AI in Academia: The Rise of the Digital Pen
The availability of AI has led the way for many technological advancements. It has created jobs, made many people’s work easier and made technology more accessible. But at the same time, the IT job market has suffered greatly. Some people have lost their jobs with their creative positions being replaced by AI. It also has an effect on the academic sphere. Many students are tempted to use AI to generate essays, either in full or partially. And while plagiarism is obviously a punishable offense in the academic world, AI is still in the gray area.
There can be many ways to use artificial intelligence for help with academic work, and not all of them are breaching academic rules. For example, you can use generative AI to create outlines, explore topic ideas, look for sources or edit your work. But all these are hard and require the user to still do most of the work, so it’s only natural that a student wouldn’t prefer them.
Instead, many students opt to generate paragraphs or even entire papers for their classes, not thinking about the AI detection essay can go through. Not all educational institutions have caught up with the trend yet, but it’s not long before they do. And for students, that means no ai-generated essays. But is it that bad?
In reality, academic writing serves a valuable purpose for students. It teaches them how to put their point across, analyze sources, and think critically. Generative AI is not only unable to do all that, but it also rids students of the necessity to learn that valuable skill, while presenting them with an academic paper lookalike. That ease of access can be detrimental to one’s education in a way that they will lose on skills and potentially get into lots of trouble with the uni.
Behind the Screen: Unraveling AI Detection Mechanisms
But how does AI detection work for essays, really? These tools analyze the text and try to determine if it has been generated by AI. Keep in mind that detection tools work differently and not all of them share their algorithms. But usually, they look at the texts and try to find patterns in writing, comparing pieces of the same text. These tools look for high predictability. That means similar length of sentences, and easy-to-predict logic.
Text written by a person can be illogical, unpredictable and contain mistakes. With AI-generated text, it’s unlikely. It uses basic structures and grammar to form sentences. And humans can be creative, use incorrect grammatical structures or write in a confusing way.
Some sources state that Ai detection tools can also compare the given text to a database to find matches, sort of like a plagiarism checker.
Another way to detect AI generated content is to ask the language model itself.
But, unfortunately, none of the current Ai detection methods can boast a 100% success rate. Since the AI technology has only recently become widely-used, a need for detection tools is also new. This is why, nobody can tell you for certain if a text has been generated or written by a human.
Many test results turn out to be false-positive, meaning, they highlight human text as written by AI. And vice-versa, with some tweaking and editing, content that has been generated by a language model can pass as human. There are even tools that rephrase text to make it seem human.
The Grey Area: Ethical Dilemmas and Detection Challenges
There’s no certain answer to a question of how is ai detected in essays. All the detection tools have their own algorithms and databases, and most of them are private. This means that we cannot know for sure if the detection tool even does anything at all, or if it just allocates random percentages to texts.
However, most detection tools claim to look at predictability, or perplexity of the text. This means that a human writer, no matter how professional, can sometimes write in a convoluted and confusing manner. Using questionable grammar and unexpected word choices. Generative AI is unable to write that way since it writes by placing the most anticipated word after another.
Whether using AI for academic writing is ethical or not is not even a question. Writing assignments serve a clear purpose in the academic world, and taking a shortcut to avoid them does not do a student any favors.
Yet, at the same time, students are often so busy and loaded with these assignments, that they have no time to cook a meal. So it’s clear why one would want to take a shortcut, after all. To get straight A’s, never miss a lecture and always submit papers on time, a student has to sacrifice every part of their life that has no connection to studying. This is the reality of the modern education system.
However, using generative AI to write an essay for you does not guarantee you a good grade. On the contrary, it can tank your performance and image in the professor’s eyes. Even if the usage of AI goes unnoticed, the essay is likely to be low quality. AI is not able to produce creative ideas. Neither does it have the ability to analyze sources critically.
From Theory to Practice: AI Detection vs Students
While it’s clear to students that using AI for their homework assignments is cheating, and can get them in big trouble, many students say they have no other choice. The school curriculum is so packed, it’s impossible to deal with everything on your own. And professors are not willing to cut anyone any slack, either. That is why students resort to using controversial methods for their homework. And since many understand how does ai detection work for essays, students have already learned how to trick it.
Trying to trick a robot is dangerous, though. As we’ve mentioned before, each detection tool works differently and they may use different algorithms to test the text for authenticity. Most of these tools do not disclose how exactly they are testing the content. And is what makes these results hard to object. If your professor is biased towards you, they are more likely to believe an external tool that says you’ve used AI for your essays, even if it’s a false positive.
So, it’s best not to resort to AI for writing your essays. If the workload is so heavy that you absolutely can’t manage it by yourself, it’s best to use an essay writing service instead. A writer that will tackle your assignment is an experienced professional. They will be able to provide you with an exquisite paper that not only complies with all academic standards, but can even mimic your writing style. Besides, upon receiving that sample, you can analyze it, learn from it, and base your future papers off it.
Looking Ahead: The Future of Essays in the AI Era
Companies like OpenAI already claim to work on watermarking technology for easier ai detection essay. They recognize the threat generative AI poses to the academic community and strive to mitigate it. However, it is not clear yet how the watermark will work: will it be visible, and will the user be able to remove it by editing the text? We’ll have to wait until the technology comes out to answer these questions.
The general consensus is that the detection tools will get better and better, leaving no room for cheating. At the same time, academic rules may get even stricter to stop students from using any external tools for their papers. And while that may seem dire, it’s actually for your own good.
Learning to write academic papers is a valuable skill that, believe it or not, can be used beyond academic setting. Learning to structure your text, analyzing sources and referencing your text properly is extremely important. In the era of fake news hiding behind social media posts, it’s crucial to learn how to analyze information critically. Besides, many people advance in their careers using LinkedIn. And how better to show your expertise than by writing a post on your blog. One good, knowledgeable publication can get you hired with a significant raise.
