The Power of Questioning

This week I commissioned my students to do a very challenging and "much anticipated" dangerous assignment for their Philosophy class.

It all started from my fears of students using ChatGPT, I had to come up with something unique that only humans can achieve. But what? Soon enough I came up with an interesting insight: human interaction. Given our studies of Socrates, I thought nothing would be better than having students apply the Socratic questioning in the first person. Without much thinking about it, I assigned my students the task of engaging in a dialogue with another human being (e.g., a friend, a stranger, a relative, etc...) with a clear goal in mind: having the interlocutor doubt his/her knowledge about a topic that is culturally given for granted. What is a better way of learning something than doing that something? I must stress that the community around here, a small town in Honduras, is not the most open. Having kids going around town questioning people about god, freedom, politics, abortion, religion, etc... is a proper hurricane. I would like to share a small excerpt from the dialogue of a student (twelfth grade):

"...

G: in your opinion God created everything?

D: the bible says that

G: and what do you think about that?

D: nobody has said if its true or not, what is in the bible is not confirmed if its true or not. Like in science is not said that way.

G: you told me before that everything from the bible is true.

D: almost everything that happened in the bible is confirmed, but not the creation of the world. Adding the science we were created by the big bang.

G: so now you’re telling me we are not created by God but the big bang yes.

D: maybe the big bang was created by God.

G: in the bible says that?

D: no, but that’s what I think.

G: so you don’t believe in God at all as you told me before.

D: its really confusing but maybe like that it is.

..."

When checking the students' homework, I felt a strong sense of responsibility coupled with immense joy. I was aware that the assignment might cause some "trouble", but more importantly, I was sure that it made the students think. Today, in class, students recounted their adventures with great enthusiasm and surprise. I was incredibly happy to see them appreciate the work they have accomplished. They have all learned a great lesson: "questions can be more powerful than answers".

Last week I questioned the future of education in the time of ChatGPT. Thanks to the questions I asked myself, I was able to work around the problem. It goes without saying that Chat GPT would not have been able to do this, or if even able, it would have been easy to find out. Both my students and I learned a lot from this adventure.

For my part, I have to thank you, Chat GPT.