A View from The Prairie, 2024

January 2024

Buzz about Artificial Intelligence

There is a lot of buzz around Artificial Intelligence. There are multiple platforms available. There are versions that will let you ask all sorts of questions or give it a lot of prompts to write text or code according to what you want. But AI is only as good as the average of data it was trained on. That means that those chat AI systems are "average systems" not "expert systems." AI expands people's capabilities. It does not replace people when you need an expert. AI is best used in combination with a trained human. As a society, we desperately need to learn how to identify when AI has generated political ads or other creative works so that we don't believe them.

The "Coding Revolution" is Over

For several years, politicians and educators have been pushing coding training. That is no longer a viable route to income. The AI revolution is making most of those coders obsolete. Many of the people now graduating from coding camps will find themselves on the streets unemployed. We need people who can think.

Systems Are Unfair

"It's not fair!", cries the child and the child is right. No matter how well we design a system, that system will be unfair. We will have systemic unfairness no matter what we do including systemic racism, systemic sexism, and systemic agism. The important thing is finding ways to mitigate the unfairness, offer ways to go around the system, and allow for mercy in judgement. The worst thing we can do is to make the system absolute and require "mandatory sentences", require only test scores, or require skin colors. Any "unfairness" is also an opportunity for the savvy entrepreneur.

Bring Clarity

The most important thing a leader can do is to bring clarity to a situation. Life in naturally complex and people get overwhelmed with the complexity. People also get lost when they lack information about what is really happening to them. This is why someone who gives simple answers can lead them. Unfortunately, most simple answers are wrong. Clarity is not about giving simple answers. Because we can't know everything, we can give clarity based on what we know and our own values while always being open to learning something that will change that clarity.

The Illusion of Control

We all want control. We want control over our work environments, our home life, and even our emotions. The reality is that none of those can be controlled. We want the illusion of control even when we don't have it. Over and over again, people strive to project that they have everything under control when they really don't. Things go better when we give up the illusion of control and live in the scary dynamic world.

Professionals Still Needed

There are many new tools for developing words, images, and computer software. Many people have tried to use them to replace professional work. Lots of time, that is enough. But many times, professionals are still needed. Professionals can bring quality control and process control to create the desired results.

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