Amazing, Alex. I agree with Robin, too. So different from the writing I did as a child nearly 70 years ago - or encouraged my students to do from over 50 years ago. Writing to ourselves, as it were - and which I have done quite a lot of over the past 20-30 years - but not to this degree. And so fluently written - both you and your "avatar" (can I say) or am I already several AI steps in the past. Mind-blowing. Neural connectors sparking on all pathways!
There are a study done within the past 2 years that compared medical doctor replies to patient questions to that of generative AI. In brief, the AI provided more accurate and more empathetic (when rated by the question asking patients) than the medical doctors. We certainly live in interesting times and AI is likely to be very good at the 'soft skills' of therapeutic care. As you note, a robot can give you unlimited attention, empathy and adjust its approach with the change of a prompt. I see real benefits for society. Psychological care can be expensive and difficult to access - an AI assisted care program could provide inexpensive and accessible care to many. Similarly, in the education or self-guided education space, AI likely has the ability to significantly reduce the cost of tertiary education (which has reached extreme levels, e.g. $400k USD for an undergraduate degree at Harvard)... Where does AI leave knowledge based industries and workers is quite a question... My sort term answer would be, make sure you train in a profession that has a physical craft based component and isn't purely knowledge based. But if robotics and AI eventually reach the level of a postgraduate professional, our entire human work ecosystem may be upended. Interesting times indeed.
Thanks Dr Delf; interesting times indeed. I suspect knowledge based work will change - the degree to which we can harvest insights from AI will depend, again, on the quality of our inputs. The consequence of this will be, quite simply, that knowledge workers will have deepen their own insights or be left behind.
On therapy - it's an amazing tool, as my blog suggests. What we risk missing is that therapising is not the same as integrating. You can bounce thoughts into AI all day, but without action, without living with the reflections you generate in your chat, self-awareness is only half the battle. The challenge will be what it always has been with digital technology; turning information into embodiment.
Amazing, Alex. I agree with Robin, too. So different from the writing I did as a child nearly 70 years ago - or encouraged my students to do from over 50 years ago. Writing to ourselves, as it were - and which I have done quite a lot of over the past 20-30 years - but not to this degree. And so fluently written - both you and your "avatar" (can I say) or am I already several AI steps in the past. Mind-blowing. Neural connectors sparking on all pathways!
This is fascinating Alexander. I look forward to seeing changes in your plans and actions in response to AI. So much for the jobs of therapists….
There are a study done within the past 2 years that compared medical doctor replies to patient questions to that of generative AI. In brief, the AI provided more accurate and more empathetic (when rated by the question asking patients) than the medical doctors. We certainly live in interesting times and AI is likely to be very good at the 'soft skills' of therapeutic care. As you note, a robot can give you unlimited attention, empathy and adjust its approach with the change of a prompt. I see real benefits for society. Psychological care can be expensive and difficult to access - an AI assisted care program could provide inexpensive and accessible care to many. Similarly, in the education or self-guided education space, AI likely has the ability to significantly reduce the cost of tertiary education (which has reached extreme levels, e.g. $400k USD for an undergraduate degree at Harvard)... Where does AI leave knowledge based industries and workers is quite a question... My sort term answer would be, make sure you train in a profession that has a physical craft based component and isn't purely knowledge based. But if robotics and AI eventually reach the level of a postgraduate professional, our entire human work ecosystem may be upended. Interesting times indeed.
Thanks Dr Delf; interesting times indeed. I suspect knowledge based work will change - the degree to which we can harvest insights from AI will depend, again, on the quality of our inputs. The consequence of this will be, quite simply, that knowledge workers will have deepen their own insights or be left behind.
On therapy - it's an amazing tool, as my blog suggests. What we risk missing is that therapising is not the same as integrating. You can bounce thoughts into AI all day, but without action, without living with the reflections you generate in your chat, self-awareness is only half the battle. The challenge will be what it always has been with digital technology; turning information into embodiment.