(From my hand-written notes.)

Do I choose to use AI today?

Efficiency for me but not for thee or society – Unknown Broligarch

I find this decision to be more urgent and more difficult every day. On the one hand, not choosing to employ AI in solving a particular problem decreases the range of candidate solutions I can practically explore as a solo programmer. On the other hand, the opportunity to effortfully stretch my own organic neural net and thereby expand its future utility should not be squandered.

Have we reached the moment in history when cognitive pushups become a lifestyle choice? When I’m ninety (will I reach ninety?), will I look back on today and wish I’d taken the red pill?

Someone smarter than me is at this very moment employing their very good mind to the task of unhorsing the rest of us. Will they toy with their food, or more humanely hasten us off to greener pastures?

Am I that somebody, made just that iota “smarter”, in this moment and for now, on the back of an LLM steed that was bred in the stables of antisocial media and fed on the grain of my ancestors, my heroes, my betters, my peers?

And where the hell is Yeats when you need him?

Did I earn my mind, such as it is … ?

Shadows do not detach from casters of shadows.

Eliminate casters at your peril.

Are you casting your own shadow, or someone else’s?


Banner photo by Kyle Glenn on Unsplash