Our Future with AI

AI has become ubiquitous in daily life. There has been some notable backlash against the use of AI in the media, but the truth is that AI is here to stay. It is a tool that can be used for good or evil, and it is up to us to decide how we use it.

Uses of AI

Despite the many detractors of AI, there is no doubting its usefulness when it comes to increasing productivity. AI can be used to automate many tasks that would otherwise be done by humans. This frees up humans to do more creative and productive work. I would argue that AI is not a great replacement for humans, but rather a great complement to them.

Sure, an AI can write an article. However, it is unlikely that it will be able to write anything that would have real impact without the contextual knowledge of a human. This is where AI can really shine. Like a genie in a bottle, AI can make some things possible, but it is up to us to decide what we want to do with it.

Personally, I am not afraid of losing my job to AI yet. Tools like codex and GitHub copilot are great for writing code, but they are far, far away from being able to complete a project on their own. Not least of which because they are not able to understand the context of the project. They do not communicate with the client, and most of all, clients usually can’t even articulate what they want. It is up to the developer to understand the client’s needs and translate them into code. The code that is written by AI needs to be guided by the careful hand of a capable programmer.

Anybody who does face a risk of losing their job to AI would do well to start taking advantage of the new tools that are available to them. The more you learn about AI, the more you will be able to use it to your advantage. This could be generating the final product quickly - “A photo of a teddy bear riding a skateboard in times square” - or it could simply be a tool inspire an artist and enrich their work. There are many ways AI could be incorporated into the creative process.

If AI is to replace many jobs, we have a window of time to use these tools for personal gain that is rapidly closing. That said a lot of jobs are repetitive and boring, and I would argue that they should be replaced by AI. The difficulty lies in knowing where to place our efforts once we have freed up our time. It seems to me that we would do well to ponder on what being a good human being means. Recent increases in productivity have led many to live sedentary lives, and I think that we should use our newfound free time to strengthen our communities and learn about ourselves.

Our future together with AI

Even now, we are living in a reality that is more and more influenced by technology. Not just for our convenience and productivity, technology is starting to affect the way we think and behave. I think this is an important moment in history where we should take the time to assert ourselves on the direction that technology is taking us. We should not be afraid of technology, but we should be aware of its implications. As always the negative implications are to numerous to count, but the positive ones are just as numerous. A wise man once told me that there is a relationship between ideas, good and bad, and their ability to be completed. In that sentiment, let us hope that the good ideas for the uses of AI and technology are the ones that will prosper.

DALL-E was used for the image generation in this article