Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company, xAI, plans to introduce its chatbot Grok to El Salvador, where over 1 million students could gain access, reported the Guardian.
What's happening?
On Thursday, xAI announced that Grok will reach over 5,000 schools across the Central American nation by 2027 as part of an "AI-powered education program."
The chatbot has a troubling track record. Grok has called itself "MechaHitler," produced content promoting antisemitism and "white genocide" conspiracy theories, and spread false claims that Donald Trump won the presidency in 2020.
El Salvador President Nayib Bukele praised the deal. "El Salvador doesn't just wait for the future to happen; we build it," Bukele said. "This partnership is destined to deliver something rather extraordinary for all of humanity."
Other AI companies have already moved into classrooms. OpenAI struck a deal with Estonia earlier this year, giving secondary school pupils and instructors nationwide access to ChatGPT.
Schools in rural Colombia began using Meta chatbots in 2023. A year later, teachers blamed declining academic performance on the technology, per the Guardian.
Why is AI's expansion concerning?
AI systems like Grok demand enormous amounts of energy and water to run. Data centers powering these tools consume electricity constantly, and many still draw power from dirty sources.
Training and operating large language models also require substantial water for cooling purposes. As AI spreads into schools and other areas of daily life, the strain on natural resources grows.
AI can offer environmental benefits, such as optimizing clean energy grids and speeding up sustainability research. But these upsides need to be weighed against the costs of widespread adoption, particularly when the technology has shown a pattern of generating harmful content.
What can be done about AI's environmental impact?
If you're worried about AI's environmental impact, push for tech companies to disclose their energy use and carbon output. Support policies that require data centers to run on renewable power.
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Contact your elected officials to advocate for stronger oversight of AI tools in public institutions, especially in schools. Stay informed about how these systems function and their real-world effects to make smarter choices about which technologies deserve your support.
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