There's no such thing as Just a Tool | deadSimpleTech
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Heidegger thinks about tools like so: a tool is something (a thing that has being in the Heideggerian sense, not necessarily an object) that represents an extension of human capabilities in some way. A tool is thus any kind of thing that *lets you do something you wouldn't otherwise have been able to*. The important (for us) conceptual leap here is that when a tool works well, or isn't broken, it develops what Heidegger describes as a "ready-to-hand" quality: the tool fades into the background as a kind of human-tool gestalt of a human with the additional capability afforded by a tool forms. As a simple example of this, consider eating with a fork. When the fork is well-designed and not broken, *you don't explicitly have "I am using a fork" in your conscious mind while eating dinner*.
  • DoctorWhoDMC@lemmy.world
    30·
    2 days ago

    The “just a tool” refrain gets on my nerves because of the implication…

    A photocopier is also just a tool… But nobody’s delusional enough to think you can write an essay using a photocopier as an “assistive tool” without compromising your claim of authorship. But I’m expected to overlook when someone says they made an “AI assisted” artwork/novel/article, as if I’m too dumb to know that could well mean you didn’t actually make it.

  • altphoto@lemmy.today
    5·
    1 day ago

    AI is basically a drive through window library where the books are stolen and the librarian answers your questions about the subjects covered in those books by using a ouija board to composed the answers. Maybe the librarian would be one of those special people with photographic memory who turns their eyes upwards pretending to comoute something in their eye sockets before answering. But every so often they get a twitch or a full body convultion.

    • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
      1·
      11 hours ago

      Really good read. Making the car comparison and all its effects hammers (pun intended) down that “just a tool” can be an incredibly complex thing that needs a lot of variables to work properly. A hammer is a simple tool, a computer is not simple - there’s a global logistics chain that allows their existence - and neither is AI.

      We need to fight back against design that flattens our humanity at the benefit of efficiency and productivity. We need to question how our tools have created infrastructures and landscapes that are hostile to human existence.

      Emphasis mine. I’ve been thinking about that a lot. Everything is about being more efficient, more productive. Fuck that shit, I wanna enjoy life.

  • Pratai@piefed.caEnglish
    15·
    2 days ago

    This is every bit as obnoxious as when they try and claim that a photographer doesn’t take a picture, tHe cAmErA dOeS!

    Or how a musician that records analog instruments plugged into using digital audio software isn’t creating music.

    They’re desperate to defend their hackish soulless content.

  • Miller@lemmy.world
    3·
    2 days ago

    I tried to make that exact argument when I was buying a hammer from Homebase but they said fading into the background of an observing consciousness is not the same as merging into a single entity with it.