ChatGPT’s Smart – But It’s Not Your Brain

Some people have started treating ChatGPT like it’s the oracle of all knowledge.

They think of it as Di Vinci, Wikipedia, and their Year 9 Science teacher all blended into one convenient search box. It can write emails for you, plan out your week, and even help you sound vaguely intelligent when you give business presentations.

I use AI all the time myself and have come to the realisation that by using it because it is at my fingertips, I am opting out my own brain – it makes things too easy. That’s got me thinking – if you let it do everything, what happens to your brain over time?

Will you eventually get to the point where you go from the guy  who “used to be really sharp” but now struggles to remember where the hell he put the remote for the TV.

Your brain needs to exercise

It needs to be trained, stretched, and occasionally challenged to keep it active. Leave it sitting around doing nothing like a teenager on TikTok and it goes flat. Thinking, reading, learning, memorising and writing are like the exercises you do at the gym but these ones are for your mind – keeping it limber and, most importantly, ready for whatever new challenge life might throw at you.

However, if you skip “brain day*” and outsource everything that is slightly challenging to ChatGPT, your brain will just sit there like a lump of uncooked cookie dough, waiting for someone else to preheat the oven.

* just like skipping “Leg day”…

Getting older? It helps to keep stirring the pot.

The older we get, we seem to think that we can coast on what we already know. But the brain, like an old pot of soup, needs stirring – or the good bits will sink to the bottom and the rest will go lumpy.

How do we stir the pot? Read new things. Learn a new skill. Argue with your friends about which decade had the best music. Join a theatre group (like I did 😊).  It doesn’t matter what you do, just as long as the activity you think! Numerous studies show that keeping your mind active helps delay cognitive decline. In plain English, it stops you from becoming that person who begin every sentence with, “Back in my day…”

AI never has and never will be human

ChatGPT can describe love, but it’s never experienced it. It can talk about fear, but it’s never had to open a rates notice from the Hinchinbrook Shire Council. It won’t get goosebumps with certain music from the 80’s and it definitely didn’t cry at the end of Toy Story 3 (admit it – you did).

But when YOU write or create something, you’re unconsciously mixing in all your lived experiences – your wins, your mistakes, your losses and your own peculiar way of seeing the world. That’s human. Ol’ ChatGPT can try to mimic it, but it’s like diet coke: sort of similar to the actual thing, but missing the real kick.

Try reading something by another human.

Scrolling through headlines, Reddit posts and AI summaries gives you the illusion of knowledge, but it’s all superficial. Real reading – the kind that makes you lose track of time –  forces your brain to connect ideas and build understanding. It’s mental weightlifting without the sweaty gym smell.

Help your brain by picking up a book, a newspaper, a magazine – anything with words longer than “lol.”

ChatGPT is a fantastic tool. Use it, enjoy it, learn from it. But remember that it is exactly that – a tool. Continue to do mental heavy lifting yourself – think, write, read, debate, question.

Because, in the end, your brain isn’t some dusty storage cupboard – it’s a unique marvel of the universe and the best piece of kit you’ll ever own. Keep it working, keep it curious, and for heaven’s sake, stop letting the bots have all the fun.

Footnote: I could’ve written this blog on ChatGPT in a fraction of the time it actually took me to type these words in. But, not only would that miss the whole point of the story, I always enjoy the challenge putting words to a page. It’s rewarding.