Chad Harwick of New York City does not quite understand what all the fuss is these days about AI, as he has been getting by on artificial intelligence for a long time.
“It’s my go-to,” he said. “Like they say about working smart instead of hard, why worrying about being smart when you can just seem smart? That’ll pretty much get you anywhere you need to go.”
He chuckled and added, “Except maybe post-apocalypse if you’re alone in the woods or something and have to figure out real things to survive. But I’m banking on not being in that position.”
Chad explained that while he struggled in elementary school and middle school, he began to find his way to artificial intelligence in high school, largely thanks to the theater group. “All I had to do was memorize some Shakespeare lines and people thought i had brains. Even if I got them wrong, it still gave an intelligent impression, if you will.”
Chad put this newfound understanding to work in college and beyond, often relying on a few key phrases, including “post-graduate work” (which for him had been a night-shift at Chik-fil-A), “a little existential” (his response when feeling down and asked how he was doing), and “indeed” (a response he adopted in lieu of “word” for expressing agreement).
And it worked like a charm, elevating the level of women he was turned down by in bars, the promotions for which he was rejected but informed that he had been a top candidate, and the frequency with which others asked his opinion on political issues over which none of them had any influence or control.
“It was initially a little tricky to know what to say when people asked what I thought about this or that political thing because I don’t know a lot of actual stuff about that stuff," he said. "But eventually I started saying, with like a cynical can't-be-bothered sort of demeanor, ‘ I try not to, if you know what I mean.' That tends to work really well.”
However, as helpful as Chad’s verbal methods for seeming smart proved to be, most effective has been the non-verbal artficial intelligence cue he stumbled upon one morning in a Brooklyn thrift shop: a canvas New Yorker tote bag. “Apparently it’s a magazine, and I think you have to subscribe or donate or something to get those bags, but I got mine for three bucks. Throw it over my shoulder, and suddenly everyone thinks I'm a genius.”
All told, Chad feels little concern about the increasing pervasiveness of AI and services like ChatGPT because he’s found artificial intelligence to be very powerful in his own life and hopes that, as he has done, more and more people will start opting for artificial over actual intelligence.
“Honestly, I find those people easier to connect with than truly intelligent people," he said. " I think we’ll all get along better once we stop insisting on authentic intelligence and just being more chill about it all. That’s my hope and prediction for the future.”
