He Weiguang, Tang Yuxi

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IN September 2024, the release of OpenAI’s o1 reasoning model garnered worldwide attention, ushering in a new era of AI development by pioneering a new path for large-scale reasoning models. This technological paradigm shift has prompted many leading technology companies at home and abroad to actively follow suit, indicating that such innovative reasoning models will continue to rapidly evolve and advance.

In particular, these new reasoning models surpass previous large language models in complex reasoning capabilities, and with the support of advanced computing power, their development potential is enormous. They have demonstrated intelligent performance that outperforms human experts in some key mathematical and scientific domains, indicating their ability to progressively tackle problems previously solvable only by humans.

This is just the beginning, and their future prospects are limitless.

This new generation of argumentation models presents both significant opportunities and challenges for ideological and political education in higher education.

Firstly, they facilitate deep, thorough and engaging explanations of key principles in ideological and political courses by teachers. Taking advantage of the models’ ability to mimic complex human thought processes, they provide deeper and more insightful analyses of theoretical concepts, revealing their thought processes to help teachers further deepen their theoretical understanding.

At the same time, students can achieve deeper learning through these technologies, as some ideological and political course content may be difficult for them to grasp.

These technologies help to forge closer links between students’ personal knowledge structures and the course content, which helps to improve knowledge transfer and application in the future.

Secondly, the integration of these technologies with various advanced digital technologies has the potential to create a more immersive teaching environment for ideological and political courses, making the transfer of knowledge more focused and engaging. Students, in turn, can gain unprecedented, transformative learning experiences that foster stronger ideological and political identification.

Finally, the new argumentation models can serve as valuable tools for teachers of ideological and political courses, helping them to stay abreast of the latest national policies and innovative theories, thus providing a solid foundation for the continuous improvement of their teaching and educational skills.

Moreover, under the guidance of teachers, students can actively use these technologies in social practice, accelerating their growth into well-rounded talents with high qualities and innovative thinking.

However, the risks associated with these technologies warrant high vigilance.

Compared to previous AI systems, their enhanced performance and rapid development pose greater challenges to ideological and political education in higher education.

Inappropriate application may expose students to the influence of misinformation, potentially leading to over-reliance on these technologies at the ideological level, thereby constraining their behavior.

Additionally, challenges such as data privacy risks, algorithmic bias, and the generation of misinformation further complicate the implementation of ideological and political education.

Therefore, in the active use of this technology, ideological and political education in higher education should be adapted to the specific needs of educational scenarios, using these technologies in a self-directed manner.

Appropriate limits should be set for their use, and the content generated and its effects should be rigorously examined. Appropriate systems for timely control and prevention should be formulated.

(He Weiguang, Tang Yuxi are scholars from the School of Marxism, Shenzhen University, with Tang Yuxi as the corresponding author. This article is a phased research result of the National Social Science Fund’s Higher Education Ideological and Political Course Research Special Project “Generative Artificial Intelligence Promotes Teacher Innovation and Cultivation of ‘Introduction to Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era’” (23VSZ035).)