AI: Write or Wrong?

 

Image from NIH¹

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is not going away any time soon. If anything, it is a tool that can augment and even enhance many of the activities we engage in.

It goes without saying AI is an incredible technical achievement, comparable and arguably exceeds the profound impact that cars and airplanes have made for traveling. Today, arriving at a destination takes minutes/hours/days compared to weeks to months by foot, horseback or by ship (excluding cargo ships). Also with today, traveling in these classical ways are typically reserved as a hobby rather than an actual means of getting around. AI is impacting certain aspects of society where tasks can be completed in a very short amount of time.

So what happens to those tasks and the skills attached to them when we leave AI to perform them for us?

To further explain this question, I go into the reasons why I intentionally draft my blog posts without AI instead of prompting my way to it. I only make final revisions before publishing. Obviously this comes at a cost but probably not in the way that you are probably thinking.

GOOGLE MAPS

Do you remember when Google Maps came out²? The specific date of Google Map's release is not as important as the impact the application made to societies around the world because it ultimately changed and simplified the way people traveled from one place to another. Traditional analog maps and compasses became a relic of the past, like the sundial to tell time, nice to have but not needed for day to day activities in the modern world.

The adoption of using Google Maps to travel from place to place followed a particular pattern:

• General excitement of the technology,
• Usage for mundane tasks that people were already familiar with like going to the groceries because of the novelty of using it,
• Complete replacement of maps and compasses.

When Google Maps showed up on the scene, Millenials, became the group that fully embraced the new technology and using analog maps and compasses were easily shoved into the basement to never be seen again. I've seen people in this age bracket not know how to use a regular map and compass. Generations that followed either have never used a map in their life let alone own one. Also older generations don't seem to mind not having a map or a compass either.

Beresford Research provides a table of generations³.

Generations	Born	Current Ages
Gen Z	1997 – 2012	14 – 29
Millennials	1981 – 1996	30 – 45
Gen X	1965 – 1980	46 – 61
Boomers II (a/k/a Generation Jones)*	1955 – 1964	62 – 71
Boomers I*	1946 – 1954	72 – 80
Post War	1928 – 1945	81 – 98
WWII	1922 – 1927	99 – 104

We can surmise the reason for embracing and adopting an application that provides well laid out directions and precise locations are far better than using a map and compass. The amount of effort required for looking up directions are greatly reduced because the application does it for you. On top of the apps themselves are digital maps. Therefore, map apps instead of physical maps and compasses became ubiquitous for all the right reasons.

AI seems to be following a similar trajectory like the evolution of how we travel. We provide a start and a destination; AI lays it all out from start to finish.

There is no right or wrong answer on whether to use AI or not. Using AI at a certain capacity comes down to personal preferences and philosophies. In very much the same way that the map apps became ubiquitous, AI is following that same path.

I decided that writing without AI was going to be the direction I would go with the blog posts and use AI during the final revisions for clarity and correctness. I am fully aware that this decision results in less efficiency however, I find that writing helps solidify, and even mold, my ideas and thoughts instead of having an external entity construct my ideas for me. Writing also helps me further understand concepts because I am engaged in the thought process, again without having an external entity construct that for me. The process of writing without AI is very much a selfish endeavor to anchor my own thoughts and to be able to express them the way I see fit.

This isn't a negative criticism of using AI. Actually, it's far from it. Using a search engine, typically provides AI summarized queries that narrows the topic that is being searched resulting in less time gathering information that is needed. Combined with using AI towards the tail end of the writing process helps me improve my writing.

AI is advancing at a rapid pace, far faster than the speed of my thought process and typing can ever catch up to. I still have maps and compasses where I only have them for emergencies. I am not going halfway across the world on a ship to visit family for a couple of weeks, unless it is some sort of excursion as part of a vacation package; I am going to take a plane. I use Google Maps. Maybe my writing process will change...

Despite all the benefits that AI can provide, I still decided that limiting my use of AI was right for me, especially putting together my blog posts. I know that the process is slow. I know that getting to completion can sometimes not be exactly where I intended. The mental detours can put me off course. Yet, there is something compelling of creating a path instead of having something else move you through one. Not every aspect of life needs to be approached in this manner because realistically, that is inefficient and we have the ability to choose. For me, writing is fun and if I need to get somewhere Google Maps and a vehicle will work just fine to helping me get to my destination.

VERSIONS

2026v.0.1.0

REFERENCES

1. AI image from: National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering: Artificial Intelligence (AI) ↩

2. XDA-Developers: Google Maps launched on February 8, 2005 ↩

3. Beresford Research: Age Range By Generation ↩