Are we deliberately letting AI take over?

ChatGPT is all the rage now. Having launched in November last year, it's in the news for all things good and evil. It has been used to generate essays, program code, discuss various topics, etc. Most recently, it passed a law exam, although not at the top of the class (it got a C+).

Folks are using it to write short emails and memos too - you know, the mundane communications that happen on a daily basis. These are, arguably, the most obvious things we want an AI to quickly take over so we can focus on the higher-level tasks, right?

But when we will look back on the history of humanity, and how we lost our creativity and ability to think for ourselves, this might prove to be the start of our downfall. As it is, spelling and grammar checkers are automatically interjecting themselves into everything we type (even right now as I'm writing this). Do we really prefer to sit back and employ technology to the point that we are just mere passengers?

I can compare it with those personal mobility devices which are used by handicapped and seniors to move around. Many of them definitely need them on a daily basis due to health and mobility issues - but I suspect there is a fraction that prefer to be comfortable and not tire their limbs. A worry for them is their legs could eventually actually become weak and frail due to a lack of use - use it or lose it. I'm not a medical specialist, so I could be off track here.

Back to AI - as it evolves, more aspects of our lives will be automated, requiring little or no intervention, leading to cheers and high-fives amongst technologists. But for the rest of us, we don't have to give up our imaginations to become mindless zombies staring into tiny screens. Exercise your brain, flex your hippocampus to remember and construct without using Google; come up with sentences and jokes on your own (spellchecking is allowed I guess) like in the old days. Don't give in so easily to the temptation of using the PMDs of the Cerebrum.

Tempting as it is, do not sit back and let the machine fully take over. Hold on to something, before you completely forget what it means to be human.

This was written by a person, not ChatGPT.