Friend, Humane, Rabbit and Plaud are the names of current attempts to bring generative AI into our personal lives without us staring at a smartphone. MyTabAl’s Friend and Plaud’s NotePin are both wearables; Humane’s Pin is attached to your top; Rabbit’s R1 is a cute device for your pocket. Great claims are made for these devices. NotePin is the most focussed since, as the name suggests, its task is to take notes of what you’re saying. But even its manufacturers have to do marketing: “This small but powerful device is reshaping the professional landscape.” Friend has even bigger claims made about it: “We have given your friend free will for when they decide to reach out to you.” Riding the wave of LLM excitement, each device wants to be the next big thing.
But will customers really be drawn to devices which are always listening to you so they can then mimic the response of a human companion? We’re told that modern life has created an aching void of loneliness: could it be that these devices will fill it? Or are these inventions destined quickly to fall by the wayside as steps along the road of development towards a future device which will truly sell, as the smartphone did 17 years ago? Will they catch on or will they burn money and vanish? We shall see.
Failure and wastage are always part of development. For personal skills, individuals have to practise for thousands of hours before becoming expert. With inventions, any number come along, cause a stir and then fade quickly out because they are unwanted, or the time, or the technology, or the design, isn’t yet right. Think of electric bikes. Today, they are so commonplace that they are a regular hazard to pedestrians. But when Clive Sinclair released his C5 in 1985, it utterly failed to find a market, was regarded as dangerous to the rider and production ceased within a few months. Failure and wastage are just part of learning and creativity.
However, these traits aren’t limited to human development and inventiveness: they are found throughout creation. Take fruit trees. How many produce seeds which never grow into a tree and abundant fruit which goes mostly uneaten? Of course, you have to take into account the huge benefits of scattered seeds and rotting fruit to the lives of small creatures and the soil. But, nonetheless, failure and wastage do occupy a role in how creation works. How is that to be Biblically explained? Certainly, there is a sin-effect. The fall of Adam brought curse upon the earth and so plants know disease, damage and malfunction. So maybe in a world without sin there would have been perfect recycling with no failure nor wastage. Or might it be that God purposefully designed a world of abundance where more than necessary was produced? Or that He purposefully designed a world where to create what is best you have to discard other options on the way? Could it be that failure and wastage were always important design features of God’s good creation?
Maybe so. But let’s get a second opinion. I’ll ask my friend who’s hanging round … my neck.
Photo by Alan Gold on Wikipedia
All posts tagged under technology notebook
Introduction to this series of posts
Cover photo by Denley Photography on Unsplash
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