If you want to do something with AI, just ask it to help you do the thing. “I want to write a novel; what do you need to know to help me?” will get you surprisingly far. And remember, AI is only going to get better at guiding us, rather than requiring us to guide it. Prompting is not going to be that important for that much longer.

This doesn’t mean

We rely on the machine to do the hard work of analysis and synthesis, and we don’t engage in critical and reflective thinking ourselves. We also miss the opportunity to learn from our mistakes and feedback and the chance to develop our own style.