AI “personalities” and the future of critical thinking

In this session we unpack how bots think and how they’re changing the way we think.

Each talk will be around 10-15 minutes followed by Q&A
Afterwards we’ll have an open discussion along with drinks/food at a nearby bar.

Talk 1: Nurturing Critical Thinking in the Age of AI
As AI tools become ubiquitous in the classroom, a pressing concern has emerged: cognitive offloading. When students delegate their thinking to an algorithm, do they lose the ability to reflect, analyse, and critique?

Benny Pan—an AI researcher and educator—shares the results of a targeted study within senior high school settings. His research tests if custom made AI behaviours have any effect in nurturing critical thinking and self-reflection in the senior high school setting

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Talk 2: Anthropic’s Persona Selection Model: The ‘Cyborgist’ Shift

Recommended Reading: https://alignment.anthropic.com/2026/psm/

New in AI Alignment, Anthropic has recently published a blog on the Persona Selection Model. Hazel Shanks will breakdown the results and the ‘cyborgist’ philosophy that inspired them. Let’s have a deeper look at how and why the “malicious actor” persona might be an accidental byproduct of how we train them.