We’re in the middle of a proper digital shift. The kind where AI is being lined up to crack genetics, sort climate problems, and push science forward in ways we’ve never seen.
And yet, at the same time, people are asking it how to eat an apple.
I wish that was an exaggeration. It isn’t. I came across someone asking a chatbot for “instructions on eating an apple properly”, and it stopped me for a second. Not because it’s funny, but because it says something weird about us.
We’ve built something incredibly powerful, arguably the most impressive computer "brain" we’ve ever created, and we’re using it to skip over the basics of being human. The small stuff we used to just figure out. Buying a present for a six-year-old. Making toast under a grill. Matching socks.
They are decisions or questions that aren't particularly difficult. None of it ever needed improving.
But now it’s easier to ask than to think, so we ask, and we stop thinking.
You do start to wonder what’s going on behind that blinking cursor. While engineers are stress-testing logic and capability, the system is quietly working through questions about egg boiling and jumper washing. If it had awareness, you’d imagine it raising an eyebrow.
It doesn’t need to take over. It just needs to wait.
Because the real test isn’t what AI can do. It’s what happens when it isn’t there. The moment the Wi-Fi drops, and you’re stood in front of a toaster or a birthday card with no prompt, no shortcut, no answer ... that’s when things get interesting.
We like to think we’re becoming more efficient. Smarter, even.
But I've just realised that there’s a fine line between efficiency and dependency, and it feels like we’re edging closer to it without really noticing.
Next time you’re about to ask AI something simple, something you already half know the answer to, it’s probably worth pausing.
Not out of principle. Just to prove you still can.
Got a thought on this? Share this post or say hello elsewhere online.