Technology is a tool without morals and values. Everywhere you turn today, you hear about AI and ChatGPT. People are either extolling the virtues of both or saying that it is the first step to a cybernetic organism coming out of the future, calling the name SARAH CONNER.
I think we all need to take a step back and realise that technology, all technology, are tools without morals or values, and what makes them good or bad are the people who utilise them.
A month ago, a friend and I talked about her new copywriter and how she just fired him.
He had written a couple of lifeless, banal, and boring articles for her. She figured it was just him getting used to her voice, and they sat down for a couple of hours and talked through what she liked, what she didn’t and how she approached business.
He went away and created five new articles, each with the same results, in her opinion.
Out of curiosity, she used a software package that audits to determine whether AI likely wrote them.
Her results were that all eight of his articles had a ninety-five percent chance of being written by ChaptGPT. She then took a half-dozen articles that she had written and put them through the same process, and the result was that they had a five percent chance of being AI written.
She confronted the person, who finally admitted what he had done, and she fired him. He had charged her four hours of writing time per article for something ChatGPT had written in less than two minutes.
To me, this is FRAUD.
Before you think that I am anti-AI, let me tell you that I am not and use AI weekly, if not daily.
I use it to suggest headlines for articles such as this.
I use it to write the first draft of copy for emails and then clean them up.
I use it to edit my articles and decide whether the suggestions are valid or need work.
Artificial intelligence, machine learning, and other technology forms will improve our lives, but only when we learn how to use them effectively.
Without our guidance, they are merely using an algorithm of zeros and ones to make decisions based upon “if/then statements” designed by humans.
We need to stop fearing technology and stop using it as a crutch or an excuse.
We, as humans, are still firmly in the driver’s seat and will be for a long time.
We have the ability of choice and context to override when things do not look right, but we have to trust ourselves enough to do so.
Too many people are so trusting of technology that they will not decide without it. If you disagree, why do retail shops shut down as soon as the power goes out or the internet goes down? We have lost our ability to do simple maths and find ways to support our clients when technology fails us.
So, how are you going to move forward now? How will you enable your humanity to be the driving force when engaging with technology? To be willing to think, act and react when what you see technology doing does not make sense?
The decision and the choice are yours, and you need to learn how to use your voice to say, “Hang on, this does not compute.”
