The people who will be in charge of my nursing home one day will use AI

Happy Friday!

Right, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about AI. Am I selfish? Yes - after all, I’m nearly ancient. But the people who will be in charge of my nursing home one day will use AI. It matters to me!!

It seems to be a polarising topic. I’ve had friends tell me how marvellous it is for them - because it makes them more efficient. (Whilst deploring people who use AI to respond to them on whatsapp and email - and yes, I do recognise the hypocrisy!!) And I’ve had other friends decrying the end of life as we know it.

In my head - which we all know is a dangerous place to be - I’ve been trying to find a way to describe AI that doesn’t immediately descend into hype or panic.

For about a year now, I’ve been referring to my (named!) AI tools as my mental exoskeleton. Tell you why:
- A physical exoskeleton allows someone to lift more, carry more and move further than they could alone.
- My mental exoskeleton allows me to process more information, explore more ideas and tackle more complex problems than I could alone.

But here’s the thing.

A physical exoskeleton doesn’t tell you where to walk… or what is worth carrying… it doesn’t comment on direction. It just does because you do.

And similarly a mental exoskeleton shouldn't tell you what to believe... or what to value... or whether an answer actually makes sense. It just does because you do.

I said this in a comment to someone earlier this week: we spend a lot of time asking how children should use AI.

But I think the more important question is: What kind of person do they need to become in order to use it well?

Because the exoskeleton matters.
But when the lights go out - as they will some days because let’s face it, power cuts happen, and sometimes we just need to disconnect… we need to be able to continue without the exoskeleton.

So the human inside it matters more.

Go on - I'm thinking with my fingers. Tell me, am I wrong?

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