In this week’s newsletter, I explain why you need to talk to the machine like a human. I also share what I wrote earlier about my views on teaching, dealing with perfectly-written emails, new Claude Artifacts, how Perplexity delivers news in WhatsApp, and why I’m rolling out an advanced Gen AI Masterclass.
When people ask me what I do these days, I say: “I teach people how to talk to people, and I teach people how to talk to machines.”
Communication has always been a critical skill, and is more important than ever as we deal with the new alien intelligence (AI, geddit?). It matters how you talk to the machine, because it may not understand what you say.
It’s been two years since I started teaching Gen AI workshops and I’m always surprised to see how people still use LLMs like ChatGPT at a basic level (i.e., like using Google Search). Often, it’s because they are not used to communicating with the machine like they would with a human. People expect instant answers from computers because our traditional apps were only capable of that – press a button and you get the same fixed output each time.
I never had this problem with LLMs because I was already influenced by science fiction movies. In my early Gen AI workshops, I used to show this scene from the 1979 movie Alien. Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) asks the AI “Mother” why her space crew was unable to neutralise the murderous alien. Mother refuses to say and Ripley has to ask again in a different way before she gives up and hacks the computer with a password. That’s Ripley iterating her questions.
Also, when we communicate with humans, we provide sufficient context for the other person to understand our perspective. For example, if you complain to a colleague about an incident at work, you will relate what happened, why it happened, and what you wish could happen. In the same way, you need to feed AI enough context, be it in your prompt or by uploading additional documents or visuals.
That’s why some people are saying now that we should use “context engineering” instead of “prompt engineering”, but that sounds so technical. I prefer to say “give more data to AI”.
I’m not asking you to treat AI as a human. It has no feelings, morals, or a soul. But you do need to talk to it like a human.
What I wrote this week
What I shared about teaching in the age of AI as a guest panelist at Victoria Junior College’s Professional Learning Community Fair.
Only 10% of the workforce is AI-proficient, according to a survey by Section AI. That’s why I’m rolling out a more advanced Gen AI Masterclass in September.
Perplexity now works in WhatsApp, and I found something intriguing about how it delivered news updates.
Claude Artifacts now allow you to make more powerful web apps, even if you don’t code.
How should we react when we receive a perfectly-written email from someone who cannot write one?
Yes, ChatGPT can do the Meyers Briggs (MBTI) test on you. As usual, take the results with a pinch of salt, even if it was facilitated by a human.
A weird photo I took before the storm.