I first wrote about skills that become redudant with the advent of LLMs and how education systems need to evolve. But there's a corollary worth exploring: what skills might consumer AI enhance?
I am an ardent subscriber to Marshall McLuhan's 'Medium is the Message' idea. McLuhan argues that communication technologies don't just transmit information – they fundamentally alter how we perceive and interact with the world around us. I believe there's a parallel insight for technology and skills: the technology shapes the skills we develop, often in ways we don't explicitly notice.
We've seen this pattern before. Computer-aided design (CAD) didn't just make drafting faster; they expanded architects' ability to visualize more complex structures (Frank Gehry's use of tools in the 90s in building the Guggenheim). Same for DAWss and music, so on and so forth.
Two areas I think LLMs might actually improve (will keep adding this to this list):
Conversational skill: I have always believed conversation is an art form. Effective LLM use requires understanding the system's capabilities and limitations, and the ability to frame requests with precise specificity. It's fascinating to watch people develop an intuition for this – it's almost like learning a new language. I've noticed myself becoming more deliberate in how I phrase questions, more aware of ambiguities and context is helpful. I wonder if this skill will bleed into human-to-human communication as well, making us sharper about communicating clearly and precisely, with more appreciation for the counterparty's limitations and abilities.
Prompt chain thinking: Just like how there's "chain of thought prompting", I wonder if we'll see the ability to break down problems into smaller pieces improve. It's reminiscent of how programming taught people to think in terms of discrete, logical steps, but with a more fluid, conversational quality. Alternatively (and I hope this is not the case), it could be that LLMs will just expand the gap between those who have this skill or not, versus improving the baseline skill across the generation
What I'm most curious about how this will affect Gen Alpha - a generation that will not know a pre-LLM world. I wonder if these 'LLM natives' might develop fundamentally different cognitive skills and learning patterns (in addition to finding talking toilets funny). Their relationship with knowledge acquisition, creativity, and problem-solving could be different from the rest of us.