Science fiction gets a lot of mileage from the apparent difficulty of telling the difference between real human beings and their simulated facsimile. We see it in the Matrix franchise, where the computer-generated virtual reality is populated by avatars that seem all too real. It is also a crucial plot point in the TV series Battlestar Galactica with its highly sought after but ultimately unsuccessful Cylon Detector. And it is dramatically demonstrated in Bladerunner, where Deckard — played by Harrison Ford — uses something called the Voight-Kampff test to separate the humans from the replicants who, once detected, are then terminated.
But this entertaining guessing game is no longer a matter of fiction; it is now a part of our very real social reality. With the release of large language models and generative algorithms — like ChatGPT, which you have no doubt been hearing about on almost a daily basis — we now have machines that can pass as human, producing all kinds of content that is virtually indistinguishable from genuine human activity.
The problem — especially for educators, who rely on their students actually doing their own work — is that it is becoming increasingly difficult to tell the difference between the real and the artificial. Fortunate, we now have our own working version of a Cylon Detector or Voight-Kampff test — AI applications that are designed to detect the deceptive content generated by AI. So again, as predicted in fiction, we are now locked in that seemingly inescapable struggle where we fix the problem of AI with more AI.
