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Huberman Lab · 5 min · Aug 10, 2026

Students need AI access without losing the effort of learning

Fei-Fei Li says AI can sap students' agency if it replaces learning, but withholding it also blocks deeper study. She points to AI tutoring and prompting as skills schools should teach.

Fei-Fei Li

Fei-Fei Li is a professor of computer science at Stanford and AI pioneer.

Co-founded World Labs, whose Marble product generates persistent, high-fidelity 3D worlds from images, video or text.

About this segment

Fei-Fei Li says AI can sap students' agency if it replaces learning, but withholding it also blocks deeper study. She points to AI tutoring and prompting as skills schools should teach.

From “Using AI to Increase Your Intelligence & Enrich Humanity | Dr. Fei-Fei Li”, Aug 10, 2026. Watch the full episode

“Learning fundamentally, respecting the hardware you're talking about, takes time, takes effort, sometimes take some pain.”
Dr. Fei-Fei Liat 1:30:15 · Huberman Lab1:30:15

Takeaways

  1. Passive use can displace the effort that builds learning.
  2. Withholding AI can block students from exploring harder questions.
  3. Teach prompting alongside the motivation and agency to learn.

In this episode

Full episode
  1. 9:43ImageNet helped trigger the modern AI breakthrough7:57
  2. 1:04:34Surgical robots help, but rare procedures lack training data3:06
  3. 1:50:07World Labs is building AI for spatial intelligence4:09
  4. 37:05AI can remix recorded ideas but not private experience7:40
  5. 1:15:35AI can mimic motivation settings without experiencing feelings3:43
  6. 1:24:21AI oversight needs professional norms and multiple stakeholders3:12

  7. 1:29:38Students need AI access without losing the effort of learning5:29

  8. 1:37:55Care robots could ease elder care and hospital workloads2:54Up next

Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

  1. 1:29:42

    because you use the word motivation, and I was using the word agency. The absolute bad outcome is that our young generation, their agency... And human level motivation of learning and living is taken away by tools. So doom scrolling, passive watching of shorts, all this are not helping agency, human agency. Learning fundamentally, respecting the hardware you're talking about, takes time, takes effort, sometimes take some pain. That is just how our brain is. It doesn't matter how transistors move.

  2. 1:30:33

    Our neurons move in certain ways. Our chemistry, our hormones move in certain ways. So for young generation, no matter how the society will be different, jobs will be different, our human body needs to go through a deeply developmental phase where learning needs to happen. And that agency of learning, that motivation of learning cannot be taken away by anybody, should not be taken away by humans, nor should it be taken away by machines. That would be my concern, which is that if AI is not used right, the agency and motivation is taken away. Then we are left with generations or generations to come who have not properly developed the brain. The other kind of danger is In the name of agency and motivation, the tools are denied to our students because we're worried you cheat.

  3. 1:31:33

    We're worried you only got your answer from ChatGPT. That is very bad as well because with the proper agency, proper motivation, proper ways of using this tool, we can go a lot deeper with AI than we have ever learned. I was just thinking about, I was a pre-med student for a while. Man, organic chemistry was hard, you know. I remembered trying to learn the molecules, the orientations. But the TA hours are too short, or it overlaps with my other class.

  4. 1:32:08

    And my professors only have a certain number of office hours. It was just a struggle to learn that, right? If today I were to have an AI companion, I would ask so many questions about organic chemistry because I know where I'm stuck, right? I have the motivation to learn. I just needed to guide us. That would be such a powerful tool for me to learn. So that we should not deny students from. So both things worry me is either denying the tool or taking away agency and motivation.

  5. 1:32:45

    Of course, the flip side is great, is let's find a way to keep our children and students' motivation and agency. Let's find a way to give them the access and the right way of using these tools. then this generation, this coming generation and many generations to come will be way smarter than us because they are superpowered. I love that answer. I have great faith in neuroplasticity and the younger generations too.

  6. 1:33:14

    Even our own. I know we're old. Not so. Let's give ourselves some credit. Plasticity does exist throughout the lifespan. Even our own neuroplasticity, right? Like I find AI a great tool for my learning. I mean, for me, it's been a remarkable discovery of what it can do. But I tend to approach it from the position of consumer if I know nothing about something and from the position of creator if I have some knowledge set inside of whatever it is I'm asking.

  7. 1:33:45

    Well, I actually have another thing. A staffer undergrad taught me something last year. And I realized before ChatGPT, sometimes I get lazy. If I have a question, I ask the person I think is smart next to me. Now I realize I should not ask lazy questions because it's so much easier to get information before you spend somebody else's time to ask something that's too lazy. And AI is forcing me not to be too lazy.

  8. 1:34:17

    How essential is the specificity of the prompt to getting the best information out of AI? Prompting is very important. And that's a skill, right? That is a skill. This is why public education is so important. This is why education is so important. I would love to see our schools, K-12, teaching prompting. Here's a quiz. Who is humanity's best prompter? I'm going to flunk this quiz. Socratic, if he were alive, because that is the method of prompting, right?

  9. 1:34:52

    Think about it. What is Socratic' method? It's prompting and seeking truth by asking questions. And we should go back. Like I'm teaching kids that. And taking a walk while you have those discussions. Yes.