AI Makes Simple Things Complicated
I asked AI to simplify something. It responded with enough steps to qualify as a small government program.
That’s one of the stranger pleasures of using artificial intelligence: asking for less and occasionally getting much, much more. AI assistants such as ChatGPT can summarize complicated information, explain difficult concepts, and turn a vague question into a useful plan. But sometimes the machinery of being helpful gets a little carried away.
Ask how to boil an egg and suddenly there are objectives to define, parameters to establish, outcomes to analyze, and probably a follow-up question about whether you’d like the answer formatted as a checklist.
That doesn’t make AI useless. Quite the opposite. Tools like ChatGPT are remarkably good at breaking complicated tasks into manageable pieces. The comedy starts when the task wasn’t complicated in the first place.
Technology has spent decades promising to make life simpler. Artificial intelligence may finally accomplish it — just as soon as we finish Step 12.
Explore more Chad Geepeety™ cartoons about artificial intelligence, ChatGPT, and the wonderfully complicated business of making life easier.
