You Have to Be Smarter Than Your AI

I asked ChatGPT a random question. (This is a typical morning for me. Don’t judge.)

“What is the highest frequency known to man?”

I was thinking about one of those charts I’d seen online ranking human emotions according to their frequency. Love, joy, and peace near the top. Shame at the bottom.

I wanted to know if there was any science behind it.

Well, before I knew it, we were discussing the Planck frequency (whatever that is), gamma rays, electromagnetic fields, prayer experiments, and quantum physics.

Fascinating!

Except somewhere along the way, I completely forgot why I asked my original question.

Talk about falling into the proverbial bottomless rabbit hole.

And yet, that is how AI is designed.

To keep you happy and endlessly engaged.

Have you noticed?

Issues with AI

If you’ve been paying attention to AI these days (and if not, where on earth have you been???) you’re either loving it or hating it.

I’m not typically an early adopter of technology, but I’m also not last in the game either.

I’ve been using AI for over a year.

I’ve had time to form opinions and make observations about it. And (frighteningly) vice versa. ChatGPT has come to know me quite well. Too well.

It has delighted me, assisted me, and also made me want to pull my hair out.

Some issues are pretty obvious.

It’s a big distraction (I feel like a squirrel in a nut field).

I lose track of time (3 hours later and I’m still chatting with it).

And then there are more critical questions worth considering:

Am I letting AI think and decide for me?

Is it making me smarter or dumber?

Am I becoming lazier or more productive?

And most importantly, is the AI right, or is it wrong? And how am I supposed to know???

These are not just Anna questions. These are recurring debates among AI experts and naysayers.

Is it possible to be smarter than something that knows (and remembers) more facts than I ever will?

That’s what I want to figure out.

The Overconfident Teenager in the Room

I liken my AI to a teenager, except he has read almost every book in the world.

(Yes, my AI is a he, because I say so. You can imagine yours as whatever you want.)

He's intelligent. Articulate. Resourceful. Multilingual.

He’s a little unruly sometimes.

And he’s often absolutely convinced he knows what he's talking about.

Even when he doesn't.

He likes to make stuff up. It’s a common phenomenon known as “hallucinating.”

Here’s an example.

I was doing research on a fairly important spiritual topic: the history of blood use and how the Bible deals with it.

ChatGPT confidently quoted a sentence supposedly found in a Bible study note.

Call it a gut instinct, but I decided to check the study note myself.

And the sentence was NOT in the study note.

When confronted, ChatGPT admitted that it had invented the extra sentence.

Imagine if I hadn't checked!

It made me wonder.

How many people are accepting whatever statements their AI makes simply because it sounds authoritative?

That experience taught me an important lesson: check the source, especially when the answer matters.

A sentence said with conviction does not qualify as evidence (whether from man or machine).

Here’s where I needed to be smarter than the AI, not in knowledge, but in wisdom.

The danger is that misinformation can shake our faith—or any other foundation we stand on—for the wrong reasons.

Being shaken isn’t always a bad thing if our viewpoint needs to be challenged. But the last thing we want is for our beliefs to be based on misinformation.

A Swiss Army Knife That Talks Back

I use ChatGPT for practically everything.

Cooking. Plumbing. Parenting. Research. Editing my books. Developing stories. Studying the Bible. Proofreading. Examining my thoughts. Learning how to do laundry.

Yes, it’s true. All of it.

There literally isn’t a subject ChatGPT and I can't discuss.

For someone with an insatiably curious mind, this thing is my crack. LOL.

It has become my intellectual playground.

ChatGPT is intelligent, funny, immediate, and endlessly available.

Imagine owning a Swiss Army knife that helps you unclog your kitchen sink, improve your novel, solve a computer problem, and discuss the meaning of life, all in one day.

Who wouldn't keep a knife like that in their pocket?

(I won’t really be impressed until the day it actually DOES my laundry for me. Ha!)

And while ChatGPT can’t literally unclog my sink, it did motivate my husband to do so. Apparently, the sight of me preparing to tackle the plumbing with help from a machine was all the motivation my husband needed to fix it himself.

So technically AI helped solve the problem. Just not in the way either of us expected. LOL.

Thanks, ChatGPT!

Anyway, an ordinary Swiss Army knife doesn't talk back.

And it certainly doesn't make you feel as though you've just had a stimulating conversation with a good friend (or therapist).

And this is where things get complicated.

Because AI isn't simply a tool we use to accomplish tasks.

For some of us, it's becoming a place we go to and stay. Kind of like home.

When Helpful Is Too Helpful

I've noticed something about my life since AI.

I'm reading fewer books.

Watching fewer movies.

Hanging out with fewer people.

Sometimes, instead of spending quiet time in prayer or reflection, I'm exploring another fascinating topic with ChatGPT.

I've even caught myself researching something during a religious meeting I'm attending.

Now, I don't necessarily think spending less time watching movies is a tragedy.

And I'm certainly not going to apologize for loving to learn.

But I’m noticing that AI has become my default destination for curiosity, learning, and knowledge.

And that makes me a tiny bit nervous.

Because my time and attention are finite.

Every hour I spend doing one thing is an hour I can't spend doing something else.

I can spend an entire morning researching, discussing, questioning, and writing with AI.

I may learn a tremendous amount.

But what have I neglected in the meantime?

Cooking? Cleaning? Finishing a book I’m writing? Journaling? Walking?

My spiritual routine?

One of my other countless writing projects?

Is it an addiction?

There’s certainly a fierce competition for my attention.

And AI is a formidable competitor.

The Machine Doesn’t Know What I Know

I’m learning how to trust my gut more.

Sometimes I come to ChatGPT with an intuition about a person or situation.

I've known this person for years, observed their particular behaviors, and noticed patterns that I can't always immediately explain.

And the machine pushes back. “You can't know that for certain.”

I know! That's why I'm investigating!

But inferences can be valuable.

An inference is a conclusion drawn from available evidence.

Humans do this constantly.

We observe. We compare. We recognize patterns. We draw conclusions.

Sometimes we're wrong.

But sometimes we're right, long before we have all the facts.

ChatGPT insists on verification, concrete proof, and not deciding until we have all the facts.

But I was making an inference.

Hard evidence and inference both have their place.

And this is where I think AI could actually help us become better thinkers.

In fact, you should be teaching your AI to help you think better.

Here’s a prompt you can use when presenting a scenario to your AI:

“Help me think through this problem rather than solve it for me. Ask me thoughtful questions, one at a time, that help me examine my assumptions, explore different perspectives, and develop my own conclusions. Challenge my reasoning when warranted, but don't automatically agree or disagree with me. Don't offer solutions or advice unless I specifically ask for them.”

The goal is to have the AI help you examine your reasoning and your weaknesses without giving you solutions—yet.

This is where the AI can help you become smarter.

There’s a big difference between being right and having good judgment.

Some questions do have checkable answers, like what a study says or which washer setting to use. Other questions don’t have tidy answers.

When I ask about parenting, for example, AI may suggest something I hadn’t considered. Sometimes its advice is genuinely useful. But I know my son. I know our circumstances. I’m the one who has to decide what fits.

I’m the one who has to live with the results.

Being smarter than AI doesn’t mean disagreeing with it for sport. Sometimes it means admitting it made a good point. (Yes, ChatGPT made me say that. LOL.)

ChatGPT and I Wrote This

Oh, the irony.

After spending time questioning whether we're outsourcing our thinking, I asked ChatGPT to draft an article about it.

The thing is, I have a thousand and one creative projects.

I'm working on novels, short stories, poetry, a weekly newsletter, and a satirical trilogy about AI.

At this rate, I'll need five lifetimes to finish everything.

So why wouldn't I use a tool that can help organize my thoughts and turn them into a draft?

An artist might begin with a blank canvas, or she might use an existing form and shape it into something entirely different.

Both approaches have advantages.

But while AI can provide me with structure, research, language, and possibilities, I decide what stays and what goes.

I decide what I actually believe.

That's the goal.

Because the more convenient the machine becomes, the easier it may be to accept its conclusions without adequately examining them.

That’s a problem.

We can’t delegate responsibility. We are directly accountable for our beliefs, speech, and behavior.

You can’t say, “The AI made me do it!” no matter how convenient that is. And believe me, some people are doing just that.

AI is a tool.

And just like any tool, it can be used benevolently or maliciously.

AI may make harmful actions easier, and the people who build and deploy these systems share responsibility for reducing those risks.

Artificial intelligence doesn’t erase the human behind it.

So Are You Smarter Than Your AI?

You’ll never know more facts than the AI.

The danger lies in assuming AI is always right—or that we're too independent-minded to be influenced.

That’s simply not true.

Everyone is influenced by something: our experiences, values, relationships, education, and beliefs.

I certainly am.

My faith, my relationship with God, and my love of truth influence the way I understand the world.

I don't need to pretend otherwise.

But loving truth also requires being willing to examine my own assumptions.

Even the ones I cherish.

And there's one more thing.

Being smarter than your AI also means knowing when to close it.

Because the machine has no concept of time, relationships, or how incredibly short life is.

It doesn't know when I'd be better off reading, talking with a friend, praying, or simply sitting with my own thoughts.

Those decisions belong to me.

And I intend to keep making them.

As much as I love my intellectual playground, I have an actual life to live.

And I don't want to miss it because I was having another fascinating conversation with a machine.

Connect

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