INDEPENDENT SINCE 1880
The Corne¬ Daily Sun 8 Pages – Free
Vol. 139, No. 31
TUESDAY, JANUARY 31, 2023 n ITHACA, NEW YORK
News
Arts
Sports
Weather
S.A. Convenes
Elvis Evaluation
Free Throw
Cloudy
The Student Assembly held its first meeting on Thursday, reviewing resolution updates.
Max Fattal ’25 reviews the recent blockbuster ‘Elvis,’ a Best Picture Oscar Nominee.
Cornell beat Brown for men's basketball on Saturday with an impressive record of 4-2.
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Ph.D. Candidate Seeks to Secure Mayoral Race Win By SOFIA RUBINSON Sun News Editor
Following an announcement that Mayor Laura Lewis would not be running for reelection, Alderperson Robert Cantelmo grad announced his bid for the position on Jan. 8. “I’ve had a lot of opportunities to work closely with colleagues to build coalitions around legislation already,” Cantelmo said in an interview with The Sun. “And I have every confidence that I will continue to be able to do that in Council and continue to be able to do that in the community.” Cantelmo is the first and only person thus far to announce his candidacy for the 2023 mayoral election, which will be held in November. He is the associate director of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, represents the Fifth Ward on the Common Council since winning the 2021 election — which includes parts of the Cornell community — and is finishing his Ph.D. in government at the University. At the Einaudi Center, Cantelmo works on the Democratic Threats and Resilience initiative, which examines the causes of democratic backsliding and institutional resilience mechanisms that can help insulate democratic societies
from autocratic tendencies. He said his research at the Center has relevant implications for his service on the Common Council. “Even these hyper-local issues that we deal with about streets being paved, sidewalks being in good condition, fire departments being fully staffed, this is all service delivery stuff that matters at the local level, no matter where you are in the world,” Cantelmo said. “It’s when governments are unable to provide those basic services to their populace, that some of these risks are generated about threats to democracy. I love having the ability to engage in good evidence-based policymaking at the local level.” See MAYOR page 3
COURTESY OF THE CANTELMO CAMPAIGN
Books to bid | Robert Cantelmo smiles brightly in front of the State Theatre of Ithaca.
HIGH: 26º LOW: 13º
High achievers
JULIA NAGEL / SUN PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Students work in Gates Hall on an snowy afternoon of Jan. 30. Gates Hall houses the College of Computer and Information Science, well-known for its expertise in technology fields such as artificial intelligence.
ChatGPT Disrupts Academics
Professors and students discuss impact of artificial intelligence By JULIA SENZON Sun Staff Writer
Long gone are antiquated excuses of dogs eating homework and students selling essays after class. The new enemy of plagiarism and cheating is an artificial intelligence chatbot known as ChatGPT. ChatGPT was built by OpenAI, a San Francisco technology company also credited for GPT-3 and DALL-E2. The platform, launched on Nov. 30, attracted a million users in its first five days. ChatGPT uses a type of machine learning called natural language processing to generate realistic language at any level. Previous AI chatbots were capable of specific, explicitly defined jobs like writing marketing copies, but they failed when tasked outside their areas of expertise. ChatGPT is more flexible and intelligent — able to both write jokes and explain scientific concepts at high levels. Ph.D. student in information science Jose Guridi
grad believes that users are unnerved by the humanlike capacities of ChatGPT communication. “I believe that [what is] most revolutionary about ChatGPT and other AI advancements of the last years is not necessarily the technology itself, but how it openly challenges the boundaries between humans and machines,” Guridi said. “What scares people is how we [accept that] technologies can [now] do things we [previously] believed were exclusively human, which forces us to rethink what is to be human, how we generate value and how we will live with these systems.” Universities are struggling to maintain academic integrity amidst this technological development. An informal and anonymous poll conducted by The Stanford Daily reported that 17 percent of Stanford student respondents admitted to utilizing ChatGPT on their fall quarter assignments and exams. See CHATGPT page 3
TCAT Receives Funding Increase By PATRICK KUEHL Sun Contributor
The Tompkins Consolidated Area Transit reached an agreement on Jan. 20 with its three local donors — the City of Ithaca, Tompkins County and Cornell University — to increase their contributions by five percent for the coming fiscal year. The three underwriters are obligated to give the same amount of finances each year, as agreed upon in a contract organized in 1991. An eight percent increase was proposed this year to address inflation, supply chain issues and staffing shortages which led to reduced TCAT services. While the
city of Ithaca and Tompkins County agreed, Cornell raised concerns based on the TCAT’s budgeting. Cornell’s Vice President of University Relations Joel M. Malina stated to the Ithaca Times that Cornell would keep up their commitment as an underwriter to the TCAT but was unwilling to drastically increase their financial contribution to eight percent in a Dec. 29 article. “TCAT has not offered any specific justification for such a large increase in the underwriter contribution,” Malina said. Furthermore, Malina argues that TCAT already holds adequate fund-
ing. “[TCAT administration] holds approximately $16 million in reserve and fund balance with an additional $15 million in grant funding,” Malina said. The grant funding came from an $8.7 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Low or No Emission program and a $7 million grant from the New York State Energy and Research Development Authority. The DOT grant is intended to fund 10 electric buses, while the NY State grant was unspecified.
JULIA NAGEL / SUN PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Bus ride | Cornell student gets on a TCAT bus on Tower Road on Jan. 30,
See TCAT page 4 escaping the snow and rain on their daily commute to classes.