The Emergence and Progression of AI in Comparative and International Education

The history and evolution of AI reveal many twists and turns, but a consistent thread in the story of AI is the humans’ fascination to (re)create intelligence in their own image. Ancient myths of intelligent machines serving humans in their mundane or ambitious undertakings stored in human imagination and consciousness throughout the centuries have infused modern attempts at creating machines capable of displaying intelligence comparable with those of their human creators. In this process, humans have brought to bear cognitive science, psychology, philosophy, technology, and computer science to tinker at the intersection between human biology and neuroscience with computer programming, software and hardware to breathe life into the enduring, yet still elusive, captivation with the AI machine. This history is replete with cautionary tales for education in general and comparative and international education in particular, as AI systems and platforms are attempting to (re)shape the educational landscape with important consequences for the foreseeable future.