People who refuse to use AI

No one has convinced Sabine Zetteler the value of using AI.

“I recently read a really great phrase that said something along the line: 'Why do you care about reading something that someone couldn't care about writing?'

Zetteler runs a London-based communications agency with a staff of around 10 people, full-time and part-time.

“What's the point about sending us things we haven't written, reading newspapers written by bots, listening to songs created by AI, and looting the administrators who have four children and making a little more money?

“Where is the joy, love, or ambitious improvement, even to me as the founder of it? That means nothing to me,” she says.

Ms Zetteler is one of those who resisted the AI ​​invasion that actually launched ChatGpt at the end of 2022.

Since then, the service and many of its rivals have been extremely popular. According to software company Semrush, ChatGpt has earned over 5 billion visits per month.

However, training AI systems like ChatGPT requires a huge amount of energy, and running them after they're trained is also energy-intensive.

While it's difficult to quantify the electricity used by AI, a report by Goldman Sachs estimates that ChatGPT queries use almost 10 times more electricity than Google search queries.

It makes some people uncomfortable.

For Florence Akelly, the owner of Yoga Retreat and other things, the environmental impact is one reason why she vows to leave AI.

“My initial response was that AI is soulless and contradicts my business.

“But I have found that the environmental impact is terrible with all the energy consumption needed to run a data center. I don't think people know that.”

Ms Zetteler acknowledges her respect for AI for all the social benefits she can achieve, but she says she is concerned about the wider impact on society.

“If AI can translate articles translated by AI and anything truly beneficial, we are pleased that AI exists for the blind. But in general, I don't think it will benefit us in the long term.”

Does she worry that it could have a knock-on effect on her business, especially if her rival company uses AI?

“Like everything, I saved money by sending agents to Milan on EasyJet flights rather than trains.

“It already seems my profit margin has failed, whether it's a way of measuring success or not, but how do you measure success by how much you contribute to society and how well you sleep?”

Sierra Hansen, who lives and works in Seattle, also refuses to use AI. For her, she is worried that the use of AI is hurting our ability to solve problems.

“Our brains help us organize what our days look like, asking us to tell them how to manage my schedule, rather than going to the AI ​​co-pilot.

“Our job as a human is to apply critical thinking skills and if you are giving ChatGpt a simple task, you are not solving it yourself. It's thinking for you. If you want to listen to music, I don't need AI to create the perfect punk rock album.”

But not everyone has the luxury of opting out of AI.

Because Jackie Adams (not her real name), who works in digital marketing, initially resisted AI for environmental reasons and thought it was lazy to use it.

“I've heard about the energy needed to run the data center and the amount of land they're taking up, but it wasn't sitting with me. I couldn't understand why it was necessary,” she says.

But about a year ago, her three colleagues at the marketing company she works for began employing AI for tasks like copywriting and idea generation.

Six months ago, Ms Adams had to follow them after being told they had to cut their budgets.

“Then it was out of my control,” she says. She feels that continuing to resist will hurt her career.

“I started playing a little more after reading job descriptions in search of AI experience. Recently I realized that if I don't implement them in my work style, I'll be left behind.”

Now she says she doesn't think she's tapping like she's no longer lazy.

“It can enhance my work and make some things better,” she added to use it to improve her copywriting work and edit the photos.

James Brisseau, a philosophy professor specializing in AI ethics at Pace University in New York, says the moment when you opt out of AI has already been passed.

“If you want to know why a decision was made, you need a human. If you don't mind that, you'll probably use AI,” he says.

“So we'll have human judges in criminal cases and human doctors to make decisions about who should get the implant. But the weather forecasts will soon go away and anesthesiology will go away,” says Professor Brissau.

Ms. Adam has accepted the use of AI at work, but she still feels discouraged about the growing influence of AI.

“Even when doing Google searches, they contain an AI overview, but some emails contain a topline overview, which makes them feel like they have no control. How do you turn everything off? It's snowballed.”