On Caring
Subtitled: A Trait That May be Invaluable
(Note: This post is related to Traits That May Cease to be Valuable from Quarter Mile.)
A: Why do [x] if you can just AI it?
B: Because I care.
If you don't care about something, use AI for it.
Don't want to deal with an email? Use Smart Reply (or an equivalent). Don't want to spend time doing homework because it's boring/difficult/meaningless/time-consuming? Shovel your work into some specialized homework machine. Don't want to actually get out there and stumble around trying to make new friends? Just start chatting with your almost-perfect digital companion.
Conversely, if you care about something, don't use AI for it1.
Really care about programming? Then write your own code – don't use Cursor. Really enjoy design? Then design as if you really did care – ditch Figma AI. Want to write actual cool and meaningful emails? Then write emails yourself, and in the way you want them to sound.
Fundamentally, AI will never "be human" – AI is a model on a loss function, and the thing about being human is that a loss function will never capture the full human experience.
Specifically, do the hard work. To be a better writer, you should be doing the writing. To fully understand a topic, read the book instead of the distilled AI summary of the book.↩