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I’d like to pose a question. Let’s be pessimistic for the moment, and assume AI *does* destroy the university, at…
Hear hear
I agree with all of this. The threat is really that stark. The only solution is indeed in-class essay exams,…
I’m not sure I’d yet go so far as to call LLMs an existential threat to universities. But I do…
My big problem with LLMs at the present time, apart from being potentially the epitome of Foucault’s panopticon & Big…
I’m also at a British university (in a law school) and my sentiments largely align with the author’s. I see…
If one is genuinely uninterested in engaging with non-human interlocutors, it is unclear why one continues to do so—especially while…
Professor Enoch asked me to share his response: Download Following the nine Bar Ilan Professors response Enoch
I am opening comments, but they will be moderated for relevant substance, and perhaps edited to that end. Only comments with a full name (in the name line) and a valid e-mail address (which will not appear) will be approved.
I admit to being quite ignorant of how the tenure process works in Israel, but I think we do not have all the elements here. The most important, but yet unanswered question, is whether the "midway review process" is in fact retaliatory or, as Prof. Harel suggested, a standard procedure. This the crux of the matter. Prof. Enoch makes a couple of points about the general atmosphere at Bar-Ilan, but he does not address the substance of the nine Professors' letter. I hasten to add that I am quite sympathetic to Prof. Sheinman's situation. I really do not understand how such an innocent and well-meaning e-mail could have stirred up such a scandal.
Obviously, I cannot imagine that someone with Prof. Sheinman's outstanding cv could be denied tenure. If he is, it will certainly smell fishy. But until then, we need to know more about the midway review process before allowing ourselves do draw conclusions.
Alon Harel's claim is that a midway review process is standard *elsewhere*. That is irrelevant to the point that it is new at Bar Ilan, imposed retroactively on Prof Sheinman, and in a way that any reasonable person would think oppressive (for instance, without time to prepare). What we need to know about Bar Ilan is whether this is so. I think it interesting that no one at Bar Ilan has denied this.
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