Steer Away from Barren AI Group-Think

This morning, as I helped my granddaughter get ready for school, she was very excited to show me a new app on her iPad. It enabled her to download photos she had taken of her pet dog, select a background, and make a montage of the photos. The photos were accompanied with word, and when I asked her if she had selected them herself, she told me that the app had done it.

I appreciated her photographic skills, but cringed when she indicated that the app supplied the words. It seems that AI had reared its ugly head. When I think of it –AI, artificial intelligence– I wonder how those two words became yoked so closely together. It's an oxymoron of the highest order. Artificial – not occurring naturally, fake, not 's the intelligence?

AI insidiously inserted words and gave not a hoot about the creative instincts of my granddaughter. The words were appropriate, but they were not her words. I could not help but think how much more satisfaction she could have derived had she been left to pen the script on her own.

I've read many opinions regarding the efficacy of AI. While I agree that there are areas where this technology can be useful, such as helping to develop new drugs, I do not view AI as some sort of panacea. I abhor the fact that when I write something, AI wants to reword it by spitting out some pablum that it is programmed to placate me and allow me to quickly move onto my next project. I want to stew on my words, think on them, struggle to find my voice. Yes, it's hard work, but then again, isn't that how we grow our intellect and work ethic?

Personally, I will strive agains the shortcuts of AI, and I hope that I can instill that same desire in may grandchildren. But I know it's an uphill battle. I'm old and my ways may be antiquated, at times arduous, but they are the product of years of life experiences. So please! Let's encourage more "readin", "writin", and "rithmetic," more thought and research, and steer our future generation away from barren "AI group-think".