Behind the Scenes - 3/7/25

Dear Friends,

For those who are new to our emails, I try to do an email once a week where I go into the details of what is happening behind the scenes of our small business. If you want to catch up on prior messages, check out the blog here or just jump right into the story below.

I've had more time this week to think. Production has a certain simple and focused beauty to it once you've made 5000 journals. Your hands know the steps like a pianist knows a concerto. This leaves your mind free to wonder, and my mind has been on "Artificial Intelligence" lately.

I put the term in quotes, because I think it is a misnomer. Intelligence is for the living. What it should probably be called is Advanced Search Engines. Realistically it isn't thinking of an answer (although the tech people begin to wax philosophically at this point about what really is thought). In fact in a not too distant future there will be a great debate about the rights of robots and "AI" programs. After all, some will argue that we all are just pretending to be people.

To their credit, this argument is not without its surface level merits. They will say that while the software is running advanced calculations to properly determine the best next word in a sentence from a vast database of training data, that we do the same as humans. They will accurately point out that in fact, many of these programs are "better" than people at any number of tasks.

Even now I am constantly bombarded with ads talking about how I can automate my marketing with "AI" and streamline my operations. Customer Service lines staffed by "AI" has been rapidly propagating across every industry, and the very best models can mimic a human voice and phrasing that is indistinguishable from people aside from its inability to get upset with the caller. Always on, always available, always "happy" to speak with you.

I hate it.

My disdain is actually a philosophical one. I am not a luddite, although they may have had a point. Technological progress is arguably the only way my business has been able to succeed. There comes a time where we have to look past the well crafted facade of the software and understand what it will do if we allow it. I am not an "inevitablist" when it comes to these things. We choose everyday what we are willing to support with our dollars, our attention, and our conversations.

My philosophical point is actually a theological one, and very human one as well. We are created with the spark of the divine, and if we forget that the machine we are talking to is a machine and treat it like a person, we degrade humans in the process. We are not machines. It is very vogue in the modern era to think of humans as chemistry sets, that our body is a complex biological machine. Perhaps in one sense this is true, but that sense is a very narrow and shallow one.

There is an interesting intersection of thought where the practicalists, the humanists, the religious, and the populists can all agree...

We must prioritize humans.

I wonder if in 10 years time products will begin to say "Made without AI" or "Made by Humans" the same way we put "Made in USA" on our products. I wonder if it will be a point of pride for companies that they refuse to let AI do their marketing, or web design, or customer service. Will we be willing to pay more for a product, knowing that the extra cost is going to pay real people for their labor? Will we be happier to have an argument with a customer service person who is obstinate because we will know that only a person would have such a failing? Will "AI" be relegated to its proper place of pure database retrieval?

These are the kinds of things that business owners are faced with today. It's all the rage to create ghost businesses where "AI" handles everything. Marketing, Website design, customer service, reordering and logistics with manufacturers and third party warehouses, all taken care of by robots. To some that sounds like the dream. They think that sitting on the beach while the money rolls into their account is the goal.

I think that is a tragic story.

The lie that we have all been told is that the goal of life is to get rich so you can enjoy leisure. It is pernicious, and ultimately is the path to a hollow life. Perhaps it's only fitting that it is married to "AI" then. A match made in hell.

I don't fault those who have fallen prey to this mindset. It isn't a new idea after all. We have just spent the last 50 years turning its propaganda up to eleven. Now I will paint an alternative picture.

What if the goal of your life was not to seek your own pleasure, but to be of service to those around you? How would you structure your business if that was your mindset?

You would certainly seek to make your product as good as it could possible be, and you would price it in such a way that would reflect this effort while still being affordable enough that people could obtain it. If customers were unhappy you would do whatever you could to remedy the issue. You would pay your employees well, and do your best to provide them with benefits that would help them live good lives. You would compensate yourself since that money is used to support your own family. Profits would be used to support all the above goals.

Think for a moment if you were the leader of this business. Don't you think that the day to day life that would result from this mindset would be far better than another day on the beach? I certainly have found it to be better.

Leisure has its place and is not inherently bad or evil, but it makes for a poor excuse for someones "life's work" and leaves people hollow after a little while.

We must choose the hard path.

That path costs more, but keeps our humanity intact. The siren song of "AI" in everything must be realized for the trap that it is. Big businesses will almost certainly fall prey to it, and on the balance sheet it will appear as a good thing, but at what human cost?

I began this by pointing out that "AI" is more properly understood an advanced search engine, churning through the vast sea of information that we have voluntarily given it on the internet to find the right word that would most likely come next. It is a soulless calculating machine that is as human as a solar powered calculator. Don't be fooled by the packaging.

Humans make art. We write, paint, play, and build. Our lives are deep and meaningful, far beyond our mere bodies. We leave behind our thoughts, emotions, and memories in journals and books. Those writings connect us with the minds of the future, and in turn we connect with those who have come before us in their writings. There is something transcendent about humans, and we must realize that. When we pick up a leather notebook, there is something that happens in our mind that connects us with our ancestors. For a moment we feel as though we are an explorer taming the vast wilderness, or an inventor discovering the fundamental forces of nature. That is something a machine can never feel, because machines can't feel.

This has been on my mind this week. I'll admit it's a bit esoteric, and many people won't have much opportunity to make decisions like I have to avoid using AI. Perhaps though my thinking on this will catch on. What do you think?

Stay tuned for more letters on Fridays in the coming weeks and be sure to go subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you like and watch the videos it helps us get promoted more by the algorithm to people who may never have heard of us.

Ever your servant,

Colin Murdy CEO/Owner

Murdy Creative Co.

Cell: 414-434-9001

MurdyCreative.Co 

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