produced paper by The AI Scientist-v2 on compositional generalization was submitted to the Thirteenth International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR 2025), and became the first AI system to pass the same peer-review procedure as a human would. In short:

The AI Scientist-v2 came up with the scientific hypothesis, proposed the experiments to test the hypothesis, wrote and refined the code to conduct those experiments, ran the experiments, analyzed the data, visualized the data in figures, and wrote every word of the entire scientific manuscript, from the title to the final reference, including placing figures and all formatting (Sakana.ai).

This is an incredible feat and one that begs the following question: If AI systems can eventually learn and create at or beyond our current human understanding, then what role does formal schooling have in our society? While education is the subject matter of this thought bubble, the prior question can be framed for any institutional system if (when?) AGI is reached. Rather than “fight the machine,” let it have linear, algorithmic, and computational thinking. We can offload these tasks and peer back into history and ponder on the questions that brought us to this moment in time. Namely, what does it mean to be human when all our technical problems have been solved?

            Termed by Edward de Bono (1967), lateral thinking involves approaching problems provocatively so that our creative abilities can be “unburdened by what has been” (pun intended). Realistically, de Bono’s idea harkens back to a time when western thought was being influenced by Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Thinkers of the truest sense, these individuals laid a foundation for our freedom of thought to flourish via probing questions into human behavior, ethics, epistemology, metaphysics, and scientific inquiry. But let’s look even further back in time and focus on what allowed these great minds to develop. What was it that allowed our species to influence one another to such an extent that we are now on the precipice of creating an artificial intelligence that has the potential to surpass our level of understanding? Put simply, our communication abilities, our cooperation agilities, and our organizational willingness to work as collective sapiens. These traits allowed us to shape our future and take control of our purpose in life.

Now, as we are primed to enter a new era of potential uncertainty, I want to remind our educators of their true mission in life, i.e., the reason you chose to enter this sacred profession. You wanted to make a difference in the lives of people by helping shape their thinking. You knew that, regardless of the agenda, curriculum, or mandate being implemented, what you were truly doing was guiding a mind. It is this principle, human thinking, that needs to be developed and curated within our educational systems. When a student asks, “Why do I have to write when AI can do it for me?”, your answer can be “Because writing involves thinking and that is what we are trying to develop.” When a student asks, “Can’t I just use AI to provide the answer?”, you can respond with “It is the questioning process that matters when searching for an answer.” When teaching history, “Why do I need to know what happened in the past”, you can answer with confidence that “Understanding how we arrived at this moment in our advanced society allows us to reflect and grow together as human beings.”

In closing, it is our thinking abilities that separate us from other animals. I would encourage my fellow lifelong learners to start constructing a future that emphasizes human creativity in meaning-making. Doing so will require us to understand the value in our emotional intelligence and learn to live with mechanistic beings that perform skills at a level unattainable by humans. If we accept these conditions then we have a chance of obtaining a level of comfort and tranquility that our forefathers would say are ripe conditions to foster human relationships. For isn’t this the key to meaning in our potential new world, i.e., learning to love one another just as we are. If so, then our level of happiness should rise and in doing so, we finally find the connection that links us all.

How Do We Know What We Know?

What does it really mean to know something, and how do human beings turn experience, observation, reasoning, and interaction into knowledge?

I would normally begin by defining the word knowledge to create a foundation for the discussion. In this case, though, I want to begin with my own understanding. To know something means that I have sufficient justification for believing it to be true based on my senses, experiences, and reasoning. I may witness an event, recall a previous encounter, or think through an idea until I reach the point where I can say, “I know this to be true.”

That statement carries more certainty than saying, “I believe this to be true.” Belief may be sincere, but knowledge implies that the belief has been examined, supported, and, when possible, verified.

How we come to know the world

Philosophers have long debated whether human beings are born as blank slates or enter the world already possessing certain forms of knowledge. Whatever position one takes, our earliest interactions with the world are limited. As newborns, we are primarily driven by basic needs such as hunger, love, comfort, and safety.

As we grow, our surroundings begin to shape our understanding. The people we interact with, the environments we enter, the mistakes we make, and the questions we pursue all influence how we interpret the world. That understanding is not fixed. It may be expanded, challenged, realigned, or replaced as we encounter new experiences and perspectives.

For that reason, I view knowledge as something both personal and social. It begins with the individual, but it becomes stronger when it is tested beyond the individual.

Knowledge as verified belief

My working definition is that knowledge is the verification of a belief. Much like the scientific method, we observe, form a hypothesis, test it, and examine the results. At times, this process takes place through direct interaction with the world. At other times, it occurs through reasoning and reflection.

The important distinction is that knowledge should involve some form of validity and reliability. Otherwise, what we call knowledge may only be conviction.

One way we strengthen a claim is by involving other people. We ask whether they observed the same thing, reached a similar conclusion, or can reproduce the outcome. In simple terms, we ask whether “what I thought is what you thought.” Agreement alone does not prove that something is true, but shared observation and repeated verification provide stronger grounds for confidence.

Testing the theory

Imagine that I wanted to test the claim that sunlight and water help a seed grow into a plant. I would begin by gathering a small group of observers to create what I might call a “verification table.” Because human senses, experiences, and interpretations are imperfect, each person may understand the same event somewhat differently. Having multiple observers can help reduce individual bias.

I would then place a seed in soil, water it, and set the container near an east-facing window. The observers would document the conditions and confirm that the stated process had been followed.

If the seed began to grow, I could say that the original belief had been supported. The observers would add validation, and they could repeat the experiment to see whether the result remained consistent.

Even then, the result would not be free from uncertainty.

The condition of the soil, the planting depth, the amount of water, the type of seed, the temperature, and the amount of sunlight could all influence the outcome. The devil is in the details. A failed result might not disprove the general claim. It might instead reveal that an important variable had not been controlled.

This is where knowledge becomes more complicated. Verification does not always produce absolute certainty. More often, it gives us a stronger or weaker basis for what we claim to know.

What can we know with certainty?

Descartes famously wrote, “I think, therefore I am,” though the wording varies by translation. The power of that statement lies in its attempt to identify something that cannot easily be doubted.

I know that I can think. I can question, reason, calculate, remember, doubt, and consider possibilities related to my own existence. My senses may be fallible, and my experiences may be unique, but the act of thinking provides a foundation from which other knowledge can develop.

From there, human beings can observe, test, compare, revise, and reach conclusions. Some conclusions become highly reliable and are treated as facts. Others remain provisional and open to further examination.

Knowledge, then, is not simply possessing information. It is the result of an active process involving thought, evidence, experience, and reflection.

How people learn

My own educational experience shaped much of this view.

I attended the same public school system throughout my kindergarten through twelfth-grade years. It was not the strongest school system, but it was not the weakest either. It was the kind of middle-of-the-road district supported largely by blue-collar, hardworking families who wanted better opportunities for their children.

The dominant classroom model was fairly traditional. Teachers stood at the front of the room, often using an overhead projector, and presented information for us to write down and later reproduce on a test. Desks were arranged in rows. Hands were raised before questions were asked. The teacher was the primary source of academic knowledge.

That approach gave us structure and foundational information. However, much of the learning that stayed with me happened through collaboration.

My classmates and I shared notes, discussed assignments, and re-explained concepts in language that made sense to us. We would ask, “How did you get that answer?” or say, “He said to do it this way, but this makes more sense to me.” Through those conversations, we reconstructed the information and connected it to our own understanding.

Eventually, the light bulb would come on.

We did not realize it at the time, but we were participating in a constructivist form of learning. Knowledge was not simply transferred from the teacher to the student. We actively interpreted it, questioned it, and rebuilt it through discussion.

Because our school was diverse, we were also exposed to different ways of understanding the same topic. Those moments when someone said something that made me think, “I never considered it that way,” were important forms of intellectual growth.

My personal learning theory

Based on these experiences, I do not believe people learn through one method alone. Learning is more likely to occur through a combination of direct instruction, discovery, collaboration, experimentation, reflection, and active participation.

Instructivism can provide necessary facts and structure. Discovery learning encourages exploration. Constructivism helps learners build meaning from prior knowledge and social interaction. Experiential learning connects ideas to action.

My own learning theory is therefore a mixed one. People need information, but they also need opportunities to discuss it, test it, question it, apply it, and explain it to others.

Human beings are social learners. We bring different experiences to the same situation, yet we often share enough curiosity and common purpose to learn from one another.

A final thought

The central question is not only whether knowledge can be transmitted, but how it becomes meaningful.

Information may begin with a teacher, book, lecture, or experience. Knowledge develops when the learner examines that information, connects it to prior understanding, tests it against evidence, and discusses it with others.

To know is not simply to receive an answer. It is to participate in the process through which an answer becomes justified, useful, and open to further reflection.

Leadership Under Pressure: A Systems View of Darkest Hour

How do relationships, institutions, and historical forces shape a leader’s decisions during a national crisis?

I included this project in The Learning Curve because it demonstrates how systems thinking can be used to analyze leadership, communication, and decision-making. Rather than viewing Winston Churchill’s choices as the actions of one individual, the accompanying Miro systemigram maps the personal relationships, political institutions, military pressures, and international events that influenced his decisions during the early stages of World War II.

The project also shows how a visual mapping tool can turn a complex narrative into a more understandable representation of relationships, pressures, and turning points.

Viewing the film as a system

Darkest Hour follows Winston Churchill’s appointment as British prime minister in May 1940, as Germany advances across Europe and British forces become trapped at Dunkirk. Churchill must decide whether to pursue negotiations with Adolf Hitler or continue fighting despite the possibility of military defeat.

The situation can be understood through three connected levels of influence.

Microsystem: Personal relationships

At the micro level, Churchill is influenced by the people with whom he interacts most directly:

  • Clementine Churchill, his wife, provides emotional support, perspective, and honest criticism.
  • Elizabeth Layton, his secretary, sees both his public authority and private uncertainty. Her personal loss at Dunkirk also makes the human cost of the conflict immediate.
  • King George VI initially distrusts Churchill but eventually offers his support and encourages him to listen to the British people.
  • Neville Chamberlain and Viscount Halifax challenge Churchill politically and advocate exploring peace negotiations.

These relationships do more than surround Churchill. They influence how he interprets events, questions his own judgment, and ultimately communicates his decision.

Mesosystem: Government and institutional conflict

At the meso level, the film depicts a government divided over how Britain should respond to Nazi Germany.

Churchill faces pressure from Parliament, the War Cabinet, the monarchy, and members of his own party. Halifax and Chamberlain believe negotiations may prevent further destruction, while Churchill increasingly concludes that an agreement with Hitler would place Britain in a weaker position.

The interactions among these institutions create the immediate decision-making environment. Churchill’s authority depends not only on holding office, but also on gaining support from the king, Parliament, his party, and the public.

Macrosystem: World War II

At the macro level, the decisions occur within the expanding crisis of World War II.

Germany invades Belgium, France begins to collapse, and Allied forces become surrounded at Dunkirk. Churchill also seeks assistance from the United States, but President Franklin D. Roosevelt cannot provide the destroyers requested. These events narrow Britain’s options and increase the pressure on the government to consider negotiations.

Operation Dynamo, which mobilizes civilian vessels to evacuate troops from Dunkirk, becomes a major turning point. The evacuation does not end the military threat, but it preserves a substantial portion of the British fighting force and strengthens the argument for continued resistance.

Leadership as an evolving process

The film presents Churchill’s decision as something that develops through interaction rather than appearing fully formed.

He receives competing advice, confronts military realities, considers negotiation, speaks with Clementine and Elizabeth, gains support from the king, and listens to members of the public. Each encounter changes the larger decision environment.

The Miro systemigram organizes these developments across the film’s three acts. It connects the micro-level relationships, the meso-level political conflict, and the macro-level war events that culminate in Churchill’s rejection of a negotiated peace. The visual sequence ends with his speeches to Parliament and the declaration that Britain would continue fighting.

Communication as a form of leadership

One of the clearest themes in the film is the relationship between leadership and language. Churchill does not control the military situation through speech alone, but his words help people understand the situation, establish a shared purpose, and prepare for continued resistance.

His speeches transform a strategic decision into a public commitment. The statement that he “mobilized the English language and sent it into battle” captures the role communication plays in aligning Parliament, the government, and the public.

This does not mean that effective leadership is simply persuasive speaking. Churchill’s communication becomes powerful because it follows listening, doubt, conflict, and a growing understanding of the system surrounding him.

Why this project matters

This project demonstrates that major decisions are rarely produced by one person acting independently. They emerge from relationships among individuals, organizations, historical events, available information, and competing priorities.

Creating the systemigram helped me move beyond summarizing the film and instead examine how its characters and institutions affected one another. It also provided a practical example of using visual mapping to identify:

  • Levels of influence
  • Relationships among stakeholders
  • Competing goals
  • Critical events
  • Feedback between personal and institutional decisions
  • Turning points within a complex narrative

The exercise connects systems thinking with leadership analysis and instructional design. It shows how tools such as Miro can help learners organize complicated information, make relationships visible, and understand how decisions develop over time.

Explore the Miro Systemigram

Systems Thinking, pt. III

To conclude the Systems Thinking series, I wanted to draw attention to another book I finished reading titled A Random Walk Down Wall Street by Burton Malkiel. In it, Malkiel suggests that stocks are unpredictable in the short term and that passive investing, i.e., index funds, provide more stability in their holdings by diversifying risk across many different sectors. If, as Burton suggests, the market efficiently accounts for all known information available in stock prices, then attempting to pick stocks or “beat the market” is a futile effort for most investors as the market has already accounted for all knowable knowledge (this being especially true in our digitally connected world). Several historical examples are provided in his book that illustrate how financial bubbles, largely driven by speculation rather than value, caused great angst in society as reality caused many “castles in the sky” to come crashing down to earth (Tulip Mania, South Sea Company, Dot-Com, etc.). “How could we have been so foolish,” cried many an investor? “It seemed like a can’t miss investment,” exclaimed another! Well, as with many shiny objects and bright lights, the euphoria fades once the curtain is drawn back and we see a company’s fakeness for all it’s worth. Bernie Madoff, a classic example discussed by Malkiel, convinced investors that his returns held steady during turbulent times, even when the market was turning downwards (cue the 2008 financial crisis and we all saw his scheme for what it was).

My purpose in writing this article is due to the vast amount of attention that AI is garnering in many sectors as a transformative technology, but also in the financial markets as analysts and gurus attempt to monetize its present and future value. Generative AI is capturing our attention as more businesses are advertising its capabilities and as technology companies promote its benefits in the form of free services for consumers. We recently saw another massive investment in the US ($500 billion to be exact) as Apple seeks to “produce servers to power Apple Intelligence, its suite of AI features” (AP News). Similarly, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) announced “it will build three new chip fabrication plants, two advanced packaging facilities, and a research and development center at its complex in Arizona, growing the company’s total investment at the site to $165 billion” (Investopedia). It seems that everywhere we look, news of AI is being reported as companies position themselves for what seems to be an AI race between nations. The US was thought to have a clear advantage with this technology, only to be surprised by China’s DeepSeek V3 and R1 models (see Systems Thinking, pt. II for my thoughts on it). In short, AI has shifted from a purely business opportunity to a geopolitical priority, with governments aggressively securing their national interests. And, as history has taught us, various companies looking to take advantage of the AI train will undoubtedly begin to market their goods and services as “AI powered” or some similar variant. In this scenario, there will undoubtedly be losers whose business will fail. As described in Malkiel’s book, stay diversified, avoid speculation, and think long-term. AI will surely be a rising tide that lifts all boats. So, rather than picking the single best option, invest in broad index funds to ensure you rise with the tide. In doing so, you limit your risk of choosing incorrectly while maintaining your peace of mind.

Lastly, harkening back to Kahneman’s thoughts pertaining to System 1 and 2, if ever there were a time to invoke our System 2 process, that time is now. As nations, businesses, and consumers try to get a leg up on their deemed competition, bubbles will form as companies with no background in technology begin advertising how they are “harnessing AI” to its full potential… Just play it smart, don’t give in to FOMO, and continue investing a set dollar amount (bi-monthly or monthly preferably) into your broad market index fund and watch as your investment grows via compound interest.

AI is a technology that will surely change how we do business. However, along its path to embed itself within our markets, bubbles will form and pop.