Didactical Reexamination on Liberal Arts Education in the Age of AI

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to didactically review the direction, contents, and methods of liberal arts education based on the concept of the German ‘Bildung’. This concept aims for the ‘harmonious development of human abilities’ based on the premise of both self-understanding and world-understanding. For the question of how to strengthen the competence of subjects in the current accelerated globally changing world is one of the major challenges faced today in the field of education. In order to detect global changes, Mega Trends and the 4th Industrial Revolution were set as key issues. Moreover, AI was closely looked at as a driving force that will play a crucial role in leading the world of the future. The development of AI, along with the rosy prospect of liberating humans from work and thus enriching their lives, has in fact caused many to take a negative view regarding such cutting-edge science and technology. For such a radical advancement may actually bring humanity itself to the brink of a crisis. Indeed, perhaps the most feared prospect is that AI might accelerate the rise of what is being called a “post-human” world. In relation to such a post-human era, the issues of human existence, the end of labor, and the inevitable gap arising between AI and humanity, were discussed. In the age of AI, liberal arts education should actively intervene in the achievements of advanced science and technology, as well as transform our perception and values of machines. For that purpose, it is necessary to instill the values of coexistence, symbiosis, and coevolution with non-human beings (animals, plants, ecosystems, nature, things, and the universe itself). In terms of contents, it is also necessary for us to improve the standard draft of the Korean National Institute for General Education so that it might better fit a post-human era. Given the influence of AI, we need to redesign the future of human beings who will be living with machines, and to provide a liberal arts program suitable for such a world. In this way, learner-centered education, design thinking, project-based instruction, and liberal learning should be enthusiastically supported. However, whether the era of artificial general intelligence (AGI) comes or not, the future of mankind will ultimately depend on human choice. The accountability of future liberal arts education should be found in raising the discernment, morality, and ethical awareness of learners, and to develop their faculty of judgment so that one may distinguish good from evil, right from wrong and beauty from ugliness. Digital literacy and ‘post-human literacy’ will obviously serve as fundamental skills in the future.