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Thinking with Machines

Four short lessons on working with AI tools without handing over your thinking: say what you mean, lock your own answer first, check it against the source, and know when not to ask.

Spark & Whetstone · sparkwhetstone.org/learn/thinking-with-machines · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Answers are at the end, so you can try each question first.

Lesson 1. Say what you mean

A tool that writes back to you answers the question you asked, not the one you meant. If you ask for "a short summary", it has to guess how short, for whom and what to leave out.

Writing a good request is the same skill as writing a good brief for a person: the goal, who it is for, what a good answer looks like, and what must not change.

A useful habit is to write the request, then read it as a stranger would. Anything a stranger would have to guess, the tool will guess too.

Question. Which request leaves the tool the least to guess?

  1. Make this email better.
  2. Rewrite this email to my landlord so it is polite and under 100 words. Keep the date and the repair list exactly as they are.
  3. Fix my email, you know what I mean.

Say it back. In your own words: what are the parts of a good request, and which one do you usually leave out?

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Lesson 2. Lock your own answer first

When we see a confident answer before we have thought, it pulls our own judgement towards it. This is called anchoring, and it happens to experts too.

So before you ask a tool, write down your own answer, even a rough one: your estimate, your first draft, your guess at the diagnosis of a problem.

Then compare. Where you agree, good. Where you disagree, you now have a real question to look into, instead of quietly adopting whatever came back first.

Question. You want help estimating the cost of a kitchen repair. What should you do first?

  1. Ask the tool and use its number.
  2. Write your own rough estimate and how you got it, then ask.
  3. Ask three tools and average them.

Say it back. Say it back: why does it matter that you write your answer before you look?

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Lesson 3. Check it against the source

Language tools can write sentences that sound right and are not: a quotation nobody said, a date that is off by a decade, a book that does not exist.

The fix is simple and old-fashioned. For anything that matters, find the original source yourself: the document, the page, the official figure. Check the specific claim, not the general topic.

A good rule is to check the one fact that, if it were wrong, would change what you do next.

Question. A tool tells you a medicine should be taken twice a day. What is the best check?

  1. Ask the tool if it is sure.
  2. Read the label or the leaflet that came with the medicine, or ask a pharmacist.
  3. Search the web and pick the first result that agrees.

Say it back. In your own words: which kind of fact do you always check, and how?

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Lesson 4. Know when not to ask

Some things are worth doing yourself because the doing is the point: a letter of thanks, a hard decision about family, the first draft of something you are trying to learn.

If you hand over the part where you think, you get the result without the learning. That is fine for a form you will never fill in again. It is a loss for a skill you want to keep.

A useful question before you ask: do I want the answer, or do I want to be able to get the answer?

Question. You are learning to write clearer reports at work. Which use of a tool keeps the skill?

  1. Have it write each report for you.
  2. Write the report yourself, then ask it to point out one unclear sentence, and fix that sentence yourself.
  3. Never use any tool for anything.

Say it back. Say it back: name one thing you would rather keep doing yourself, and why.

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At the table: Find the confident mistake

Players: 3 to 6 grown-ups. You'll need: Paper, pencils, and the printed brief cards from this page.

  1. One player writes a short brief, such as "plan a picnic for eight people, two of them vegetarian, for under £40".
  2. Another player plays the machine: they answer the brief exactly as written, confidently, and slip in one mistake that the brief did not rule out.
  3. Everyone else hunts for the confident mistake and says which line of the brief would have prevented it.
  4. Rewrite the brief together so the mistake cannot happen, then swap roles.

Answers

  1. Rewrite this email to my landlord so it is polite and under 100 words. Keep the date and the repair list exactly as they are. — The landlord request names the reader, the length, the tone and the parts that must not change. The others leave all of that to a guess.
  2. Write your own rough estimate and how you got it, then ask. — Writing your own estimate first protects you from anchoring, and any gap between your number and the tool's becomes a question worth checking.
  3. Read the label or the leaflet that came with the medicine, or ask a pharmacist. — The label, the leaflet or a pharmacist is the original source. The tool cannot check itself, and a search that confirms what you hoped is not a check.
  4. Write the report yourself, then ask it to point out one unclear sentence, and fix that sentence yourself. — You still write and you still fix; the tool only points. That keeps the learning with you.