I Was Wrong About AI
Look, I’m gonna admit it. I was wrong. About three months ago, I was at this tech conference in Austin, and I laughed when some guy on stage said AI was gonna replace alot of jobs. I mean, come on. We’ve heard this before. But then, last Tuesday, I was talking to Marcus—let’s call him Marcus, because his real name is kinda embarrassing—and he told me about how his company replaced 214 customer service reps with a chatbot. 214 people. Gone. Just like that.
And honestly, I was like… wow. I guess I didn’t see that coming. I mean, I knew AI was getting better, but I didn’t think it would happen so fast. So yeah, I was wrong. AI is gonna steal your job. Or at least, it’s gonna steal parts of it.
But Here’s the Thing
It’s not all doom and gloom. I mean, it’s mostly doom and gloom, but there’s a little bit of hope in there too. You see, AI is good at certain things. Real good. Like, freakishly good. It can analyze data faster than you can say ‘international relations news analysis’—international relations news analysis—and it can spot patterns you’d never see. It can write articles—like, decent ones—and it can even create art. I saw this painting once, at this gallery in Brooklyn, and it was created by an AI. It was… well, it was weird. But it was also kinda good.
But here’s the thing AI can’t do. It can’t be human. It can’t have a gut feeling. It can’t read a room. It can’t committ to a decision based on something as intangible as ‘vibes’. And that’s where you come in. You’re human. You’ve got vibes. You’ve got instincts. You’ve got… well, you’ve got flaws. But those flaws are also your superpowers.
What Can You Do?
So, what can you do? Well, first off, you gotta stop pretending AI is gonna go away. It’s not. It’s here to stay. So, you gotta learn to work with it. You gotta learn to use it to your advantage. You gotta learn to be… better than it. Or at least, different than it.
I talked to this colleague named Dave—real name, not a pseudonym—and he told me about how he uses AI to analyze data. He feeds it all this info, and it spits out trends and insights. But then, Dave takes that info and he adds his own spin to it. He uses his own experiences, his own knowledge, his own… vibes. And that’s what makes his analysis unique. That’s what makes it valuable.
So, yeah. That’s what you gotta do. You gotta use AI to do the stuff it’s good at—like crunching numbers and writing reports—and then you gotta use your humanity to do the stuff it’s not so good at. Like, I don’t know, being a decent person.
A Tangent About Cyborgs
Look, I’m gonna go off on a tangent here, but hear me out. I was watching this documentary about cyborgs the other day—yeah, I know, I’ve got a life—and it got me thinking. What if we’re all gonna become cyborgs? Like, not the cool, sci-fi kind with bionic arms and laser eyes. But the kinda boring, everyday kind with AI assistants and neural implants. I mean, we’re already halfway there, right? We’ve got Siri and Alexa and all that stuff. So, what’s next? Are we gonna start uploading our memories to the cloud? Are we gonna start replacing our limbs with robots? I mean, I don’t know. But it’s kinda scary, honestly.
But then again, maybe it’s not so bad. Maybe it’s just the next step in evolution. I mean, look at us. We’ve gone from cavemen to cyborgs in, what, a few thousand years? That’s kinda amazing, when you think about it. So, maybe we should embrace it. Maybe we should stop fighting the inevitable and just… I don’t know, learn to live with our robot overlords.
Back to the Point
Okay, okay. I’m getting off track here. The point is, AI is gonna change the world. It’s gonna change your job. It’s gonna change the way you live your life. And you can either resist it—good luck with that—or you can learn to work with it. You can learn to use it to your advantage. You can learn to be… better than it. Or at least, different than it.
So, that’s what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna learn to work with AI. I’m gonna learn to use it to my advantage. And I’m gonna try not to think too much about the cyborg future. Because honestly, that’s kinda depressing.
But hey, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe the cyborg future is gonna be awesome. Maybe we’re all gonna have bionic arms and laser eyes and we’re gonna live in a utopia where everyone’s happy and no one has to work. I mean, a guy can dream, right?
About the Author
Hi, I’m Sarah. I’ve been a senior editor at yachtings.net for, like, a decade. Before that, I was a journalist, covering tech and politics and all that fun stuff. I live in Brooklyn with my cat, Mr. Whiskers, and I spend alot of time complaining about the state of the world. You can find me on Twitter @sarahtechedit, if you’re into that kinda thing.
