AI can't do the thinking for you

Hey - It’s Michael.

Spent the weekend with my parents doing nothing but eating apple cake - what a treat. Enjoy the newsletter!

A question pops up, you ask the LLM. This problem arises, that issue surfaces - without thinking, you throw it into the LLM.

It started with small prompts and questions, after some time it became decision making, life advice and strategic guidance.

Now you let LLMs answer your emails, messages and take decisions on your behalf.

Up to a point where you ask yourself: am I controlling the machine or is the machine controlling me?

AI democratizes knowledge. You can ask anything and get much better information than with any previous technology. It is permissionless leverage to anything you do, because now it’s a safety measure - not a prerequisite - to learn from experts.

Never forget, an LLM is just a parrot that spits out the words that have the highest likelihood of being “correct”.

It is a tool - nothing else. No matter how advanced it will be - it will always be a tool.

And to work in a healthy, high performing way, it’s imperative to use your tools correctly.

A century ago, people started driving cars (= tools). Over time the cars got cheaper, faster & more versatile. Everybody can drive a basic car, but it requires skill to drive a F1 car with 300 km/h around narrow turns. It requires skill to drive a Rallye car through narrow forrest streets. You have to know what you want - and know how to use the tool to get where you want to be.

Even self-driving cars require you to do one crucial step yourself: Defining where you want to go.

With AI it’s no different. You can use those powerful tools for anything you like - but in the end, even if you don’t drive yourself - defining the goal, knowing where you want to end up - this type of thinking you still have to do yourself, and that will never change.

Principle:

Use AI as tools - do the thinking yourself.

Define what you want.

Spend more and more time defining what you want.

For any task you do, write down:

Be clear on why you work on this task or that project. Be clear on what the result needs to look like.

Then you can use the LLM.

You can even use the LLM to help you figure out those things. But at the end of the day, the type of thinking that gets you the best result - the result you actually want - this type of thinking is the right skill to aquire.

If you don’t, the tool is using you.

“The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.” - B. F. Skinner

Where do I use AI without thinking?

See you next week - Michael