Are You Using AI To Get Better Or Worse?

In June 2009, an Airbus A330 was crossing the Atlantic at 35,000 feet.

Ice blocked the airspeed sensors. The autopilot disconnected and handed the aircraft back to the pilots.

They had spent their careers monitoring automation rather than flying planes. At night, over water, with unreliable instruments, they put a working aircraft into a stall they never recognised.

Three and a half minutes from disconnect to impact.

228 people died.

Investigators named a contributing factor: skill fade - manual flying ability degrading through lack of use.

The autopilot was meant to reduce workload so pilots could think more clearly.

Instead it almost completely replaced the thinking.

Now apply that to AI.

It’s the most powerful augmentation tool any of us have ever used. That’s not in question.

But there’s a line, and it’s easy to cross without noticing.

Using AI to sharpen your thinking makes you better.

Using AI to replace your thinking makes you dependent. And it costs you something that doesn’t appear on any dashboard.

Take AI generated content for example.

If everything you publish is completely AI-generated, rather than AI-augmented, you’ve built a gap between the person people think they know and the person who actually turns up.

And you’ll feel that gap in every human conversation.

Someone quotes a line back to you that they found valuable, and something in the back of your mind says: "that wasn’t me."

That’s not imposter syndrome arriving out of nowhere.

That’s imposter syndrome you manufactured.

Same with emails.
Same with coding.
Same with writing.

The test is simple... Is this AI tool making me better, or is it making me unnecessary?

Use AI to think deeper, operate faster, write sharper, and see further than you could on your own.

Just don’t outsource the thing you’re building your reputation on.

Because the autopilot always hands the aircraft back eventually.

If you know someone who would benefit from reading this, please forward it to them. It may change the trajectory of their life for the better, and the catalyst could be you.