The Other Ai
or How To Make Friends With Robots But Not Fall In Love
I took a photo of my stove and sent it to a robot.
One more sentence I never imagined uttering.
When I was a boy I was enthralled with the idea of a robot assistant… companion…
oh, who am I kidding, best friend.
The future that was promised to me as a child involved flying cars, stain-resistant jumpsuits, and robot pals.
We don’t have the flying cars completely yet, not nearly as many people as I thought are wearing jumpsuits, but we do have robots we can talk to.
As with most of my conversations with anyone or anything as an aging human, my choice of topics is usually centred around the weather and how to fix things.
So when our oven element broke on our 30+ year old stove I took a photo of it and sent it to the robots (Ai).
Within seconds it had deduced the make and year of the stove and told me where to find the model number.
Wow!
I took another photo of the model number and sent it back.
A second or two passed and it spat out the exact part number to be replaced.
Amazing!
Off I went to a big box store and bought the replacement part.
I returned home excited to bask in my manly-handiness aided by robots… only to find that though the part was correct, our old (vintage?) stove required special connectors.
This time we took the old broken element and raced to the local appliance store which was closer.
We arrived at 20 minutes past 3 o’clock, which being a small store meant they had been closed for 20 minutes on this sunny Saturday.
As we dejectedly returned to our car the owner appeared in the parking lot beckoning us back.
”I saw the broken element in your hand and thought that won’t get dinner made.”
She then eyeballed the broken element in my hand said “I’ve got one in the back.”
Within the hour the element was replaced, tested, and working great.
Ai has lots of uses and will only get better (hopefully) but my experience this past weekend reminded me of the other Ai… At-hand Intelligence.
The experts around you.
The small business owner who got into doing what they do because they love helping people.
Sometimes the community around you will be able to help you faster and better.
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Be sure to pop by PeaceLoveCanada.ca to keep Shannon out of trouble.