The Cup of Coffee Theory of AI

AI image generation is essentially a truncated exercise in taste; a product of knowing which inputs and keywords to feed the image-mashup machine, and the eye to identify which outputs contain any semblance of artistry. All that is to say: AI itself can’t generate good taste for you.

Until now, skills have been a major differentiator for humanity. However, in the age of AI, taste will become more important than skills as much of skill-based work and productivity is offloaded to compute. Taste seems more scarce these days, and increasingly differentiating in the age of AI. This assertion makes me think about the development of t... See more

taste > skills taste seems more scarce these days, and increasingly differentiating in the age of AI where so much of skills-based productivity is offloaded to compute. makes me think about the development of taste, and how we nurture taste for the next gen of humans.

Use the tools if you must. But a better use of your extra energy — such as it is — is to live the gap between human and AI. Can an AI gather, synthesize, calculate, and even speculate faster than we can? Yes. Can it do all those things better than we can? Maybe. Can it be more interesting, unexpected, artful, or meaningful? Well that’s just a matte... See more

AI’s creative contribution also enhances the creative performance of old intellectuals, because the bottom line is not the number of ideas. It’s how well you choose the final idea and how well you execute on refining it. The more raw ideas we dump into that sausage maker, the more flavorful the final sausage. (And whether you find this metaphor cre... See more

as science writer Corinne Purtill states in regard to the hurdles encountered by AI engineers, “To understand a person’s humor is to know what they like, how they think and how they see the world.” An artificial intelligence with humor would have to know us better, in a sense, than we know ourselves.

It’s possible that algorithms will one day be superior to humans at both of these functions, but I’m skeptical: the critical recognition of context and creativity are the two arenas where computers consistently underperform humans.