It is nearly impossible to be a student in this day and age and not have experience with ChatGPT. A seemingly endlessly useful tool for generating ideas, researching and writing, its temptations are certainly alluring. It can be a lifesaver for analyzing a 16 page source, for generating ideas and, more concerningly for MUN research.
Obviously, THIMUN has its own regulations around its use; the most obvious, to generate clauses or even entire resolutions, is forbidden. The approval panel has software to identify AI use and any resolutions that are flagged will not be approved, something known to most delegates in the conference. Yet according to some, AI use is still obvious in many resolutions and even more so in research. Chat GPT comes with many of its own concerns, such as privacy, intellectual property, and limitations on AI itself. But how is this affecting THIMUN committees? Is there a way to use this tool morally?
MUNITY was able to discuss the effects of ChatGPT on THIMUN with a USA ECOSOC delegate who had much to say on the topic.
How is ChatGPT being used in your committee?
It’s being used for everything. It’s being used for research and people are going in and sticking in the topic straight from the research report and getting out the exact same thing as the next person. ChatGPT has the ability to give users a lot of information without actually saying anything, so they are coming away with 5 or 6 pages of “research”. Yet, they don’t understand it, and it is not valuable because it’s just the same thing said over and over again.
Then they go into lobbying and the point of lobbying…the nice thing is that you come out with a better resolution because it’s not just one person writing, it’s a collaboration. It forces the standard of debate to rise. The problem is when you go into lobbying, and say only one person has done their research correctly, you come out with a resolution that has only really been written by one person because nobody else has a clue.
What result would you get from a lobbying group with only ChatGPT research?
You would come out with a highly flawed resolution that is much more boring to debate. Yesterday, I spent a lot of time neither able to agree or disagree with what was in the resolution because it wasn’t a good resolution. There was no point in it; it didn’t achieve anything but it also wasn’t technically wrong. So what we had was just a long, boring, exhausting debate.
How can we make good use of ChatGPT?
It is useful for very basic research. Say you come across a topic you don’t know anything about—and we are all teenagers; we don’t know anything about say housing policy. You stick it into ChatGPT and you get a very concise, understandable answer.
It should be used like a search engine that you can ask more long winded questions to. Which is timesaving because instead of taking five Google searches, you can put your question in and get a basic overview of the answer you want. That is invaluable, because we are all coming from busy terms and don’t have time to read hundred page government documents trying to understand. Plus, our teachers don’t have the time or, sometimes, the expertise to explain it to us in the detail we need.
The problem is when people don’t further their research beyond the overview. Then when you see a resolution that it comes out with, it’s so rubbish, it’s so juvenile. But say you come along with a hypothetical for your resolution. You input “What would happen if I did X, Y and Z?” and then use it to imagine outcomes.
It’s here, and it’s here to stay and so we need to find a way of using it without it harming the future of organizations like MUN.
Have you noticed an increase in its use in your time in MUN?
It has exploded in the last year. This time last year we were just discovering that we could use it for things like this but we were aware that information was out of date so we took it with a pinch of salt. However, it has exponentially increased ever since. To a point where it is obvious that everyone is using it because research just lacks the nuance of a real person.
How is debate affected by the lack of knowledge?
It’s really disappointing because people should know more and in past conferences they would have known more, but they are coming from busy school terms so they stick their question into ChatGPT and come out with 5 or 6 pages that they don’t understand and can’t use spontaneously. They are ticking a box but when they come to MUN and have to know things to ask questions or debate and they don’t know it. So they can’t do it, full stop.
How do you see its use progressing in MUN?
I don’t know what could be done to police it, but as long as it stays unpoliced, there is going to be a decline in “take up” of MUN. Even in the quality of debate.
The purpose of MUN is to engage students in world politics and make them think. You want them to want to come here to come among students from all over the world to debate topics that often have very little to do with them. But when they are coming here and they are bored because they don’t know what they are doing and feel it’s a waste of their time because they have other studies they need to get back to. There is the danger that it loses its appeal, which I think is such a pity.
I think there is potential to police it, and I do hope that they find a way to because it is just incredible to see thousands of students here, from all over the world, debating politics.
What would you say to delegates thinking of using it?
I do recognize that it can be difficult for first time delegates, who have never written a resolution before, who are going into a committee where they believe all these students know so much more than them. It’s understandable that they want to take the quick way out but actually, you’ll find that it’s actually very doable to know what you’re talking about and when you do, people have a lot of respect for that. People are nice, so I think that putting a little more effort into doing their own research is very rewarding and you get so much more out of a conference when you know what’s happening.
Illustration By Billy Williams
