Bringing my best as a researcher
I’m a newbie to robotics and artificial intelligence (AI). Like Neo in The Matrix, this feels like I’m going down a rabbit hole that I never wanted to explore. My son-in-law designs robotic farm equipment. He has designed computers that, when integrated into a combine, can harvest crops without a human in the cab. When we talk about his job, I ask lots of questions and then smile while he talks. Mostly, it just goes over my head.
This past summer, I experienced it for myself when I drove with a friend in his Tesla. At one point he put the car into self-driving mode. I was uncomfortable seeing his hands off the wheel and the vehicle driving independently. Highway driving was bad enough, but when we pulled up to an intersection on a busy stretch of road, I thought my friend would take over the controls. Instead, he let the car navigate from a complete stop. The Tesla inched out carefully. It was scanning the traffic, looking for a space, and judging how fast the oncoming traffic was approaching. It made several adjustments and then accelerated onto the busy road in the same way a human driver would. Impressive, but I breathed a sigh of relief when I knew we had made it. I’m uncomfortable putting my life into the hands of a robotic car.
I did a comparative search on Chat GPT comparing the concepts found in Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman and the “thinking” required to drive a Tesla into oncoming traffic or harvest a thousand-acre wheatfield without human aid. It turns out, there are interesting implications. Kahneman identifies two systems for thinking in the human brain. System 1 (fast thinking) operates automatically and swiftly, relying on intuition and heuristics. System 2 (slow thinking) is deliberate, slow, and analytical. It requires effort and conscious thought.[1] According to my AI-aided research, I found that AI is much like System 1 thinking in the human brain. Like System 1, AI algorithms process vast amounts of data rapidly, making quick decisions. Like System 1 thinking, AI is also prone to biases and therefore prone to errors. In an Interview about AI and thinking systems, Kahneman noted that, despite my fears of driving in a Tesla, AI systems are much safer than human System 1 thinking. However, Kahneman stated, “…when artificial intelligence makes a mistake, that mistake looks completely foolish to humans, or almost evil.”[2] I’m still not ready to take my hands off the wheel. As it turns out I may not have a choice. In that same interview, Kahneman said, “So clearly, something is coming… And clearly AI is going to win [against human intelligence]. It’s not even close. How people are going to adjust to this is a fascinating problem – but one for my children and grandchildren, not me.”[3] My stomach churned when I read this. What does his mean for the future of humanity?
However, as marvellous as System 1 is, we are still better served when we combine System 1 thinking with the ability to engage System 2 thinking. Because of the quick way System 1 operates, it is prone to biases, wrong judgements and, therefore, errors. Kahneman writes, “Because System 1 operates automatically and cannot be turned off at will, errors of intuitive thought are often difficult to prevent. Biases cannot always be avoided, because System 1 may have no clue to the error…errors can be prevented only by the enhanced monitoring and effortful activity of System 2.”[4] The interaction of the intuitive system and analytical system are optimal.
An awareness of the interplay between System 1 and System 2 will be critical as a researcher. As I consider my NPO, I realize that I had certain biases, hunches, and intuitions about a collaborative form of leadership and its impact on the mission of God, that was then refined and reshaped through a collaborative design process with stakeholders. This process required System 2 thinking.
The resources we’ve read thus far, have demonstrated how to actively engage in System 2 thinking. Let me provide a few examples from our reading. Adler and Van Doren taught us how to engage in more critical reading.[6] While elementary reading is largely a System 1 exercise, inspectional reading, analytical reading and syntopical reading requires one to engage System 2. Ahrens’ method of note taking requires the writer to put ideas into their own words rather than simply parroting the ideas of other sources.[7] That’s System 2 at work. Paul and Elder’s book, is a manual on how to engage in slow thinking by asking crucial questions.[8] The discipline of coaching found in Camacho’s book requires both the coach and coachee to engage System 2 thinking.[9] Meyer and Land encourage System 2 thinking by bringing an awareness to threshold concepts and the need to push through frustration and fuzzy thinking when concepts are hard to grasp.[10] Tim Harford provides the reader a System 2 approach with ten different rules to help one determine the truth behind statistics.[11] Finally, to become the kind of self-differentiated leader who maintains a non-anxious, non-reactionary, yet challenging presence requires one to engage System 2.
The encouragement for me in all of this is that human beings are required to think critically rather than simply allowing System 1 to be in the driver’s seat all the time. While a Tesla may be able to navigate through traffic, we need researchers and leaders to navigate the more complex and critical challenges of life. The warning in his book for me is to effortfully engage System 2 thinking. It’s a warning because as a leader and a researcher, I know that my propensity can be toward a lazy brain. I can very easily allow System 1 to lead and System 2 to follow blissfully. Bringing my best as a reacher means seeking to optimize my brain through the interplay of both Systems 1 and 2.
[1] Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow (Toronto: Anchor Canada, 2013).
[2] Tim Adams and @TimAdamsWrites, “Daniel Kahneman: ‘Clearly AI Is Going to Win. How People Are Going to Adjust Is a Fascinating Problem,’” The Observer, May 16, 2021, sec. Books, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/may/16/daniel-kahneman-clearly-ai-is-going-to-win-how-people-are-going-to-adjust-is-a-fascinating-problem-thinking-fast-and-slow.
[3] Adams and @TimAdamsWrites.
[4] Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, 28.
[5] Eve Poole, Leadersmithing: An Apprenticeship Approach to Making Great Leaders (London ; New York, NY: Bloomsbury Business, 2017).
[6] Mortimer J. Adler and Charles Van Doren, How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intellgent Reading., Revised and Updated ed edition May 10 2011 (New York: Simon and Schuster, Touchstone, n.d.).
[7] Sönke Ahrens, How to Take Smart Notes: One Simple Technique to Boost Writing, Learning and Thinking, 2nd edition, revised and expanded edition (Hamburg, Germany: Sönke Ahrens, 2022).
[8] Richard Paul and Linda Elder, The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking: Concepts and Tools, Eighth edition, Thinker’s Guide Library (Lanham Boulder New York London: Rowman & Littlefield, 2020).
[9] Tom Camacho, Mining for Gold: Developing Kingdom Leaders through Coaching, First published (Nottingham: IVP, 2019).
[10] Jan H. F. Meyer and Ray Land, eds., Overcoming Barriers to Student Understanding: Threshold Concepts and Troublesome Knowledge, 1. publ (London: Routledge, 2006).
[11] Tim Harford, How to Make the World Add up: Ten Rules for Thinking Differently about Numbers (London: The Bridge Street Press, 2021).
About the Author
Graham English
I was born in Cape Town, South Africa 30 minutes from Table Mountain, the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean. My family immigrated to Vancouver, Canada where I spent my teen years, met Wendy, and got married. We now live on the Canadian prairies in northern Alberta. I think God has a sense of humour. I'm a follower of Jesus, work in leadership and church development, love my family and walk a lot.10 responses to “Bringing my best as a researcher”
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Graham,
When you mentioned the self-driving Tesla, you reminded me of a time a few years ago when Chris and I were in a friends new Ford Explorer that had AI-generated backup capabilities for parallel parking. I was SOOO nervous as he took his hands off the wheel and breathed a sign of relief when the car did its thing and parallel parked into this somewhat tight space.
And, as you already noted, none of us have a choice whether AI makes there way into society or not … mainly because it’s here and probably not leaving anytime soon, if ever ;-).
Your question of “What does this mean for the future of humanity?” Is a continual question I have. Here is where I’ve landed. Your grandchildren (aged 4 years +) are already more tech-savvy than the rest of the world. But… for those who are not privileged to have steady income or rely upon menial jobs, my question has been, “what will they do?” as AI takes over their jobs. We’re already seeing it in Japan where the grocery stores are becoming more and more vendor-machine operated. We also see it in the US with more and more self-check out cashier stations.
This means that less and less critical thinking will be needed, which will end up making humans dumber? You seem to think differently, can you unpack that a bit more?
Enjoyed reading this!
Thanks Nancy, I am a complete neophyte with regards to AI. I was listening to a podcast with Patrick Lencioni just now and he talked about how leadership requires courage, compassion, relationship, love etc. All of these cannot be replicated by AI. As well, I’m not sure that AI can replicate System 2 thinking.
Thanks Graham, it’s a brave new world we live in. What thoughts do you have on what strategies people can employ to ensure they effectively utilise both System 1 and System 2 thinking in decision-making processes, particularly in contexts where biases and errors can have significant consequences? It’s a big one for Pastors I think.
Thanks, Glyn. I was thinking about the need for System 1 thinking when doing the kinds of things that just require great systems. For example, I am working on some licensing issues that would have been much easier if I had a template to work from. But because no system had been put in place I had to start from scratch.
However, a board or lead team would benefit from System 2 thinking as they make directional and strategic decisions. For that to happen then would need a leader or chair that would ask critical questions rather than simply nod heads in agreement. We need our best minds effortfully engaged.
So I think, great systems in place as well as opportunity to effortfully engage System 2 on a leadership level might be a good combination of the 2.
Graham,
I think that this is your best blog yet. Well done friend. It seems that you are setting yourself up well for your syntopical essay with this blog. You added some signposts in there and you stepped into the technology and asked AI some prompts.
Thanks, Adam. I appreciate the encouragement. I have started to think more about addressing my NPO and also preparing for the syntopical essay in my blogs. Your feedback is much appreciated.
Great analysis of our work so far Graham. As it happens, my husband and I had a conversation about AI earlier today. He’s an engineer, deeply entrenched in a lot of secret stuff. His comment was, “I’m glad we have AI. It can do what we don’t need to do, so we can focus on the more important, less-redundant tasks that require human input, like figuring out what to do about nuclear weapons, how to talk to the Russians and the Chinese, and things like that.”
As you think about the work in which you are mostly engaged, how do you see the interplay between Systems 1 and 2, and how would it be optimized?
Hi Debbie, great question that I’m still thinking about. A couple of things that I think… there are some things we can and should do in System 1. However, when it comes to decision-making we need to slow ourselves, and our teams, down through a critical thinking processes. To do that it would be helpful to have processes to do that. We need to effortfully engage System 2 in the things that really matter, like problem solving and directional discernment.
I think optimizing means allowing System 1 to do the things it needs to do and developing the discipline needed to engage system 2 at key moments.
Here’s a real time issue… I deal with boards that want to operate in System 1 when going through a lead pastor transition. All they want to do is hire a new lead pastor and move on. They don’t want to think about who they are, what their goals are, and what they might need in a lead pastor for the future. My role is to get them to slow down and effort fully engage System 2 as I want them to navigate transition for their congregation rather than simply replace their lead pastor. I want them to work through a process of transition, asking hard questions, forming new vision, inviting Jesus to speak to them. Etc. at this critical juncture they must engage System 2 if they are going to successfully navigate transition.
Graham,
Thoughtful post. I agree with you, it is scary to let the car drive itself. I don’t think I could ever get comfortable with that.
Appreciate your post, especially the last paragraph. It made me realize that I had never considered that there could be two different ways of thinking. I would bet heavily that I have mainly been a systems 1 thinker most of my life, as I want it and want it now. (not the most patient guy around at times). How can individuals, especially leaders and researchers, avoid the pitfalls of letting System 1 dominate their thinking?
Thanks Chris. I think setting intentional practices to engage System 2 during decision making or problem solving might be helpful. For example, on our team we practice discernment when we’re making key decisions and have a series of steps we walk through that involves asking questions, listening and responding. I find these types of intentional behaviours force us out of System 1 thinking.