Holy insanity
But overall premise is on point, people are being pretty goofy about this tech; it’s just another tool - nothing to go into psychosis over, which seems to be happening in some cases, unfortunately. Touching some grass certainly helps.
p.s. LOVE the animated header on this blog
Strong claims require strong evidence - which isn't offered here.
And besides, maybe the person running dates by Claude just does that for a bit of fun as a hobby. People have weird hobbies! Better not to yuck someone's yum.
Maybe alternatively it's that person's way of experimenting with these new tools to explore what they can do. Maybe that person will discover something - for example, ebay was a terrible idea when it was first brought up!
It'd be unsound to assume if you're playing with agents you don't also talk to humans.
I wish more people viewed things this way.
Feels like a lot of the public discourse now is "strong claims, vibes as evidence".
Weren't the past years - from attention economy, surveillance capitalism and enshittification over crypto grifters to rationalist cults , "existential AI risk" that they're simultaneously warning against and building to Thiel's "Antichrist" to every Big Tech company pivoting from progressive to conservative the moment Trump comes back into power - enough evidence?
I use AI, but I don't feel the need to convince those who don't to use it. Conversely, if someone who doesn't use AI tells me not to, I'll just agree and move on.
I see the ongoing AI driven transformation as part of the early adoption phase of a technology, a period where it's often 'overused.' I think there will come a time when we acknowledge its limitations and adopt a more mature approach. Right now, I feel we're still in the early stage.
I don't know if the two examples in the post are real or fabricated, but even if they are, I don't see a reason to think relying on that technology is necessarily bad. Because I've seen a 30 year old woman with the intellectual capacity of a 15 year old use AI effectively. She asked about everything she didn't know, and it actually helped prevent a crime, a case of voice phishing.
Ultimately, technology is value neutral. But society's demands can reshape themselves around technology.
If that's the case, we should first question the nature of the anxiety itself. Why does a husband earning $550,000 still cling to something despite that? Why does a startup founder want even his dates to be evaluated?
It's because society demands those values and norms. From an Eastern perspective, we often say to step away from those value frameworks and realize who you truly are. But even that value framework is itself a kind of frame and a shackle.
The real question is where most anxiety comes from. It arises whenever individuals feel the need to conform to societal norms.
Both examples show that. Society demands self optimization through performance and competition, and AI simply makes that demand cheaper and more granular. The first example is about maximizing competition for promotion, wealth, and status using AI. The second example, the startup founder, treats even human relationships as improvable metrics.
We always feel anxiety in the gap between norms and our current state.
Even with a $550,000 salary, if the surrounding norm is 'a better house, higher AI productivity,' it will feel insufficient.
Even if a date was enjoyable, if the question is 'Was I empathetic and attractive enough?' then evaluation becomes necessary because you care about how you'll be perceived on her social media.
'Never Enough' isn't because desire is infinite. It's because the evaluation criteria are constantly updated externally, so we can never feel satisfied.
nelsonfigueroa•2h ago