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AI could fix this but I refuse to let it

Another day, another concern about the pervasiveness and growing omnipresence of AI.

Yesterday I wrote my column early in the morning after getting only a couple of hours sleep the night before. A sad and poorly managed element of my Parkinson's disease is its huge effect on sleep and the flow-on effect is that on bad days there's clearly a degree of cognitive impairment.

The effect of that brain-fog was that I used the word "inciteful" when I actually meant to use "insightful".

So bad was the situation that I didn't even notice until a reader emailed me a cryptic clue -- then the penny dropped.

It's time to take extra creatine monohydrate on those brain-fog days. Recent studies point to large than normal doses of this substance acting to significantly improve cognitive abilities when people are in a sleep-deprived state, so I'll give that a go.

I was also sent an AI-generated proof-read of my column that highlighted a bunch of other grammar and style issues.

Interesting.

To date, I have kind of steered clear of using AI (or even a spellchecker) on a regular basis for one very simple reason.

I'm already 72 years old and have Parkinson's Disease (PD). A significant percentage of PD sufferers go on to develop some form of dementia so I am always trying to keep track of my cognitive performance.

When I was making regular flying-day videos for one of my YouTube channels I had a brilliant metric for tracking my cognitive performance. A key part of those videos was the witty, quick-fire comments I'd roll out in response to the actions of those around me.

For a while, I noticed that the delay between something happening and me firing off a smart-arsed but clever comment was slowly increasing. Before my diagnosis, such responses were almost instantaneous but a few years later there was a very perceptible delay of up to several seconds.

I didn't notice this change until I was actually editing my videos and then the pause became very apparent.

That's not good.

I upped my dose of creatine and made a few other changes to my diet and exercise program which resulted in a significant improvement within a few months. I improved, although still not as fast as I once was but a pause of two or three seconds was reduced to a second or less in most cases.

Since I'm no longer allowed to make those flying-day videos (thanks to the lame-arsed SWDC), I'm finding this column to be my new metric for measuring my cognitive performance.

If I were to use AI, a grammar checker or spell checker to parse my prose and fix up all the mistakes then I'd lose what will (at least to me) be a valuable way to track my gradual mental decline over the coming years. Even if PD doesn't deliver me a fatal dose of dementia then I fully expect that the general wear and tear of aging will continue to erode (hopefully slowly) my brain's performance.

It will be extremely useful to be able to look back over the years and compare my style, accuracy and delivery, through this column.

In the meantime, I guess all of those reading this daily dross, will have to become more adept at sidestepping the effects of my decline and learn to read between the lines a little more than you've had to in the past.

Another reason for not making this column clinically correct in every way is that I tend to shoot from the lip here rather than plan, structure and design each column. Some days I write a title, start typing and, 30 minutes later, realise that I've actually ended up going so off-track that the title is no longer relevant. This creates a somewhat visceral connection between what I'm thinking and what you're reading.

So rest assured, this column is not, and never will be (without disclosure) written or edited by AI. If that means it eventually turns into a jumbled word-salad then so be it but at least the journey to such a jumbled mess will be documented on a daily basis and may be of interest to those who wish to study it.

Carpe Diem folks!

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