I'm glad generative artificial "intelligence" was not available yet during the vast majority of my career.

A number of realizations arose while temporarily exploring generative Large Language Models…

• Generative AI is based on massive theft from creatives, without consent, credit or compensation. Using gen-AI is asking a chatbot to spit out the combined efforts of ripped-off creatives. It is industrializing and devaluing human expression, artistry and craftsmanship. Creatives are losing their jobs and motivation because tech corporations unscrupulously absorb and exploit their work. If you appreciate art, support the artists, not the thieves of their labor.
  
  
• Tech corporations are building more and more huge AI data centers, consuming lots of internet bandwidth, energy, water and other valuable resources, increasing scarcity, prices and emissions, degrading the already fragile environment.
  
  
• When you're using an LLM like a chatbot or image generator, every bit of data you submit helps build a personal profile of you and your relatives, contributing to the power and reach of corporations and governments, and decreasing your privacy and security.
  
  
• Generative AI enables fake images, videos, text and speech that are widely used for abuse, deception, cybercrime, misinformation and propaganda, polluting safety, justice, science, news reporting and much more.
  
  
• Using gen-AI is not creating, it is merely delegating, like regarding the results of an online search as your own creations. To my experience, there's no exciting challenge, no exploration of your capacities, no rewarding creative trajectory, no fulfilling sense of achievement, no skill development, no authenticity and no deserved (self-)respect.
  
  
• AI use outsources your thinking and decision-making. Challenging your brain is essential to maintain mental agility, and to avoid AI dependency. Increasingly leaving tasks up to chatbots and gen-AI will result in a decline of skills, problem-solving capacity, independence and self-confidence.

I'm not against positive applications of Machine Learning, such as finding patterns and anomalies in large data sets to improve medical science and weather forecasts. I also welcome useful ML tools that merely aid your own work, such as denoising models that allow to reach a proper 3D rendering result in less time, as long as the ML models are efficient and local.