Transcription
The point about [music] a tool is are you using it or is it using you? Are you the one in control of it? Are you able [music] to take AI giving you an idea for something and then making it your own or is it using you? Is it really warping the power of your [music] own brain?
When it comes to the laws of power and human nature with AI, yeah, there are a lot of intersecting points. One of the laws of power is get other people to do the work but always take the credit. But in this case, you're getting AI to do all the work and you're taking the credit. So we see in colleges these days, students aren't necessarily writing their essays. People are using AI to send emails to write things about, but they're making it look as if they're the ones doing it, right? So it it can be a very deceptive form of power. And all of the dirty stuff that I talk about in the war book and in the 48 laws, AI is a master at that. It's a master at deception. It's a master at creating deep fakes, as they say.
But the book of mine that has the most to do with AI that troubles me the most is mastery. To be truthful about it, because the laws of power are what they are, and AI doesn't change the laws of power. It just makes certain laws easier to use for purposes of deception or whatever. But Mastery is the book that most intersects AI and troubles me the most because in Mastery, the whole point is you have a brain and your brain is like this absolutely the most magnificent tool that's ever been created in the history of the universe. It's an incredible miraculous thing. If you just think about where we were a 100,000 years ago as a species and how we've evolved and the insane powers that we have with technology, with science, but with all the other powers that we have in the arts, in literature, etc. It's mind-boggling to think about what the human brain can accomplish.
And the fear that I have is that all of these natural powers that we have that we can develop that I go into great detail in mastery about how you can use your own brain as this tool and make it sharper and sharper and sharper day by day by day and how that can lead to mastery to being creative to being a true master in your field. How that's all being degraded, how that's all under threat because people are becoming incredibly lazy. So I know as somebody who does a lot of research for my books, I go through a very intense process of digging, digging, digging, finding these books, reading very deeply about them, taking the thoughts in them. Sometimes I don't like a book, sometimes I do, and and thinking about it deeply and putting it into my own brain, into my own system, and making it something that comes out from within me comes my own thought as I adapt it, as I interpret it. It's a process of thinking, of going over something and thinking again and again and again deeper and deeper and deeper. You're developing skills. You're developing a kind of a depth in your brain.
And if you don't go through this process, if you don't like learn a language, if you are so lazy that you don't learn how to write or how to organize your ideas, that brain starts to atrophy and the depth that the human brain has, the complexity starts shrinking. It becomes more and more superficial. And so what you're finding are people who can't think on a deep level, whose thoughts are always on the surface, right? They can't reason their way through any kind of problem. And so 50, 100 years from now when we're going to depend on experts and people who know their field, who know how to build bridges, who know how to build buildings, who know how to design things, who know how to make things, know how to create political movements, etc. When all that falls apart and people are only using these tools to help them instead of thinking on their own, we're going to be in an incredible mess.
Since the beginning of time, we humans have used tools. We've used hammers. We've used wheels, etc. And it becomes an extension of who we are. It increases our power. A telescope allows us to see the universe, not with our own eyes, but through this piece of brilliant technology. But the point about a tool is are you using it or is it using you? Are you the one in control of it? Are you able to take AI giving you an idea for something and then making it your own or is it using you? Is it really warping the power of your own brain? So, I'm really concerned most of all for what this means for our ability in the future for thinking on our own and developing our own reasoning powers.