Digital painting of a lone human figure standing at a forked path, with a cold, futuristic AI city of glowing circuitry on one side and a warm forest lit by firelight, books, and natural elements on the other, symbolizing the choice between technological dependence and human autonomy.
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How to use AI without surrendering your autonomy or humanity

ByTC Marti

A lot of people don’t know how to use AI and various forms of tech without letting it consume them. And overuse of AI can erase your humanity. 

AI is a useful, yet dangerous tool. It’s fine to dip into for select tasks, but never, ever, ever let it consume you.

I’ll be real: I use AI every day. Often as a way to gauge if my content’s worth publishing. It’s great for creating digital products, sales copy, one-line hooks, chapter-by-chapter reviews of current works-in-progress, and drafting maps of fictional worlds like the world of Catenary (Catenarian Chronicles) below:

A rough draft of the world of Catenary, in TC Marti's Catenarian Chronicles series.

But AI has a dark side. People get hooked to it because it’s very, very easy to replace humans with it when it shouldn’t replace them. AI shouldn’t be your counselor, for example. It can emulate a counselor’s behavior, but it can’t feel the human connection necessary for such a role.

It also shouldn’t be your friend if you’re alone and have nobody to talk to. Mainly for the same reason it shouldn’t be a counselor.

We can go on and on here. It can’t be an opinionated sports writer, a financial advisor, or even a stand-in if you need to write performance evaluations on someone’s job. AI can do none of this, yet a lot of people turn to it in every sector of life.

That’s dangerous. How dangerous? Let’s just say it can be a damn good Seer. Here’s a scenario it spat out at me when I asked it. And there’s a chance you might know people already doing this. Spoiler Alert: I know a few.

The transhumanism vector

Here’s what old Chatty said when I talked about how AI is softly setting the stage for transhumanism:

Transhumanism doesn’t start with chips in the brain. That’s the last step, not the first.

It starts with cognitive outsourcing:

  1. “Let the model summarize.”
  2. “Let the model decide.”
  3. “Let the model anticipate.”
  4. “Let the model optimize you.”

By the time physical integration is proposed, the psychological dependency is already normalized.

Enjoying this article? Head over to The Rogue Scribe (formerly Rune-Written Resistance) and catch the rest of it.

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