Knowledge & Wisdom in the time of AI

“Knowledge is a love affair with answers. Wisdom is a love affair with questions.” – Julio Olalla

Everyone is reading about Artificial Intelligence or alternatively, trying to avoid reading about it. It is all at once something to pay attention to and yet unsettling enough that avoiding it is a reasonable response. AI literacy, practice, application, and knowledge are the focus of the conversation. Headlines are frequently highlighting the ability of AI to “go rogue.”

If that wasn’t alarming enough, I recently read a NY Times article about the study of AI Consciousness by a researcher at Anthropic and his engagement with philosophers and religious leaders. It stopped me in my tracks. The idea that AI could feel emotions, have an inner life, and imagination is an avenue I wouldn’t have considered.

I spent most of my career at the IBM Corporation selling, implementing, and positioning technology to improve the company and the work of its clients. Early adoption of technology and seeking what can be made better because of it was how I was trained and how I continue to operate. However, I don’t feel AI can be compared to other technological advances. I have personally limited my adoption. Some days I am cautiously optimistic. Most days, I remain wary. Assumptions we have today will be drastically different next month, or potentially next week.

One practical habit experts recommend when using AI is “verify and verify again and again.”  The Merriam-Webster dictionary definition of  the word “verify” is: “to establish truth or accuracy, to confirm or substantiate, make certain something is correct, find evidence.”   We can in fact commit to exercising this habit and repeat until we are satisfied. We can keep asking questions and pursue clarity and depth of understanding.

If verifying and asking questions is essential, then I believe this time of AI could usher in a new “Golden Age” where the liberal arts and are more valuable than learning how to code. Let us imagine that critical thinking, collaboration, functional debates, the pursuit of curiosity, the love of deep reading, time for discernment, and reflection are requirements for survival and relevancy.

In this new Golden Age, we can’t afford to not talk about AI. We can’t afford to turn a blind eye. We can’t settle for its first response or even any response without seeking to verify and find truth. We can’t solve all the problems it might present, but we can continue to ask questions. Instead of making sure we have a “human in the loop” we retain the discretion to have “AI in the loop.”  We can and should determine whether AI is invited into our equations and problems or even the simplest tasks that we ourselves can do.

Our true power isn’t in a data center. It isn’t in an “artificial” intelligence model. It is in our “non-artificial” minds, hearts, and spirits and our eternal drive to live and learn. We are in fact intelligent and have infinite value. It is incumbent upon us to build our intelligence, practice it, exercise our agency, and not relinquish it.

I offer up questions to ponder and propose in  your next conversation. I invite you to borrow some and  generate more of your own to take with you to this landscape we find ourselves navigating every day. Here goes!

·       How often are we engaging in conversation about an AI application and asking, “why, how, for whom and what if?”

·       What goals do we have for AI? What boundaries and limits do we desire? How do we use our voice and in what spaces?

·       What questions do we have for political candidates and elected officials about their views of AI and how knowledgeable they are so to represent and protect us?

·       What is one small thing we can learn about AI that has importance in our life? How will that use affect others?

·       What new skills do we need to be effective in this space? Where do we obtain them?

·       Are we knowledgeable and responsible about how we share and store information within AI tools? Do we know where the guardrails are?

·       Do we understand how AI “runs” and what resources it needs such as power, water, security, land? What is the cost in dollars and future resources? Is it scalable or realistic?

·       How do diverse cultures, age groups, and other countries view AI? How does it differ from ours or the United States? Does each group learn and perceive it in a unique way?

·       Are we skeptical enough about handing over everything about us including our patterns, habits, places, financial choices, purchases, secret ideas, and even parenting to technology?

·       Do we know what it means to not trust an answer? Can our eyes fool us in the time of AI?

·       What do our instincts tell us about AI? What experiences are we basing that on? What do we fear the most and what excites us the most?

“Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Do not become bitter or hostile. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Never, ever be afraid to MAKE SOME NOISE and GET IN GOOD TROUBLE, NECESSARY TROUBLE. We will find a way to make a way out of now way.” – John Lewis

When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers. And for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it – always.” Mahatma Gandhi