Is there ever a concern that those who use AI, and use it well, will eventually become so dependent that they are unable to remember basic principles and strategy without it?
Julius LeacockI Care Business Support ServicesDiego Martin, Trinidad & Tobago, Trinidad and Tobago
Many leaders are seeing its benefits with the rise in AI and its popularity. However, there are also concerns that it can make us mentally lazy and we may even get to a point where we cannot think efficiently for ourselves. In my opinion, there must be a balance between when to use it and when not to. However, this is more in the mind of the user and not something that can be easily determined by some external metrics. Saving Changes...
Raman ChadhaManager| DeloitteMillbrae, United States
Jul 08, 2024 3:47 PM
Replying to Guy Weisenbach
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The best parallel I've read is when schools started introducing calculators into the classroom. There was fear no one would know how to do basic arithmetic. A lot of angst was present at the time. Looking backwards, we can now see that bringing calculators into the classroom has been a positive movement. It has actually allowed for instruction to move to higher level concepts faster. It has allowed students to self-check their work and to focus less on rote memorization and focus more on critical thinking.
The critical thinking skills are what separates us from machines. AI is very powerful but it's only parroting back the data it was trained on. Keeping "humans in the loop" is necessary to make sure the suggested actions or ideas actually make contextual sense.
Project managers that use AI to take care of the "rote" PM work will have more time to focus on the higher-level aspects such as communication and networking with stakeholders -- you know, the human things.
The calculator analogy is a good one, although two additional thoughts came to my mind right away:
1) Even with calculators, there has always been a downside that it makes us lazy. Students do not exercise their math muscles enough to be able to do simple calculations as they over-rely on calculators. Common example is when I see people struggle with calculating how much they should tip for different services. That said, this by itself is never a sufficient argument to disregard the advantages of using calculators. Same argument applies for GenAI too.
2) One key difference between GenAI and calculators is that calculators are definitive - the inputs are structured, the output is certain. That is not true with GenAI, which is both good and bad. It just shifts the balance towards being creative and logical in a slightly different way - with GenAI, if you can write logically "airtight" prompts, you'd get better results. What concerns me though is that when people would simply outsource things to GenAI and eventually not cite their sources. Imagine people using GenAI for creative endeavors (e.g., writing stories, movie scripts, songs, etc.) - it is one thing to use GenAI for ideation and motivation, but another thing to claim credit for something generated by a machine in 10 seconds! Saving Changes...
The best parallel I've read is when schools started introducing calculators into the classroom. There was fear no one would know how to do basic arithmetic. A lot of angst was present at the time. Looking backwards, we can now see that bringing calculators into the classroom has been a positive movement. It has actually allowed for instruction to move to higher level concepts faster. It has allowed students to self-check their work and to focus less on rote memorization and focus more on critical thinking.
The critical thinking skills are what separates us from machines. AI is very powerful but it's only parroting back the data it was trained on. Keeping "humans in the loop" is necessary to make sure the suggested actions or ideas actually make contextual sense.
Project managers that use AI to take care of the "rote" PM work will have more time to focus on the higher-level aspects such as communication and networking with stakeholders -- you know, the human things.
Guy, thanks for that brilliant example with calculators.
Particularly love what you said about how calculators have "actually allowed for instruction to move to higher level concepts faster."
That's exactly how I see the use of AI panning out. Intelligent use of AI can help more people elevate their critical thinking skills quicker.
Thanks again for sharing. Saving Changes...
Sergio Luis ConteHelping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based OrganizationsBuenos Aires, Argentina
AI is a broad term. We are using AI from more than 40 years ago. We are surrounded of AI inside phones, refrigerators, air conditioners, etc. The new architecture on generative AI made it explode because some tools like ChatGPT. What people mostly forgot is that AI entities gave outputs with probability associated to it then the human being must decide on them. Human in the loop is the basic and foundational key element when AI is considered to be used. Saving Changes...
Guy WeisenbachSr Systems Mgr, Enterprise Systems| Uncommon Schools Inc.Old Bridge, Nj, United States
Jul 08, 2024 3:47 PM
Replying to Guy Weisenbach
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The best parallel I've read is when schools started introducing calculators into the classroom. There was fear no one would know how to do basic arithmetic. A lot of angst was present at the time. Looking backwards, we can now see that bringing calculators into the classroom has been a positive movement. It has actually allowed for instruction to move to higher level concepts faster. It has allowed students to self-check their work and to focus less on rote memorization and focus more on critical thinking.
The critical thinking skills are what separates us from machines. AI is very powerful but it's only parroting back the data it was trained on. Keeping "humans in the loop" is necessary to make sure the suggested actions or ideas actually make contextual sense.
Project managers that use AI to take care of the "rote" PM work will have more time to focus on the higher-level aspects such as communication and networking with stakeholders -- you know, the human things.
Raman Chadha, thanks for raising the two add'l points. I particularly liked #2 with the calculator inputs being structured and the output certain. This is why keeping "humans in the loop" and, as you mention, citing your sources and including your prompt(s). This can lead to what the scientific community has been doing for a century or more with peer reviews. Saving Changes...
Jose ColonProject Manager| PGT SolutionsOrlando, United States
Only individuals who are intrinsically lazy, carefree/careless, and irresponsible before adopting AI will become blindly dependent on AI. If you spend a few minutes interrogating AI, you'll discover that (1) there is no training standard or universal data source of truth (other than the Bible, but I digress...), (2) all LLMs, including ChatGPT3, 3.5, 4, 4-o, Gemini, LLAMA, Grok2, 3, 3.5, Claude 2, 3, 3.5, CoPilot, Co-Pilot+, etc., are trained with unique and developer-chosen targeted data sources, and (3) if you try to use multiple LLMs to cross-check or validate each other's results (to ease you mind, or to cover yourself) you will dig yourself deeper into confusion.
My recommendation to everyone considering AI is to always ask AI to provide the "rationale" for its decisions so you can decide if you agree with the approach. Also, ask AI to repeat the same task back-to-back (no changes to the prompt) and compare results so you can see if it's consistent, or not. In time you will discover the truth of AI - it will never replace HI, i.e., human intelligence. AI can only know more than you about its trained subjects but doesn't know everything. It gives the impression that it knows everything by the SPEED in which it can use its algorithms, for example, mathematical logic (if A=B and B=C, then A=C), extrapolation and estimation, data mapping, and associations/alignments. Always remember that the AI tools don't know YOU, what's in your memory bank (your trained data set), doesn't have the historical context and experiences you have, doesn't have intuition, and therefore, IT WILL MAKE MISTAKES (hallucinations) THAT REQUIRE YOUR PERSONAL (HI) VALIDATION. Saving Changes...
