Riddle me this: Is AI solving a problem it created?
By AI, I mean this version we’re being sold in the form of subscriptions.
AI for Research
There’s another kind that I’m not talking about here. An AI I’m excited about!
It’s solving medical puzzles or seeing new structures in space right now.
Analyzing huge sets of data in minutes. (A task that would otherwise take humans months.)
So our humans can work on the big questions with their big, fleshy brains.
They create and test new hypotheses.
Figure out new ways to gather more and better data.
And try to answer the questions of our inner and outer cosmos.
AI for Profit
While Claude cleans my inbox?
Disclaimer for AI Super Fans: Relax.
I know Claude can do more than that — you keep telling me about it. But just go with this example for a minute.
Why do I need my inbox cleaned?
I’ll give you one guess.
Yes. You got it!
I have too many emails.
And why is that?
Could it be that AI (and its closely related cousin “automation”) made sending 50 Gagillion emails per minute possible?
Would I need to “clean my inbox” if a human person had to write and send every email I received?
OF COURSE NOT.
Don’t get me wrong. Automation isn’t all bad.
Of course I want to know when Steam games go on sale.
But I’m also getting ungodly amounts of spam (filtered by yet another automation) and AI pitches (one human with 30,000 robot arms reaching into my precious day).
Is the answer “stop hitting yourself”?
Garbage In, Garbage Out (GIGO)
Have you heard this phrase and its whimsical shortform?
As the human moderators fighting the good fight on Wikipedia, explain:
GIGO is the concept that flawed, biased or poor quality (garbage) information or input produces a result or output of similar (“garbage”) quality.
Now who decides the input for AI?
With Research AI, scientists feed in colossal amounts of data from the Spitzer and James Webb telescopes.
ChatGPT ingests… the internet? The 4chan, Reddit, Meta of it all?
You be the judge of this point. Because we need a…
Human in the Loop
Humans need other humans. It’s an unfortunate part of our programming.
We harm and hate and need each other.
And, in business, I can’t tell you the number of times recently that I’ve been assigned “Human in the Loop.”
I need to check what’s going into the AI and what’s coming out of the AI.
Like a farmer tending my flock of robots.
And I have yet to say, “Wow! This robot poop is amazing! I wouldn’t change a thing!”
I often say, “This is fine.”
Yes, it’s better than bad.
But it’s bland and full of idioms and unfeeling and often incoherent. (“You’re right to point that out!” it’ll say back to me. And I sigh.)
Tangent I mused while the robot was “thinking”: Is there PIGO? Perfect In, Garbage Out?
Like when humans eat cheese and the result is shit.
BuT tHe TIME I’m SaViNG!
I can understand this argument on its (clock) face.
With AI, someone finishes their task, so I get MY automated task that very second.
Except it glitches. Except my inbox isn’t clean enough to see it in the sea of nonsense. Except I’m sleeping.
This timesaving seems based on two things:
- GO GO GOGOGOGOGOGO! TIME IS MONEY, MONEY TIME.
- Humans drop the ball sometimes.
But is the real question: Are we doing too much?
Why eliminate every “wasted” second?
Is it for the customer? The worker?
Who else gets sacrificed at the altar of efficiency? (And what crops grow when our gods are pleased?)
You Gotta Spend Time to Save Time
You’ve heard the argument before, and it’s not wrong.
\begin{math}
If you spend 5 minutes per day doing a task you don’t like… Multiply that by 5 days per week. And 52 weeks per year and WOW! 21.67 hours doing something you don’t like.
\end{math}
INSTEAD: you could spend a bunch of time now training AI to do that thing you don’t like.
And you could pay monthly for the AI to do it! And when you run out of credits you could pay more. Or if your tier no longer covers that task you could spend time training a new AI!
I’m all for taking things off my plate (except food — that food is mine and you don’t want to lose a hand).
But are we missing the big picture? Why are there SO MANY “necessary” tasks we don’t like?
Capitalism Enters the Chat
Again, I don’t hate AI. But I really, really want us to think about why we’re using it.
Who benefits when you pay for the Enterprise Super Subscription of RobotCorpUnited? I really, really hope it’s you.
But is it more likely we’re buying our very own emperor’s new clothes?
Something flashy that promises the moon and delivers a too-shiny image of a space rock. Something to save time that soaks up every minute it can with re-engagement (while you “fix” the “mistakes” it made on its first attempt at your task).
If your plumber had the same success rate as your AI, would you keep paying them?
When you have a hammer everything is a nail.
When you have AI, everything can be OPTIMIZED… instead of questioned.
When stakeholders are the only people who matter, you don’t.
Teach a Robot to Fish
There’s something frighteningly gooey about AI.
Every time I ask an expert, “Can it do X?” The answer is, “Ask the AI!”
I’m supposed to ask the machine designed to keep me engaged, if it can help me?
The answer will be, “Yes, Emperor! Beautiful shoes! Here’s 20 steps to make them more beautiful!”
Am I asking the AI because you don’t know what it can do? Or because you don’t know what I can do?
Other Options:
- The system changes so much, the experts don’t know what it can do.
- The output is so variable, it can do X on day 1 but not day 3. And not during peak hours.
- If you host it yourself… if you get extra credits and turn up the processing… if you pay someone to write the prompt… if you just try one more time…
Is anything else this slippery and amorphous?
Am I being given a fish or taught to fish or is this just a too-glossy fishsuit I’m wearing?
Don’t Be Fooled
If that much of your job can be automated and generalized… is this a job you love? Is this a job we need?
If AI is so great, use all that productivity to fund universal basic income.
Let’s go back to doing what humans do: exploring, creating, singing, dancing, making art, hanging out, and caring for each other.
Let’s optimize for naptime and rest and joy.
Because if AI can’t help with that… then that word… I don’t think it means what you think it means.
It might just be naked capitalism with an invisible, too-shiny boot on your neck.
Edited: For math error by human (me) who tried to use robot (calculator) and still messed up.
Words About Stuff by Amy the Copywriter | Art by RAD Studio