You Know Me, AI

A new tool for reviewing new technologies, the Seinfeld Test: There has been some discussion in our office about the use of AI. There has not, to date, been any use outside of a couple of experiments. Before I describe the way we see the issues, I should discuss my bias: I am pretty much against the use of generative AI in design, although some lesser forms of machine learning are fine. (I’m not giving up predictive spellcheck any time soon.) I’m not particularly against new technology, but I look for technologies that reduce work rather than create it, which brings us to accuracy. There are multiple criticisms of AI, but in an engineering design, the top of the list is accuracy. When I see AI output in engineering discussions, it seems to always have errors. Sometimes I see it in terms of “we used AI for the first pass and now we’re cleaning it up,” which is fine. Sometimes – particularly on LinkedIn – I see people using AI to make illustrations of engineering principles and those…