AI won’t make reading less necessary

If obtaining answers is easier than ever before, then learning to think deeply matters more than it’s ever done.

Much of modern technology provides us all with multiple temptations some of which might be particular problematic, nefarious or malevolent. Yet many of the temptations also appear at first glance to be significantly more benign such as scrolling through Instagram videos, wasting time on mindless games or binge-watching Netflix. One temptation which is especially prevalent among students is to read less. The lure of instant messaging and entertaining videos will provide a more instant hit of dopamine than the slow satisfaction of reading a novel but in an age of constant distraction, reading is critical in developing attention. According to a recent study by the National Literacy Trust, only 36.1% of children aged eight years of age or over enjoy reading in their spare time, which is a worrying statistic, even if the figure has crept up since last year.

Yet it is not just reading habits in the traditional sense that are being undermined by technology. Equally – if not more concerning – is the way that students approach reading when it comes to their academic work and the harnessing of artificial intelligence to replace genuine study, research, knowledge acquisition and understanding. When I was at university, I was once tasked with reading the entirety of Augustine’s City of God and then writing an essay on it, and I only had a week to do so. Most versions of this text come in at over 1,000 pages and take between 13-15 hours to read if one doesn’t stop at any point! Perhaps unsurprisingly, I only skim read chunks of the text and instead worked through a lot of secondary literature, which seemed more efficient. Today, the undergraduate history student could get a summary of the book and have the essay crafted in a matter of seconds. By reading the summary, alongside some light editing of the essay, they may feel sufficiently equipped for a tutorial on the text and confident that they have met their academic obligations. While such an approach is undoubtedly optimally efficient in the short-term, it is not understanding in any meaningful sense.

Whether one is reading a demanding novel or grappling with a historical, theological or philosophical argument, the process is more than simply knowledge transfer – it is rather the practising of mental disciplines which underpin the very cognitive process of understanding. A student who uses AI to explain the reasons for Hitler’s rise to power in Germany in 1933 may receive an extremely plausible and coherent answer – it may even be correct in the traditional sense. But that individual cannot say that they truly understand causation or the relationship between economic upheaval, electoral systems and political power within the unique context of post-war Weimar Germany.

Schools have an obligation to ensure that students can’t bypass serious learning. It is not in the long-term interest of an individual – and certainly not society as a whole – if future generations do not develop the cognitive function of grappling with complex ideas, reading difficult text which requires careful consideration, and creating genuine understanding. In a world where there is more text than ever being produced through artificial intelligence, the need for discernment, discrimination and judgement have never been greater. Rather than simply accepting what AI-generated text gives us, we need to be able to understand the quality of what is being produced, and this often requires going back to primary sources, be those specific websites, physical books or other materials.

Reading needs to be at the heart of modern education – not a superficial set of AI generated summaries, but genuine engagement with content, deep study and meaningful cognitive engagement with the process of learning. Schools that fail in this regard will be letting down their students and giving them a huge disadvantage in the future. Reading gives students the language to think, builds the intellectual foundations which enable thinking to take place, and fosters a sense of imagination, innovation and creativity. Ultimately, if obtaining answers is easier than ever before, then learning to think deeply matters more than it’s ever done.