Welcome to the forefront of conversational AI as we explore the fascinating world of AI chatbots in our dedicated blog series. Discover the latest advancements, applications, and strategies that propel the evolution of chatbot technology. From enhancing customer interactions to streamlining business processes, these articles delve into the innovative ways artificial intelligence is shaping the landscape of automated conversational agents. Whether you’re a business owner, developer, or simply intrigued by the future of interactive technology, join us on this journey to unravel the transformative power and endless possibilities of AI chatbots.
It has become increasingly clear that Miami University is doing its very best to lean into the hype around artificial intelligence (AI). With a new degree in AI being rolled out and 13 different departments integrating the technology into curricula this semester, it’s not hard to see where the Board of Trustees and others calling the shots stand.
They think AI is the future, an unavoidable and unstoppable force of progress. If it were not such a bleak statement, it would almost be funny.
For starters, the entire AI industry is pretty much built on marketing. Even the name is a marketing term divorced from the reality of the technology.
The AI tools most users are familiar with, systems like OpenAI’s ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini, are not really AI at all. They are better defined as large language models (LLMs), which are trained on staggering amounts of information for language processing tasks, especially language generation. To put it simply, it’s a statistical model that is somewhat good at predicting what word should come after another word.
The technology that has taken the world by storm these last few years is more closely related to an overgrown autocorrect system than anything fitting of the lofty term “artificial intelligence.” It has no higher thought. It doesn’t remember you. It’s not a person.
It’s a fundamentally derivative technology built on the stolen works of real people and incapable of producing anything new by its very nature.
In order to pull that trick off, LLMs require staggering amounts of both water and electricity. According to a 2025 International Energy Agency report, American data centers were estimated to have used around 180 terawatt-hours worth of electricity in 2024, a figure that is projected to grow 130% by 2030. While this number is not all from AI, the bulk of the growth in data centers is directly related to AI. According to that same report, a typical hyperscale AI-focused data center can consume as much electricity as 100,000 average households.
On a state-by-state basis, the numbers are even worse. In 2024, the Electric Power Research Institute found that states like Virginia and North Dakota have as much as 25% and 15% of their total energy consumption going to data centers, respectively.
Water consumption is equally massive. A 2024 Berkeley Lab report, commissioned by the U.S. government, found that data centers directly used as much as 66 billion liters of water in 2023. Indirect water consumption, measuring the water cost from energy generation, jumped up to 800 billion liters of water.
But, even ignoring the extremely damaging effects data centers and LLMs have on the world we all have to inhabit, Miami’s decision to dive headfirst into this technology is stupid for one much more important reason.
It’s antithetical to the entire purpose of a university.
You don’t attend a university, particularly a liberal arts college like Miami declares itself to be, just to get an extremely expensive piece of paper to hang on your wall. You go to university to learn, better yourself and prepare for a future in a better world you are supposed to help build.
You can’t help build a better future if you outsource your thinking to an LLM. If you’re coasting through your classes by cheating off what the model tells you, you’re doing everything wrong. You’re not becoming an engineer or a doctor — not one worth trusting, at least, because those jobs have requirements for a reason. All you’re learning is how to convince the chatbot to give you answers that sound correct enough.
You’re learning to be exceptionally mediocre. It’s the only outcome to letting a machine think for you. That’s the real issue with LLMs.
It’s not just that the models are confidently incorrect and show little sign of improvement, as found by the Columbia Journalism Review. It’s not just that the entire industry is a bubble of deeply unprofitable companies passing around debts in a scheme that would make the jailed Enron executives blush, as a Japanese financial newspaper found.
It’s not just that data centers are being built everywhere with reckless abandon, with no regard for the communities they illegally pollute, with lawsuits being brought by the Southern Environmental Law Center. It’s not even just that AI companies run on stolen data, with a landmark court settlement proving it, and have recently begun purchasing and destroying rare books to feed their models fresh data.
They are a tool for outsourcing the task of thinking itself. AI has no place at Miami and never will.
babbce@miamioh.edu
Charley Babb is a junior majoring in professional writing. He is an Opinion writer for The Miami Student and a fencer in the Miami Medieval Club. He likes reading and creative writing in his free time.
The “AI in the Majors” initiative at Miami University will integrate artificial intelligence (AI) teachings into 13 departments this fall. Additionally, two new minors, courses and a degree centered around AI will be available for students to gain AI capabilities catered to their field of study.
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