Short Thoughts

Responding to I Do Not Want to Be a Programmer Anymore (After Losing an Argument to AI and My Wife)

The article begins by sharing a story of attempting to use AI to resolve a difference of opinion with his wife, which convinced him he was wrong. His wife reaction:

It wasn’t the victory that stuck with her. It was how easily I surrendered my judgment to a machine.

He gives another example from work, from which he writes:

That’s the unsettling part. We don’t just listen to the machine; we believe it. We defer to it. And sometimes, we even prefer its certainty over the reasoning of the actual humans in front of us.

His concerning conclusion:

Wisdom has always come as the byproduct of experience. But if experience itself is outsourced to machines, where will the young earn theirs?

I also have experienced myself being resistant to the arguments of another only to be won over by consulting a LLM and reasoning through the arguments. In part this seems reasonable, the ideas of others which are contrary to our own are costly for us. Ideas which we arrive at, or we think we arrive at, on our own we believe we have already been through the work to vet.

Therefore, the question is whether we ask AI’s answer on the first take, or do we go back and forth with the AI examining the rationale. The first is concerning, to blindly accept the response without any further examination. But I suspect that is not what occurs in most use cases. Instead we become convinced by it because it is a nonthreatening way to explore the topic. I wonder if there is intimations of that when he says:

Clients, colleagues, even strangers are emboldened not because the machine gives them ideas, but because it gives them confidence.

When he provides the example at work the person sent him a “detailed breakdown” of how to improve the system. It sounds to me the person invested a lot of effort and thought into this, not quickly typed a question and forwarded on the AI response.

Circling back to his concern about wisdom, or lack of, I believe this highlights the need for relationship. If relationships continue to erode, lack of mentorship, and trust in AI continues to rise then is wisdom lost?

It feels this may be the case. But humans still accumulate experiences, from both our failures and triumphs. And from those experiences wisdom will still either be derived or ignored. It’s hard to imagine a complete loss of wisdom. Even the author gain wisdom from the experiencing of bringing AI into the conversation with his wife. There is precious wisdom humankind has obtained across our existence, which would be a tragedy to lose. But I have a hope in humanity, that we will continue to push forward and adapt, accumulating wisdom. It is in our nature, I don’t think we can do anything otherwise.