The more you outsource your thinking, the less you understand
And there will be a day the discrepancy will show
A few days ago a friend and I were trying to do extremely simple math and I was shocked at how painfully slow and error-prone we were.
I’m not talking about Calculus II.
It was in fact 1,050 - 300. I wasn’t sure if the result was 750 or 850 and she was on the same boat.
We’re both relatively young. We’re both engineers.
Yet how can this be possible?
Math that I could do half asleep while playing video-games in my 20’s suddenly felt like a challenge.
Not using your brain is boring
I have more than a few friends who rely on AI for information compilation, summary creation, and much of their code writing.
However, many, I’ve noticed, in exchange of having to avoid the hard, painful part of doing something difficult, are losing that joy and satisfaction of conquering a task.
Understanding new concepts is hard, and as of now, nobody can implant understanding in your brain.
You can ask AI how to ride a bike all day, but unless you actually fall a hundred times, you will never really understand it.
I’ve been practicing rock climbing for a few months, and most days, at the end of the session I often don’t want to challenge myself to a harder route.
My fingers hurt, muscles ache, my hands sweat profusely, my heartbeat accelerates when I think I’ll lose grip and somehow my knot might have a fault.
Often I fail to conquer a new route, but when I do achieve one, the feeling of coming down (alive) and the satisfaction of having achieved yet another milestone is worth that short burst of pain.
At 40, I’m still young, and I plan to keep challenging myself, mentally, emotionally and physically for hopefully at least a decade.
I advice that you do too and don’t always ask your calculator to do simple math for you, or AI for answers to questions that you just need to think about a bit.