I almost published a post on how AI is my personal assistant and employee. The post lived in my drafts for a year. I just went through my drafts and found it, re-read it, cringed… But after a year of reduced AI use; I’ve found that AI really isn’t that important to my life, my work, and absolutely not to my creativity.
This past year helped me discover the limitations of generative AI. I started to notice how it would often confidently produce wrong information. Its confidence really fooled me on multiple occasions. But prompting the model to help brainstorm business ideas that are trendy, not the norm, etc., lead to similar advice as teenagers on YouTube selling an online course on getting rich quickly.
Try inputting physics problems into the model. The concepts may be on the right track but that’s about it. I tried this with Gemini. I asked if it was sure. I reiterated that a certain multiplication operation didn’t make sense. The AI model just doubled down, before I had to spell it out.
AI doesn’t seem reliable enough to trust. Based on all of these mistakes, having the Google ai assist tell me that my Toyota Landcruiser uses an oil filter p/n 90915-YZZD3 doesn’t give me the confidence required to buy and install it, for the consequence of incorrect information could be catastrophic for my car. I then have to cross-reference the information, which is how (I think) ai should be leveraged.
In my opinion, Ai is helpful for summarizing and pointing to where it gets its information. That’s about it. Human creativity will not and should not be replaced with AI. AI may shift what creativity and innovation looks like, but it never replace.