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Achieve Your Goals with Hal Elrod
574: How AI and Technology Are Making Us Dumber
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Are you starting to wonder about how much AI and technology is helping us or harming us? Most of us have smartphones in our pockets and rely on digital tools for almost everything. But beyond that, are we replacing a higher intelligence or even our...
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Hello and welcome to the Achieve your goals podcast, the show that empowers you to wake up to your full potential and achieve your biggest goals and dreams. I am your host, Hal Elrod and I invite you to join us each week as we share actionable strategies to take your life to the next level, as well as interview world class experts and entrepreneurs who have achieved extraordinary goals themselves. And we ask them to give you a peek behind the curtain and teach you exactly what you need to do to do the same. Ready? Here we go. Foreign welcome to another episode of the achieve your goals podcast. I'm your host, Hal Elrod and today we are diving into a topic that's been on my mind a lot lately because it's something I'm personally struggling with and I have a feeling that you might be too. However, like me, you might not be aware that you're struggling with it or that there are any potential unintended consequences that you may want to mitigate. Now, you may want to be aware of and think through. Through. Here's what I mean. The question that we're asking today is how is AI and technology fundamentally changing us? What is it doing to our brain, to our cognitive function? And is there an unintended spiritual consequence? And that might be more collectively, but it's going to happen on the individual level first. And of course it amplifies it scales as more and more people adopt these new technologies. But some of what I realized is maybe the old technologies, like using my digital calendar, which I've been using for probably a decade, how's that affecting me? So I've been going really deep into these topics and we're going to look at this question of how AI and technology is fundamentally changing us from two different perspectives. Number one, is it making us dumber? Are we unknowingly allowing it to take over our natural God and given mental abilities such as our memory, our critical thinking, our problem solving, our creativity, if you can just ask AI and you get an answer, or even just Google an answer, well, you don't have to think anymore. You don't have to think anymore and if you don't use a muscle, you lose it. The same is true with your brain. Second question or second perspective on this question is are we so reliant on technology that we're replacing our relationship with God? Now this is a big question, or at the very least our intuition, which many people would say are one and the same, right? You quiet your mind, you listen to your intuition. Many people would say that's the voice of God or higher intelligence. Right? And are we replacing higher intelligence with artificial intelligence? This is a big topic and I have a lot to say on it today, but this is a lot of self reflection, a lot of research that I've been doing. I want to have other experts on the podcast throughout this year because this is such. The more I look into the topic, I realize how pervasive this is going to be in our society. It already is. And if you're not paying attention to it, which I'm paying attention to it somewhat, but when you go deep dive, you go, oh my gosh, AI is going to change virtually every facet of our lives. So if you've ever wondered, and by the way, if you're not using AI, this applies to you. I'm going to talk about using digital calendars, using reminders, using smartphones. Like, if you've ever wondered whether your use of technology is helping or harming you, stick around, because this is going to be an episode that will apply to virtually all of us. Unless you don't have a smartphone and you don't have a computer and you don't use the Internet, then this doesn't apply to you. Right? Might apply to you if you have grandkids that do. Right? Before we dive in, I have a question for you. Do you ever wake up in the morning feeling tired? And I'd imagine the answer is, of course, we all do. Right? So here's what I want to introduce you to. It's the easiest, fastest way to wake yourself up and get going in the morning. It's downloading the new and improved Miracle Morning Routine app. This isn't just another alarm clock. It is your personal guide to waking up better. With just a few minutes each morning, the app walks you through the savers, silence, affirmations, visualization exercise, reading and scribing or journaling. All designed to help you start your day with energy, clarity and motivation. So there are guided meditations to clear your mind, powerful affirmations to boost your confidence and keep you focused on what matters most. Visualization exercises to help you achieve your goals. Quick morning workouts to get your blood flowing and your energy up. Handpicked book summaries you can grow yourself every day. A simple journaling tool to capture insights and gratitude. No more rolling out of bed feeling like a groggy zombie. No more scrolling social media. First thing, just intentional mornings that set you up for success in every area of your life. So if you're ready to stop waking up reactive and start your day proactive, Download the Miracle Morning Routine app today and start waking up to your full potential. And with the premium plus membership, you get live events with me throughout the year, and you can add another person at no additional charge, friend, family member, colleague, and give them an app subscription to be your accountability buddy and help them transform their mornings and their lives as well. All right, let's dive in. Talk about how AI and technology are fundamentally changing us. There's three segments today. The first segment I want to talk about is the cognitive impact of technology. All right, so we're gonna start with. I'd call this a hard truth, and it's one that, again, I've had to come to grips with myself and more and more recently, and it's that my use of technology, things like my online calendar, chat, GPT, my smartphone, reminders, things that we take for granted, that we use on a daily basis, it's literally causing and accelerating my own cognitive decline. This is what I'm inviting you to consider, that if you are relying on these things as much as I am, it's probably doing the same to you. Think about it. If I depend on my Google Calendar to tell me where to be at all times, which I do. If someone says, what are you doing tomorrow? And I might be worse than most, but I don't know, I'm like, I gotta check the count. I don't know. It's all on my calendar. So I don't even think about it. I don't worry about it. It's in the calendar, so I don't have to remember what I'm doing. I just every day look at my calendar the night before and go, okay, what do I got in the gym tomorrow? Great. And I usually only look a day ahead, sometimes for the week, I'll look at the whole week. But essentially, if I rely on my Google Calendar and I never exercise my ability to remember my schedule, what happens to my memory? It atrophies. It weakens. And the same with AI tools like ChatGPT. If every time you have a question, you immediately turn to AI instead of thinking, pondering, or using your intuition, then you're literally outsourcing your brain's ability to problem solve, to think deeply, think critically, to imagine. And when you don't use a muscle, what happens? You lose it. And there's actually a term for this. It's called digital dementia. Researchers have found that our reliance on technology is reducing our ability to. To focus, to think deeply, to retain information. And I struggle with all of these. And I always thought it was Chemo brain, which it might be, but if you don't have chemo brain and you didn't do chemotherapy, right, but you still struggle to focus, think deeply and retain information, you may be dealing with digital dementia. Studies show that when we store information in a device rather than in our brain, we actually become less likely to remember it. Our memory gets weaker. Now there's a book and I've only scratched the surface of the book summary. I haven't read the full book. In full disclosure, it's called the Shallows what the Internet is Doing to Our Brains and it talks about this topic. And Nicholas Carr, who is the author, he wrote an article titled Is Google Making Us Stupid now again, this is Google that's been around for, I don't know, a decade, longer than not chatgpt. So I know that some people listening are like, Yeah, I use AI, I use ChatGPT, but maybe half of you, maybe you listening, you're like, I don't use AI. Hal. Does this apply to me? Okay, well again, this article from Nick Carr was on Does Is Google Making Us Stupid? Where he explained how our brains are changing. We are losing our ability to focus and engage in deep thinking because we're always consumed in shallow surface level content that is only a click away, a search away. And one of my favorite books that I'm reading right now, it's Deep Work and why am I blanking on the author's name? I completely know this author. In fact I know him personally, so I'm really embarrassed if he's listening. Cal Newport, right. Anyway, the book is called Deep Work but he talks about this is how based on Google searches and AI like our ability to do deep work. It literally we are losing the ability. We're losing the ability if we continue to be reliant on technology to replace our memory, to replace our critical thinking, to replace our ability to focus those muscles, those mental muscles are going to atrophy. And I don't know about you, but I don't want that for myself and I don't want that for you either. I don't think any of us want that. So right now I have kids and I'm thinking about this not only for me, but for my daughter who's 15, my son is 12. And thankfully they use Google a little bit maybe, but they don't use any AI. And I'm really trying to think about how I introduce this for them. So I'm thinking about this for myself and optimizing my mental faculties. I'm thinking about it for you, I'm thinking about it. For my kids, I'm thinking about it for maybe a future book that I write. I want to change gears right now. Right. So I made the case. I hope you are at least thinking about this today. This is an invitation for us to think, for us to explore, for us to consider. How is AI affecting our cognitive abilities, our intelligence, our memory, our recall, et cetera. The second area that I wanted to approach this from is in relation to God, is AI replacing God? And I'm not saying that AI could actually replace God. I'm talking about people's relationship with God replacing God in our lives. Now hear me out. I'm not saying technology can actually replace God in physical slash spiritual reality. Nor am I saying that AI is necessarily evil, although I think it could be or could become if programmed by the wrong people. But consider this. Before AI, when we had a question about our life, about our purpose, or a difficult decision that we had to make, where did we turn? Before Google, before AI, many of us, if not all of us, turned inward. We prayed, we reflected, we sat in silence and waited for divine guidance. Or maybe we reached out to a friend, a family member, a loved one, and we leveraged their life experience, their wisdom, and we created a bond, a connection, a rapport between those people. And I'm not going to go into deep exploration of how our relationships are maybe affected by technology. I'll save that for another topic. But what do we do now? When we have a question about our life, our purpose, or a difficult decision, where do we turn? Now, many of us, if you use ChatGPT or even Google, we just type the question into our phone or into our computer. We hit enter and then we get an answer in seconds or an array of articles to read where other people do the thinking for us, whether it's the technology doing the thinking or it's the other person. Again, I never thought of Google in this way. It was only when I started diving into the research of how is ChatGPT impacting our cognitive abilities and our relationship with God and our intuition that I realized, oh, wait a minute, it's been happening for decades. It was happening with Google. ChatGPT is just a radical 10x evolution in the way technology is replacing our thinking. So we're losing our ability to think critically. And potentially we are losing our connection to our intuition, to our higher self, to God. Again, we're replacing our connection with higher intelligence with artificial intelligence. Mark Vernon, a philosopher, an author, he has written a lot about this. His work really has inspired me to understand this topic at a deeper level. And he argues that AI is, can never replace spiritual intelligence. Thank God, because spirituality is rooted in direct experience. Things like suffering and joy and love and longing and connection. AI is just data. It can't give us real wisdom. And for me personally, and I'm going to do an episode on the power of primary prayer coming up because I realized recently that I've had so many real life results oriented experiences where I prayed for something that the odds were one, and I don't know the official odds, but you know, let's say one in a million, one in a billion. And these things happened in. Call it God's perfect timing, but call it a coincidence one time. If it happened two times, you're like, there's no way that that could happen twice in that way, in such a specific way based on the prayer and based on the timing, right? And then three times, like, I'm gonna tease you this, I'm not gonna give y' all the stories of these prayer examples. But the point is, for a lot of people, I'm concerned that for our society, a lot of people, especially if they don't have God in their life and they don't have a relationship with God and they're not used to praying and they're not used to going inside, like, as generations continue to evolve, where AI becomes like, introduced at a young age. And I'm so thankful that we're not there yet, but I would imagine that's coming at some point in the not too far off future. But that's going to teach from a young age. While a child's brain is developing, instead of learning how to access their intuition or learning how to pray and connect with God or higher consciousness, they're going to immediately go to technology and lose that connection and lose that ability and lose the trust in their intuition. Think about that. If you've relied on your intuition and it's gotten you through difficult times or helped you make difficult decisions that have led to great opportunities, and you've learned to trust your intuition. It is literally a tool. You can't see it, you can't smell it, you can't touch it, right? But you can trust it. Same thing with if you've prayed and God you feel has come through for you in these amazing miraculous ways that you can't explain, that you can't dismiss as coincidence based on the precision in what you prayed for and the result that came from it, then you can learn to trust that. But if you never Learn to trust your intuition or God or prayer, and you rely on technology for the answers. What is that going to do to us as human beings? How is that changing us individually and, and then collectively? And the beauty of this, the good news, if you will, is if you're listening to this, most likely, unless you're like a kid right now, you grew up without all of these technologies, right? So you have real life personal experience, like I do, of accessing your intuition, of critically thinking through difficult decisions, of reaching out to a friend or a family member or a colleague to get their advice and their perspective. And you gained wisdom from their wisdom, which may have been gained from, like Mark Vernon talked about, real life direct experience that AI cannot replace because it only is data. And so if we rely on technology too much, we can easily fall into the trap of treating AI as our ultimate source of, of knowledge of God. That is dangerous, in my opinion. That is dangerous. And also, is it just like we're losing our humanity, we're losing our spirituality? If that is the case, again, I love that comparison. In fact, maybe that's what I'll call the episode today is replacing higher intelligence with artificial intelligence. That's what too many people are starting to do and. And it's not trending the old like it's trending toward technocracy, if you will. Goal achievers and members of the Miracle Morning community. I just wanted to remind you or invite you to check out the Miracle Morning Routine app in the App Store and the Google Play Store. It is free to download and comes with a robust assortment of features including templates to create your affirmations, a built in journal, customizable timers for your savers, the Savers 101 guided track where you complete your miracle morning in 13 minutes by simply hitting play. A Miracle Evening guided track to help you go to bed at night, and a lot more. And then you always have the option to upgrade to the premium version, our most popular version of the app, which you can try for a seven day free trial. And it gives you access to over 500 affirmations, a library of nearly 200 guided savers tracks so that you can click play and complete your savers in different areas of your life. You want to improve your mental health, you want to improve a relationship, you want to make more money. There are specific savers tracks, guided or designed I should say, for each of those outcomes that you want to achieve in your life. So you can again literally click play and complete your miracle morning. Plus over 200 journaling prompts and a lot more. And the app now has over 2,900 reviews, averaging 4.9 out of 5 stars. You can download the app now in the App Store or Google Play for Android users. Either way, I hope the app enhances your mornings and your life. All right, most important part of the episode today, let's talk about how to have a healthy relationship with technology. I'm not saying that we should all throw our phones in the trash and go live off the grid. Trust me, by the way, I've tried that. My wife Ursula and I moved onto a 30 acre property. We started raising animals, grew a garden, installed solar panels, and attempted to kind of live off the land. And yes, we're doing it in a hybrid way. But let me tell you, it is a lot harder than it sounds. This is one of those scenarios that I have found. The fantasy is better than the reality. Don't get me wrong, I'm looking over my computer right now at our property. It's beautiful. 30 acres. We've got horses back there. We got chickens over there. Right? It's amazing, but it's challenging. So again, I'm talking about how to live with technology. The goal is not to eliminate technology. It's to have a healthy relationship with it. So I'm going to give you all some actionable steps that you can take today, starting right now, to develop, cultivate a healthy relationship with your technology. Number one, this might surprise you, might not be what you expect. Stop taking your phone to the bathroom. Yes, I said it. I said it. I know many of you right now are resisting. You're hitting your phone or your computer screen. You're upset at this podcast. You're like, hal, no, I have to take my phone to the bathroom. And I know me tell you to stop doing that. It creates a certain reaction, I'm sure within you. And I know it also sounds like maybe like a small thing, but it's actually huge. Our addiction to our phones is so bad that we can't even go to the bathroom without them. Okay? So I am challenging you. Do it for a week. One week. You can do anything for a week, even if it's hard. Start by leaving your phones outside the bathroom and maybe put a sign on your bathroom door, like, right by the handle that reminds you so you can remember because it's such an addiction. It's so unconscious. And by the way, this isn't easy. And I'm recommitting. I've done this before, and I'm doing it again right now. I'M on day two right now. This was yesterday where I finally was like, all right, I'm having a breakthrough in these areas. I've got to share this. What are the most effective ways that we can all implement this healthy relationship with technology? And this is the first one. And I've done this before for an extended period of time. I've done like a week or a month at a time. A 30 day challenge, I think was the longest I went without my phone. And I don't know if I even succeeded. I don't know if I made it all 30 days, to be honest with you. But anyway, here's the point. It's a small step toward breaking the cycle of dependency. And so, and if you want a positive frame on not taking your phone to the bathroom, this is the what I tell myself, I'm going to go to the bathroom with God. I'm gonna go to the bathroom with God. And again, even if, if you don't even believe in God, go to the bathroom with your intuition, with your own mind, your own spirit, like, whatever it is, whatever it is for you, for me, it's, I go to the bathroom with God and so I leave my phone out and think of it this way. Well, let me keep going. All right, number two, spend more time with God without technology. So the bathroom is the start, right? That's like, it's a small thing. You're only in there for a minute, five minutes maybe, maybe longer. Usually we're in there a lot longer because we're on our phone. Right, but you're going to get in and out a lot quicker without the phone. But that's step one. And again, small thing, small step toward breaking that cycle of dependency. Number two, my second tip for you to develop a healthy relationship with technology is spend more time with God without technology. In addition to the bathroom. And whether you call it prayer or meditation or quiet reflection, we all need time to be still and go inward and listen, spend time in nature, sit in silence. This morning I did a two hour miracle morning, and I wasn't allowed to touch my phone until I was done with my miracle morning. I know it's counterintuitive. You're like, what if you're using the miracle morning app? Well, today I was like, all right, I'm going, no technology. I, I'm not even using the miracle morning app. I just want to do a digital detox. So have meaningful in person conversations either with yourself or with other people. The point is, spend more time without technology, in nature, in silence. In conversation with others. Make this a daily practice. Number three, and this is in conjunction with number two, track your time of on technology versus and you can either say off technology or you could say with God. Like how much time are you spending with God in solitude, in silence, in nature versus with technology on your phone, on your computer. Right. Pay attention to how much time you spend between the two and you might be shocked at the imbalance. I was, I mean, I'm spending literally 8 to 12 hours a day on technology on my computer, working 8 hours a day on my phone, in between, on the TV in the evening, I was almost like, I don't know if embarrassed is the right word. I'm just like, oh my gosh, I can't believe I'm doing this right. I'm spending like an hour or two a day in silence, in nature and I'm spending eight to 12 hours on technology. So track your time, you might be surprised. And then number four, and this is important, this is specific to those of you that are using AI, artificial intelligence, specifically ChatGPT. That's the most popular AI tool out there. And here's the tip number four. Use AI as a tool to enhance, not replace thinking. And I learned this from Jeff woods, the author of the AI Driven Leader, when I had him on the podcast a few months ago. He explains that AI should be used as a tool for augmentation, not a substitution. So what I mean is instead of letting AI think for us, we should use it to challenge our thinking, to spark new ideas, to improve our decision making process. He suggests asking AI open ended questions to get different perspectives. And then just like if you were reading a book, you're getting a different perspective but then taking the time to analyze, to reflect and apply our own reasoning. So don't let what the AI spits out and go, yep, that's truth. I'm going to copy and paste it and that's it. No, use AI to support your cognitive growth rather than diminishing it. And then the fifth and final tip is create a 30 day, less tech, more God challenge. And again, I'm using the word God here. I don't want to say loosely, I don't ever want to use the word God loosely, but meaning that for depending on your beliefs, I'm just always trying to be sensitive. We have people of all different beliefs listening to this podcast. And so for you, if you're like God, that doesn't resonate with me. I, I don't talk to God or I don't even believe In God. Great. Less tech, more solitude, Less tech, more silence. Less tech, more, more deep thought. Less tech, more nature time. Less tech, more meditation. For me, the word God encapsulates all of that. So a 30 day less tech, more God challenge. And again, if for you 30 days, you're like, ah, hell, not ready to commit for 30 days and maybe you just start with that seven day, don't take the phone to the bathroom challenge. But for the next 30 days, starting with those seven, be intentional about reducing your screen time and increasing your time spent in deep thought, in prayer, in meditation, in nature, in real world connection. And see how it changes you. See how when you elevate your consciousness to be aware of technology and the role it plays in your life and how addicted to it, you slash we. I'm in this too. How addicted to it we are. And that way you can make more conscious decisions. And again, pay attention to those two questions, those two perspectives around the question of how is AI and technology fundamentally changing us in two ways. Is it making you dumber? And I know it's a crude way of saying it, but meaning right, is it affecting your cognitive abilities, your mental health abilities, your mental function, your memory or AKA your recall, your ability to focus, your ability to reason, and thank your creativity, if you're outsourcing that to Google or chat GPT and you're not using that part of your brain, it is literally atrophying and you will lose that ability. Have you seen that? What was that movie? It was a cartoon movie. I forgot what it was. It was where in the beginning all the human beings are up on a spaceship and they're just staring at a screen and they have. They can't think. And that came to me as I was prepping for today's episode because I'm like, that's the future that we're headed towards as a society, humanity, if we continue to outsource our thinking and our decision making and our creativity to technology. All right, my friends, let's recap. Technology and AI are incredible tools, no doubt in my mind. I agree. But if we rely on them too much, they can weaken our cognitive abilities and disconnect us from God, from our intuition, from higher consciousness as it's replaced with artificial intelligence. And the solution is to be intentional, to use technology when it serves you, but don't let it replace your ability to think, to reflect, to connect with something greater than yourself. So the challenge again is join me in the 30 day less tech, more God challenge starting today. Don't wait Reduce your technology use. Start by not taking your phone to the bathroom. Again. It seems small. It's also, I know you're thinking that's going to be hard. But every day, think about it, you use the bathroom at least a few times a day, right? So every time you do, it's only a minute without your phone, it's only a minute or two or five, but you're reinforcing. Hey, I don't have to have my phone. And now that I'm using the bathroom like I used to without a phone in front of my face, and I'm left to my own devices. I'm left to think. I'm left to connect with God. I'm left to tap into my intuition. Maybe you're gonna have the most brilliant thoughts you've ever had while you're going to the bathroom and your phone's out in the hallway. You follow me. All right, so spend more time in nature and prayer and silence and let's see what happens. And I'd love to hear from you. How do you balance technology in your life? Send me a message on Instagram, tag me on social media, send me an email reply to the email. If you're on my email list and you got this podcast, email reply back. And let's keep this conversation going. This is like the first of many conversations. I'm going to bring in experts who know way more than me on this topic, where it's their expertise, and bring them in to keep the conversation around technology going. All right, thank you so much for tuning in today. If this episode resonated with you, please share it with someone who might benefit from it. And don't forget to subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode. If you're down, leave me review on itunes or your favorite podcasting platform, Spotify. It really helps the show. And until next time, keep striving to achieve your goals. And remember, the answers you seek aren't just in technology, they are within you. Appreciate you, love you so much. And I will talk to you next week.
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Thanks for listening. To learn more about the Achieve your Goals podcast and to get access today's show notes, transcript and exclusive content from Hal Elrod, visit Hal Elrod.com podcast thanks again for joining us. Be sure to tune in next week for another episode of the Achieve youe Goals podcast.