The Thinking Machine

The 5th of June, 2025

The Thinking Machine is the only thing people seem to be talking about lately, and unfortunately for my readers, I too, will be tossing my tea out into the proverbial ocean as well. Something that I’ve been thinking about, as much as everyone else has, is that the Thinking Machine can imitate art, but the machine will never be human; it can never make true art. I think it’s important to remember that the Thinking Machine can never be the feeling machine. The machine cannot feel like you can, reader. I think this alone mars the validity of much of its output. We should consider how much attention we are willing to pay to the unfeeling machine.

Art cannot be made without this feeling. The feeling is what gives the art value, not just technical prowess exerted in making it. Art is not a competition to create a better thing than somebody else. Art is an expression of the human soul. You can’t create art without the human soul; it’s no longer art if you do; it’s an imitation of art. Through this lens, I do find the proliferation of the Thinking Machine’s outputs to be a bit upsetting. I’m sure you’ve seen many others complain about this incessantly too.

We all need something to fill the quiet. Something that makes life less lonely. I hate to think of a future where the traveler’s respites along the winding roads of life are adorned with the outputs of a cold uncaring machine instead of true expression of the soul made by the warmth of a human hand. So, please, let’s refrain from relentlessly praising this meaningless machine output.

The fire that casts the light that cuts through the darkness can only be forged by human hands.

However, even considering these feelings, note that I am not a Luddite. The toothpaste cannot be placed back in the tube. Whining and complaining about it online will not make it go back in the tube. This is simply our reality now, and everybody’s just going to have to accept it.

For many years, I maintained a publicly neutral stance on this. I think both sides have merit to their arguments. I think the world benefits from having both of these groups. However, I do tire of hearing about the Thinking Machine everywhere.

I hope that in the future some kind of moral guidelines can be established about what is or isn’t acceptable to use the Thinking Machine for. I think there is a vast wealth of very useful things we could use this technology for, but there has to be some responsibility about when it’s acceptable or isn’t acceptable to use it. Right now, everything is happening very fast, and all of the surrounding technology is still fairly new. The future I hope for is one where we find this technology’s niche and what it excels at, and we use it there and don’t use it elsewhere. Right now, everyone wants to show off how much better their Thinking Machine is than the other guy’s Thinking Machine, so it’s kind of an inescapable facet of life in 2025. This abundance is what prompted me to write this in the first place, of course.

In my time, I’ve seen many tech trends come and go. This one, too, will pass, and that day can't come soon enough, I'm tired of seeing it everywhere!