Educational Implications of Artificial Intelligence: Peirce, Reason, and the Pragmatic Maxim

Although Charles Sanders Peirce died over a century before ChatGPT became publicly available, we argue that he remains informative in discussions of AI because of his articulation of the Pragmatic Maxim We argue that Peirce's pragmatism offers two avenues from which the appropriateness or inappropriateness of AI in education can be evaluated: (1) Peirce's redefinition of teaching and learning along the lines of the finite origins of reason allows for a reorientation of education that would circumscribe the uses of AI to those that are dependent on authentic, inquisitive learning; and (2) Peirce's Pragmatic Maxim is used as a test by which myriad applications of AI can be evaluated for appropriateness. This test ensures that uses of AI are directed towards, experience. Rather than making a final determination on the overall desirability or undesirability of AI in education, we offer two methods for discriminating between the two extremes.