Syllabarum Syllabarium; as in, Bits of Syllabi Thrown Together

I may at some point post parts of course syllabi here; for the present, there are some sections of my syllabi that I will include here.¹

Policy Regarding Large Language Models (a.k.a. AI, a.k.a. LLMs, especially those built upon the so-called transformer model described in Google’s 2017 article, “Attention is All You Need,” but not to the exclusion of any model designed to generate text since “Eliza,” (circa 1966))

They shall not be used. For any assignment in this course, including reading, writing, preparation, and participation in the class, their use is out of the question, and the professor may at his discretion bestow a zero to any assignment informed by LLMs. If the significance of “use” is vague, imagine this hypothetical: a student by the name of Ignave is at a college on soccer scholarship, and during the pre-season his coach expects him to run 10 miles, drill daily, and eat such and such a diet. On the first day of the season, he tells the coach that, not to worry, the running and drilling and dieting have all been accomplished, not by him, however, but by a close friend of his, who was more than happy to do the required runs, drills, and diet, while Ignave lounged, undrilled, and undieted during pre-season. Ignave’s coach, somewhat dumbfounded, manages to ask him, why did you use your friend that way? Ignave is himself a little puzzled by the word “use,” all the more bewildered when the coach kicks him off the team. (Question: how might you explain to Ignave what the coach meant by the word, “use,” and further, why using his friend was a bad move for his ambitions soccer-wise?)

Policy Regarding the use of Turing-complete devices (e.g., computers, tablets, phones, et al.)

They shall not be used in class.² The use of them is made illicit upon passing the threshold of the classroom, not when we have prayed, not when the class seems to begin, not when one has found a good place to pause the video. Once inside the room, these devices and their accoutrement must be stowed away, and may reappear when the threshold has again been crossed to the world outside.

Footnotes

1. As a rule, at least most of these sections are included in my syllabus, but to my students in my classes, a reminder: these sections found here are not binding. Only the syllabus formally sent to you, and the contents therein, are binding (both to you and to me). ↩

2. There may be one assignment where students may elect to write on a Turing-complete machine, i.e., the final draft of the précis. ↩