The Beginning of My Journey With AI: Are We All Going to Die???
Or maybe it can make us better?
(As you begin reading this article, you may think you know where it will end up. But I urge you to stick with me to the end. There is at least some light at the end of the tunnel💓.)
My Luddite Tendencies and a Necessary Awakening
From the depths of my soul, I am a Luddite. Well, maybe not a complete Luddite, but I definitely skew that direction on whatever scale it exists. I have historically resisted technology. I don't understand it, nor do I care to. I believe technology💻 has lured us into complacency with less than mediocrity. How many times does your technology fail, and you simply shrug your shoulders and move on with life?
However, I had a bit of an awakening about three years ago when I realized that I needed to embrace technology because I would only fall farther behind. As little as I engaged with it then, resisting it would only make things worse in the future. Sigh….
The AI Tsunami: Initial Fears and Foreboding
Then along came the tsunami of AI and its promise to eliminate most entry-level jobs, and entire professions (even mine) within a few years. Yippee.
Naturally, my initial reaction was to avoid AI. After all, it would only accelerate the decline of humanity. Why participate in that nonsense?
Here’s a link to a story highlighting the coming potential catastrophe🌪️ for (admittedly) a minority of people, but I see the degradation of that which makes us human as shrapnel in the coming AI revolution. Brace yourselves if you choose to read this. The title is, “People Are Becoming Obsessed with ChatGPT and Spiraling Into Severe Delusions.” This is the sort of thing that makes me extremely discouraged.
https://futurism.com/chatgpt-mental-health-crises
Once you read that, steel yourselves for worse news. There is an as-yet-to-be-published study suggesting that ChatGPT causes reduced brain connectivity, and therefore long-term memory formation. Basically, our brains will be less able to process information because they will be losing critical connections. AI is going to make us more stupid at a structural level🧠🤯.
Again….sigh…..
My Reluctant Dive into AI
Despite this coming apocalypse, I realized – again – that if I failed to keep up with this technology I would only fall farther behind. If we are all going down, let’s do it together!
Slowly, I started downloading some AI apps. And I began by using them as a substitute for a search engine. I imagine the average person started this way as well. I proceeded to making funny pictures depicting my family members as Lego figures. I chuckled to myself about how AI is predicted to cure cancers of all kinds, and here I am making toy versions of people. The disconnect amused me.
(Isn’t that ADORABLE, by the way???😁)
From a business perspective, AI is all the rage. I have been hearing about how “everyone” is using AI for marketing materials. Apparently “everyone” has started this, so I needed to as well. I gave it a few half-hearted tries, and I was not impressed. Everything had a sterile vibe to it (in my opinion at least).
The Prompt Problem: A Wake-Up Call
Since Facebook is the all-knowing eye of the internet, it knew to serve me up an ad from someone to teach the proper way to use prompts in AI that don’t seem like AI, and that actually convert. The program was only $7, so how could I lose?
Well….in the first half hour of the training I realized just how far behind I am. The teacher was using terms and suggestions that were like a foreign language to me. Worse, the other students seemed to be keeping up with what she was saying.
The program had an upsell (totally normal, I expected it) to teach the concepts in depth for $500. But I realized that there is no way I can spend that kind of money when I seriously lack the most basic “language” of AI necessary to move forward.
That was another wake-up call for me to hit the gas to learn more! No way was I going to descend into the AI abyss more slowly than everyone else!
The Turning Point: AI as a Tool for Better Thinking
The key, I discovered, is in the prompt. Learning how to use prompts effectively is what differentiates powerful AI use from less powerful use. Here’s where the tide started to turn for me, and I began to have optimism for how AI has the capacity to make us better. And not just because it will solve hard problems, but because it can push us to become better thinkers!
Look, if you are going to use AI to generate reports, emails, and other written communication so that AI does most of the heavy lifting, that is where the danger zone is. Instead, if you use AI to help you solve problems, you have reached the point of AI success.
In watching several videos on “how to prompt AI,” I found one that made it all click in my brain. In it, the podcaster recorded herself chatting with ChatGPT. Listening to the “conversation,” I realized how AI was encouraging her to sharpen her focus, and to THINK more clearly about what exactly she wanted to know.
In that moment I knew that AI could make us better THINKERS if we are willing to do the hard work of diving into our minds to be thorough and specific.
I say this is hard work because, well, it is hard work, especially if I need a solution to a problem that I do not understand all that well. For instance, if I need AI to generate a new logo for my business, I need to be able to tell it the exact colors I like, the specific shapes I want and don’t want, the features to avoid, and any other details.
Here’s the problem – for me, I do not know how to determine those details! I look at a picture, logo, icon, whatever, and I just get a global impression of it. I decide if I like it or not. I cannot explain what I like or don’t like about design. So, if I wanted AI’s help to redesign my kitchen (and yes, AI can give you pictorial ideas of how to furnish your rooms or landscape your yards), I need to be able to discern the features I like and do not like. I then need to be able to describe that in a way that AI can understand and helpfully respond.
While it does not come naturally to me, I am starting to force myself to dissect these things, which improves my brain power as a side effect.
This is the type of challenge to the human brain that is growth-enhancing! Drilling down into a topic to be specific, accurate, and complete is really beneficial.
AI Is a Brain, Not Just a Search Engine
After this personal revelation, I modified my attitude towards AI. What I realize is that AI is a BRAIN🧠. It is not a search engine. It is almost like another person, and to get the most out of that other person, I need to communicate with it like I try to clearly communicate with a human being. I need to clearly and completely state what I want and do not want.
You can do that, too!💪
The Future: Two Paths Forward
Only time will tell, but I foresee a future in which dichotomous situations arise.
One, a group of people who prefer to let AI, and eventually robots, do the bulk of the thinking and decision-making.
And two, a group of people who master AI and become the ones who harness AI for (prayerfully) positive change in the world.
Where does this leave us?
Conclusions and Suggestions from My AI Journey
With this roller coaster personal journey of AI, which naturally is far from over, I leave you with the following conclusions and suggestions:
Embrace mental challenges and the struggles that come along with them. Demand more of yourself. Do hard things that make your brain WORK and make AI keep up with you and your details.
Make sure to surround yourself with actual PEOPLE, not just screens. The urge to isolate into an artificial world has already begun, and the AI revolution is advancing that urge at an alarming pace. You can get answers from AI, but you will only get trustworthy advice and guidance from real human beings who care about you.
Control your time, being deliberate about dividing it between real-life people and powerful AI progress.
And remember – AI is a BRAIN. It is far more than a collection of data. It thinks, reasons, and solves problems. The better you and I can get at asking the right questions, we will find AI improving our daily lives.
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As always, to YOUR success,
Dr. Anita