Large language models (LLMs) are prompting higher education to reassess traditional teaching and disciplinary frameworks, as they break down conventional subject boundaries. Educators face a decision between banning or embracing these AI tools in classrooms. Canadian theorist Marshall McLuhan, a pioneer in understanding technology’s impact on society, warned that technological advancements redefine educational structures by dissolving disciplinary limits and altering the learning-work relationship. He posited that rather than making the liberal arts irrelevant, technology enhances their necessity, promoting critical thinking amid automation.
To navigate this new educational landscape, an “AI-adjacency” framework is proposed, emphasizing collaboration between human intelligence and AI. Six dimensions are outlined: critical discernment, strategic collaboration, voice stewardship, social responsibility, adaptive expertise, and creative agency. These approaches encourage students to engage critically with AI tools while fostering their intellectual autonomy, ensuring technology amplifies, rather than diminishes, human creativity and self-awareness. McLuhan’s insights remind us to maintain conscious interactions with technology to avoid passive dependency.
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