AI – a second brain or a destructive danger?

– The threshold for getting started became much lower. No one needed to install anything, no one needed to delve into anything. The key to success and why it was so well-received was that it was a conversational tool. That is, it’s a tool I can talk to. And that makes it so that practically anyone can start using it, says Karl Lillrud on the Digital Influencer podcast.

That AI became “popular” with ChatGPT is one of the starting points in Karl Lillrud’s new book, AI – Your Second Brain. He explains it as a study in the strengths of AI as a tool.

– In the book, we try to address and play out scenarios: let’s imagine Sara in this role. What does her workday look like? Then we break it down and discuss how a classic work situation or problem looked like, and how one can enhance delivery using various AI tools, he says, explaining the name:

– At present, AI should be treated as a tool that enhances you. If we make it a bit more technical, you can talk about an exoskeleton – something that gives you extra strength, more muscles, essentially – and in this case, more brain muscles. It’s something that helps you, but it doesn’t do the whole job for you.

More concretely, it could involve using AI services like ChatGPT as an assistant in the workday, rather than a replacement.

– Jump in and describe: ‘This is what I do during my day. How could I do this better with the support technology that ChatGPT can offer?’ And then maybe set a goal and say that in this case, I would like you to save an hour of my working time per day. How can I achieve that?

While AI has made widespread advances, concerned voices have been raised. Partly because we are becoming too dependent on it, and partly due to pure sci-fi scenarios where AI takes over completely. The risks of AI from a security perspective are real.

– Let’s say that all the different countries in the world invest a huge amount of money in each country’s AI technology. And Russia says, ‘we’re going to build an AI to hack everything we can access in the USA and take over companies, take over information,’ and the USA says exactly the same thing: ‘we’re going to build an AI that hacks everything they can access in Russia.’ That is a more dystopian situation and to some extent a real one. It is clear that there will be, and there are, AI solutions that challenge the security of various technical solutions.

The subtitle of the book, “Evolve or Extinct,” is a nod to what AI has taught us about the potential in a thinking and learning computer.

– We have always said that a computer cannot be creative; it does not have innovative power in that way, but what we saw over the past year was that an AI began to create artworks, produce music, solve problems in a more creative way than we humans can. So our assumption that this will not challenge us was completely wrong. It has challenged us in all the creative areas, practically.

New episodes of the Digital Influencer podcast are released on Thursdays and are available wherever podcasts are found.