Over the years, as AI has advanced rapidly, I've noticed growing concerns all around us. Will my skills still matter tomorrow? Could AI eventually take over my job? Who is really in the driver's seat? What happens when we stop thinking for ourselves? What are the human traits that cannot be replicated?
Today, we are so focused on mastering the tools that we are losing sight of the bigger picture. So, I'm not here to talk about how to draft an effective prompt or build a practical workflow. Instead, I would like to share a few thoughts on AI that are rarely discussed but important for us to keep in mind.
The basics
One of the biggest mistakes we make with AI is treating it as an all-knowing oracle. It has access to a massive library of facts but lacks context and sometimes makes things up. To get the most out of AI without losing our minds, we have to treat it as an intern on their first day.
The all-knowing oracle knows what we think, but the intern at the desk next to us doesn't. If we give them a vague task, we will get a generic result that isn't helpful. To get great work, we should provide the necessary context.
Think about the contrast between these two approaches:
Give me a 7-day itinerary for Kyoto.
Give me a 7-day itinerary for Kyoto on a moderate budget. I'm traveling with my friends, love street photography and hidden local food spots, but hate crowded tourist traps, and prefer a relaxed pace with plenty of walking.
However, even with perfect context, keep in mind that the intern is inherently unreliable. They are eager to please, so they will confidently hand us a result even if they have to make it up on the spot. If we copy and paste their work directly into a presentation for our boss, we're the ones responsible for their mistakes.
The rule of thumb for working with the intern is simple: trust, but verify. Before their work leaves our desk, we have to act as the editor-in-chief, which involves questioning the sources, double-checking the facts, and ensuring the logic holds up.
Moreover, it's important to keep in mind that the intern is inherently ordinary. They are trained on an extensive collection of human knowledge, so their output is usually average. If we simply copy and paste their boilerplate without infusing it with our own originality, our work will look mass-produced and sound like everyone else's.
To ensure the work stands out, we have to inject our own individuality: our unique voice, an unusual perspective that the intern could never predict, or a specific story that only we could tell.
Ultimately, because of these limitations, managing the intern requires strategic delegation. By delegating routine, repetitive tasks to the intern, we free up our time and energy for what really matters, whether it's drafting a beautiful email that comes from the heart, or recording voices and capturing visuals for a video that needs to stand out.
The cognitive trap
Think about a situation where we're driving somewhere. We used to have to look for landmarks, use spatial reasoning, and build mental maps. GPS allows us to drive anywhere easily, but without it, we often don't know how to get there. Similarly, as advanced driver-assistance systems take over the controls, we are gradually losing our muscle memory for emergency braking, which makes us slower to slam on the brakes in an emergency.
Today, we rely on Google to search for information, so we no longer memorize it because it's readily available online. Similarly, we delegate drafting, summarizing, even problem-solving, decision-making, and deep thinking tasks to the intern. So, we risk letting our cognitive muscles atrophy from lack of use, eventually eroding our attention, memory, and depth of thinking.
The solution isn't to fire the intern, that ship has sailed, and honestly, it wouldn't be advisable even if it were possible. So, what are the best strategies to reduce cognitive atrophy while still getting the benefits of the intern?
As we just discussed, the best practice is to delegate routine, repetitive tasks to the intern while keeping strategic, creative, and deep thinking tasks for ourselves. The key is making deliberate choices rather than always relying on the intern.
Think about the contrast between these two approaches:
Write an article about the future of remote work.
I believe remote work is shifting from flexibility to isolation. Here is my rough outline and three core arguments. Act as a devil's advocate: find the blind spots in my logic and suggest two counterarguments I should address.
Before we ask the intern, we have to take a moment to think it through and create a draft, whether it's a solution to a problem or a proposal for a decision. Once we have put effort into deep thinking and prepared our draft, ask the intern to play devil's advocate: pointing out our blind spots, stress-testing our core conclusions, even bringing alternative perspectives to the table. Engaging in cognitive struggle helps prevent cognitive atrophy.
When we learn a new skill, whether it's a language or a framework, we shouldn't ask the intern during the learning phase, just as we learn basic math without relying on a calculator. We have to struggle through the clumsy, frustrating learning phase to strengthen neural connections and build cognitive resilience. Once we have struggled through the learning phase, we have to practice consistently to avoid losing the skill we just learned.
Reading physical books, mastering musical instruments, or engaging in deliberate practices that keep attention, memory, and depth of thinking alive are the ultimate antidotes to cognitive atrophy.
The real question is whether we treat it as an intern who frees us up for deeper thinking, or as an all-knowing oracle who helps us slack off, which lets our cognitive muscles atrophy.
The personal attributes
Before we move forward, I encourage everyone to take a moment to think about a question. When the intern raises the floor for everyone, what makes an individual stand out from the crowd? I have been thinking about this question for at least two years. Now, I have come up with a rough answer that involves a variety of attributes. Among these attributes, I would like to focus on two that are important.
The first is the skill to know what's right, that is, critical thinking. Think about how we consume information online. Without it, it's easy to fall into the trap of blindly sharing sensational headlines. With it, it's natural to pause, question the source, and seek the truth behind the noise.
When we work with the intern, critical thinking is essential to ensure the logic holds up, whether it's double-checking the facts, or reviewing the technical implementations.
To understand how to cultivate critical thinking, refer to the previous section or my earlier article.
More important is the skill to know what's good, that is, personal taste. Think about how we curate the space we live in. Without it, we passively fill our rooms with generic, algorithm-recommended furniture. With it, we carefully select each piece of furniture, from a vintage rocking chair to a delicate potted cherry blossom, to craft a home that reflects the books we've read, the paths we've walked.
"You don't make a photograph just with a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved." — Ansel Adams
When we work with the intern, personal taste is essential to ensure the work stands out, whether it's highlighting a lack of emotional resonance in the text, or introducing a few intentional flaws to the design to break the sterile perfection.
Cultivating personal taste is a complex, lifelong journey that goes far beyond developing critical thinking. While it's quite challenging to break it down briefly, here are some practical strategies to get started on the journey.
Great personal taste comes from high-volume, high-variety inputs. Expanding our visual and conceptual vocabulary requires getting out of our comfort zone, whether by reading a variety of books, visiting the museums we don't prefer, exploring the subcultures we don't understand, or studying the design movements we're not familiar with.
As Goethe once said, "Taste is only to be educated by contemplation, not of the tolerably good, but of the truly excellent." Building that benchmark requires exploring the classics that stand the test of time, from the opulence of Baroque and Rococo to the serenity of Wabi-Sabi, from the photographs of Henri Cartier-Bresson to the films of Wes Anderson.
Personal taste is cultivated when we shift from saying "I like it" or "I hate it" to understanding why it works or fails. When we encounter a piece of art, an interior design, or a well-crafted product that moves us or even repels us, we have to take a moment to observe it and ask ourselves some questions. Where does the eye land first, and how does it move? What is the underlying color relationship? How does the material interact with light? What design language or canon does this piece reference?
Those attributes we haven't discussed, such as curiosity and creativity, are also important. To keep things brief, I won't dive into this topic here, but it offers a perfect opportunity to practice deep thinking.
Honoring a mentor
Looking back over these words, I know it took me a long time to figure out which thoughts were worth sharing. After all, this piece was written to honor a mentor who has profoundly influenced the way I think. So, I sincerely hope that these words do justice to the depth of his wisdom.