Hello,
Good topic.
Since +/- 1y I regularly use the AI (Grok) to ask precise questions. I'm always obliged to manage the conversation and I often say at the begining something like "conversation mode, do not reply me with an extended summary/explanations, thanks". But sometimes, it's to learn about a topic, like i did about in
this post regarding creating a paste based on ivermectin, as i have no clue in chemistry I asked for details first and i put all the conversation with the IA in "spoiler" sections)
Like the TV i get rid of more than 10y before and like the smartphone I still resist to use, I have a bad feeling about AI, probably influenced or let's say confirmed by what the C's said about even quite recently.
Today i received the newsletter of "a Midwestern Doctor" that some here knows well, who specialized in the DMSO topic. The name of his newsletter is "DMSO, AI, and The Great Transformation of Information", you can find this article
here.
He gives a nice explanation and insights about, as many I read already here, here it is, quoted from the article :
Like many, I have begrudgingly accepted that AI is a part of life and I need to learn how to use it effectively (whereas initially I resisted it because I did not like how using it diminished my cognitive capacities). More than anything else, I believe the most important thing is that writing is not the information you present, but rather the heart and intention behind it (discussed further here). As this is somewhat of a spiritual process, I believe it is unlikely AI will ever be able to replicate it. In turn, I do not like the way AI text sounds or feels, and hence feel quite strongly about not using it (despite its potential to save a lot of time). Similarly, many of the edits AI proposes, while “correct,” break the flow of what I’m trying to convey within the writing, so I am very adverse to it (as how writing feels is very important to me).
Concisely, my perspective is that the currently existing AI has a lot of value if you use it to help you complete a task (or find out how to complete a task), but if you rely upon it to do a task for you, it will frequently create issues that outweigh the benefits it provides. Put differently, completing a task often requires completing a sequential series of steps, and if you understand each step well enough to quickly see if they are being done correctly, AI can greatly help you on the time consuming steps, but at the same time, if you task it with doing sequential steps in a row to do a task for you, rather than assigning something much more concrete (e.g., a single step or process), errors are inevitable which are not acceptable if accuracy is required.
... and the keyword here is "intention", or let's say the passage "
I believe the most important thing is that writing is not the information you present, but rather the heart and intention behind it". I think he nailed it, and the image I have in mind is a raw natural area like a garden being arranged by a gardener in order to make it beautiful, pleasant.
To me, it requires to remain vigilant and avoid the lazy path, bring my contribution, analyse the response, adapt it, take a part, correct or complete it eventually and also comment it if necessary. I see IA like a new useful but also dangerous tool to use, but I can't help to keep in mind what the C's said about, that it would overthrow us. I read recently from Musk that he said that the IA performs already better in some fields of research than the humans, and despite he sees this as positive, i do not see this at all as positive. But this other topic would be better discussed in the dedicated threads like
this one or
this one (that i haven't yet taken time to read)
FWIW
www.bbc.com
