“When we consider tools,” Sloane writes, “we are dealing with human benefactors of the most primary sort. Tools increase and vary human power; they economize human time, and they convert raw substances into valuable and useful products.”  As Sloane explains, tools before the onset of mass production were highly customized and varied not only region to region, but tool owner to tool owner. Axe heads imported from Europe quite quickly were iterated upon to be able to stand up to American forests, and then iterated upon again and again until each pattern suited its precise application and environment. In one ironworking catalogue, for example, Sloane found fifty axe head patterns—all intended to do more or less the same task. Blades and hooks were hand-forged, then sold to workers who would then carve their own handles for the blades to suit their exact needs. From Sloane again: “Axe patterns […] were so subtly curved and proportioned that they were as distinctive as a man’s signature; you could take one look and say “This tool belongs to Jones” or “That tool belongs to Smith.””

A few thoughts, and I’d like to hear yours:

I really love the idea of highly customizable tools. A tool that is, to some extent, in conversation with me over time makes sense, because not only does my environment change over time, but *I* change too. In the sense that AI adapts to my cues and can give me information in the formats I prefer, I’m hopeful for the future of AI-infused axes.

That said, I’d also like to be able to own my axe—not subscribe to it. And because the labs training generative AI models define the constraints, without my input or any oversight of any kind, I’m in an increasingly weird position where I’m simultaneously psychologically catered to by the axe I’m renting and compelled to swing that axe in a way that I can’t fully understand. As AI tools become the norm, we might look back at the pre-mass-production axe as a symbol: these tools should serve us (all of us), not the other way around.

I’m not 100% sure how to navigate this, but I do know I’ll need to continue to bring my lifetime of embodied understanding, my formal and informal education, and my own moral and ethical compass to bear every time I use AI tools. I’ll keep reading, listening, discussing. I’ll advocate for centering and protecting humans. As I’ve shared in our Tuesday morning AI Chats, I don’t think a “pro-AI” or “anti-AI” position is terribly useful. I do think it’s useful—imperative, actually—to be pro-human, and to let that position be our guiding star.

You can reach me at kreilly@steyer.net or on LinkedIn, and I’d love to hear from you!

Thanks,
Katelyn

P.S. Thank you for all the kind responses to last week’s Workings. A tough one.