Is AI good for our ideas?
The case for keeping your own judgment as "the final appeal"
A man's own judgment should be the final appeal in all that relates to himself. Alexander Graham Bell
Here’s something I’ve been thinking about lately: Are we actually ready for AI to be such a big part of our daily lives and work?
You should know that I’m a cautious fan—a trying-to-be-intentional one—and I use ChatGPT and Claude most days in my work. Never to write my column or book, but to review for errors and identify areas for improvement.
It’s been a very helpful partner in the app I’m developing—whiteboarding it, researching the market, and outlining my next steps in technical programs I know nothing about.
So, yes, I like it. But I do find myself a little concerned about how many people are quickly outsourcing their thinking—their wrestling, their ideating, their validation—to AI. Because, you can’t be a trailblazer if you don’t have, use, and work to believe in your own original ideas.
Dunno about you, but I’m wary of an AI telling me I’m wonderful and smart, and believing it without doing the hard work to know it.
We already have a problem with consuming content and blindly following a crowd of digital influencers with their “Here’s How You Make It Big” content. Pair that with AI, and, yikes.
If you end up just aggregating what others have already done, what you create is going to look a whole lot like what everyone else has made. You might end up building a business just like everyone else simply because AI tells you it’s smart. Never mind what God and your soul are leading you to do.
If we let experts and AI do our thinking we risk ending up like the “processionary caterpillars” I saw on the island referenced in yesterday’s column: Following the “leader,” bunching up with each other, going in circles, and looking for the same food source instead of finding or making your own path to a treasure.
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Such apt illustrations!