One of Those Weeks
You Know What I Mean
Hi All,
It's been one of those weeks (what that hell does "those" mean?).
I've always hated vague statements. When I was a college writing instructor, my biggest suggestion to students, by far, was for them to be more specific. I must have written "TOO VAGUE" in red ink across the top of 80% of the papers I graded.
Besides being incredibly boring, ambiguous statements (words without clarity) can be manipulative and down-right dangerous—from teasers that get you to click on an ad for a miraculous weight-loss toxin to political dross that ultimately causes people to get hurt.
I've always felt that a person should say what they mean, not bury the lede, and be clear about their intentions. It's way more honest and efficient, and we'd all just get along better.
It's the primary reason I took myself off social media—I read the newsletters I actively subscribe to, this weekly email, and my website.
A couple of days ago, I watched a web event sponsored by the MIT Technology Review magazine (one of my favorite science sources). They hold a few of these events throughout the year for subscribers. I really like them, as they are mostly discussions with experts on a single topic. They also have an archive of past ones.
My other favorite science magazine is the New Scientist, which also holds events for subscribers. I pay for these periodicals, because I appreciate the content and the fact that the titles of the articles aren't sensational. I can gain knowledge just from scanning the page, acquiring new learnings from just flipping through.
There are no click-bait teasers like "Five things you need to know about light," or "You won't believe what scientists discovered in a hole in the ground." Those headlines don't make me want to read the article. They make me want to unsubscribe.
Anyway, this past Technology Review event was on "AI Search"—the brief paragraph at the top of search results you often see when you use Google or Bing or any other search engine that caught the AI bug.
I wrote about this technology a couple of weeks ago in my "AI Ruins Groundhog Day" newsletter.
This specific event highlighted two journalists who discussed the pros and cons of AI search. The big pro, in their opinion, is that it is able to pull together many sources of information at once to form a cohesive, dense statement.
The con and my biggest personal beef with AI search and current AI chat applications is that you can't trust the results.
In the same breath (a metaphorical breath), the participants acknowledged that while AI Search is remarkable in its ability, you have to research and verify every source that goes into creating the answer. Because, as you know (and I have complained about), there is a lot of slop on the Internet these days. And, so, the quality of sources has gone way down.
Hence, my heartbreak over the AI results about February 2nd a couple of weeks ago.
In this case, I happened to know the data in the results was wrong, so I simply chalked it up to another AI misstep.
Imagine the unknown number of people who simply consumed the little nugget of misinformation without verifying the validity of it?
I will leave you with that thought.
Oh, and by the way, if you caught my last email, the likelihood of 2024 YR4 hitting Earth has gone up to 3.1%.
Be safe, stay smart, do something active, positive, and nice, and eat well.
Happy reading and happy writing.
David