Why? Because I hate the mediocre crap! By and large it is pitiful poorly written garbage.
(My vision of the AI monster preparing to destroy all actual writing and all actual images.)
Last year I sat down to renew my Office 365 subscription. It usually ran about seventy dollars but not that time. It was a hundred dollars. They had added AI and they charged me an additional thirty dollars for it. No choice. I was in the middle of several projects so I couldn’t opt out of the service although I am really thinking about going over to WordPerfect on the next renewal date.
I did one experiment with it. I gave it five words and a topic. It wrote an essay. Not a very good essay but sort of C+ kind of high school essay. The content did not alarm me. What alarmed me was the entire process took about thirty seconds. In theory, I could generate 120 essays in an hour. And I could see in my mind’s eye, some person writing a blog online or doing school or college work or writing editorials for the local paper writing essay after essay after essay with the touch of a few buttons.
That was the last time I used the AI feature on Word. Every time I start the program, every single damn time, it starts with the AI program with the prompts to use it. I have to deliberately turn it off.
I write my blog myself. It is my thoughts, my ideas, my writing, my spelling, my punctuation and my phrasing. You, my readers, deserve nothing less.
I am considering putting some kind of “NO AI” label on the site. If one is not available online currently, I’m sure it will be soon.
I want you to know I am not the only one upset by the explosion of AI mediocrity.
Here is the magazine Scientific American’s published article linked to below by linguist Naomi S. Baron which discusses AI and writing :
But what happens to human communication when it’s my bot talking to your bot? Microsoft, Google and others are building out AI-infused e-mail functions that increasingly “read” what’s in our inbox and then draft replies for us. Today’s AI tools can learn your writing style and produce a reasonable facsimile of what you might have written yourself.
My concern is that it’s all too tempting to yield to such wiles in the name of saving time and minimizing effort. Whatever else makes us human, the ability to use words and grammar for expressing our thoughts and feelings is a critical chunk of that essence.
I was easily able to find numerous articles in a similar vein and to my dismay many cheerleading articles as well.
But I’ve made my decision.
I am a man hopefully a gentleman — and I do my own writing.
CEO’s will soon be gone. And when they are, it will be much better world and a much better economy.
When these preening fools with their enormous salaries, portfolio of stocks and out sized political power disappear, no one will lament and no one will care.
And right now they are firing people and replacing them with AI. They are so happy about it, talking about more profits and not having to deal with ungrateful and troublesome workers. You might think that they are acting like unfeeling and inhuman machines. And you would be right.
Over and over again, you see in the business press the worship of the cutthroat CEO putting the hammer down on the workers. You get the impression that they want a man who is completely free of the normal limitations on greed and wrong doing. They don’t look for Christians. They don’t look for human qualities like love, kindness and understanding. And above all a reverence for nation or an obedience to the law is a red line to be avoided.
So, what do stockholders and boards of directors want? They want a man shorn of human emotion.
However, they are often bitterly disappointed. Even the cold blooded specimens of humanity they can find sometimes slip. It is deeply regrettable. He might develop a love for a child. He might wander accidentally into a church. There is no telling what traps of morality, religion or family can do to even the best cold blooded psychopath.
At the moment, they are happily firing and destroying the human beings that get in the way of their vision. Don’t believe me??
Eric Vaughan, CEO of enterprise-software powerhouse IgniteTech, is unwavering as he reflects on the most radical decision of his decades-long career. In early 2023, convinced that generative AI was an “existential” transformation, Vaughan looked at his team and saw a workforce not fully on board. His ultimate response: He ripped the company down to the studs, replacing nearly 80% of staffwithin a year, according to headcount figures reviewed by Fortune.
Over the course of 2023 and into the first quarter of 2024, Vaughan said IgniteTech replaced hundreds of employees, declining to disclose a specific number. “That was not our goal,” he told Fortune. “It was extremely difficult … But changing minds was harder than adding skills.” It was, by any measure, a brutal reckoning—but Vaughan insists it was necessary, and says he’d do it again.
He got rid of eighty percent! Now, that is cold blooded! And he is so proud telling the press the he’d do it again and talking about his former employees as if they were some kind of disobedient pets! What a guy! The ideal CEO! Got a conscience, hell no, screw that! Ice water for blood.
Now of course, there has to be a down side. Carping critics like me. I, a pitiful liberal, with my weird and out of date beliefs in the sanctity of the law, Christian obligations devised and stated clearly by Jesus Christ and a devotion to the ideals of the United States. Those beliefs lead me to believe that this CEO is doomed to Hell where many others like him dwell.
But as these CEO’s fire and proclaim their delight in cruelty, they don’t realize the bitter irony.
Let me tell you a story. There was once an episode of the Twilight Zone called “The Brain Center at Whipple’s.”
Let me Quote that master of television writing, Rod Serling’s intro:
These are the players — with or without a scorecard. In one corner a machine; in the other, one Wallace V. Whipple, man. And the game? It happens to be the historical battle between flesh and steel, between the brain of man and the product of man’s brain. We don’t make book on this one and predict no winner….but we can tell you for this particular contest, there is standing room only — in the Twilight Zone.
In the story, a company manager replaces all the workers with machines and then is replaced by a machine himself. and this fictional and cautionary event is about to happen in real life.
(Film screen-shot of 1956 film Forbidden Planet. Intended to support film’s plot description. I include this picture because in the Twighlight episode discussed above, our friend robbie here was the one who replaced the boss – but he was uncredited, the fate of the robot.)
In an article written by Emma Burleigh in Fortune, Google X’s former chief business officer Mo Gawdat is quoted in the following article.
But executives shouldn’t celebrate their efficiency gains too soon—their role is also on the chopping block, Gawdat, who worked in tech for 30 years and now writes books on AI development, cautioned.
“CEOs are celebrating that they can now get rid of people and have productivity gains and cost reductions because AI can do that job. The one thing they don’t think of is AI will replace them too,” Gawdat continued. “AGI is going to be better at everything than humans, including being a CEO. You really have to imagine that there will be a time where most incompetent CEOs will be replaced.”
“Better at everything than humans, including being a CEO.” I love the irony and have a certain sense that this is finally real justice at these self-proclaimed masters of the economy.
But you say, “Stop James, that is merely one voice among many. I’m sure it is not true.”
Don’t be quite so sure, I have some other sources.
And this article from Inc – EXPERT OPINION BY JOE PROCOPIO.
Let me add here just above the link that this is a very delightfully written article. You should read the whole thing. This guy is just a great writer. jp
Corporate and unicorn CEOs have never had a stellar reputation. These aren’t men and women of the people by nature. But over the last 10 or so years, the CEO role has been further marred by alleged thieves (FTX), alleged liars (Theranos), and alleged cults of personality (WeWork), among many, many more problematic abuses of the position.
So, in my opinion, the days of the CEO are numbered. It probably should have happened a long time ago.
You would think that in a democracy what a majority of the people want would matter. You’d think. But very often it seems that the distance between what Americans wish for and want to happen and what our government does is wider than the Grand Canyon.
Can I give you an example? Quite a few but let us do just one. Do Americans want subsidies for solar energy?
(Quote from the article above.) An Instagram Reel by EnergySage — a platform that helps homeowners save up to $10,000 on rooftop solar panels — shared the stunning results of a recent study.
“Nearly 90% of Americans are in favor of government programs to help homeowners go solar,” the video says. “That includes 78% of 2020 voters for President Donald Trump.”
The clip also cites a survey from 2019, in which 92% of respondents said America should expand solar power. The lack of partisan split was equally encouraging: 86% of Republicans and 96% of Democrats backed the idea. The clip finishes with a map of the United States, highlighting the states that installed the most solar power in 2023, the year the Inflation Reduction Act went into full effect. Seven of the 10 backed the Republican candidate in 2024. (End quote.)
Those number would seem to suggest with great certainty that the American people want solar energy to be subsidized and it implies that they believe the future is going to be one of sustainable energy. So, how are their views reflected in the actions of their “democratically” elected government.
The federal government abolished a major tax credit for solar energy. See the link below.
President Trump signed the “Big Beautiful Bill” into law on Independence Day, cutting the 30% residential solar tax credit by December 31, 2025—nearly a decade ahead of schedule.
But that wasn’t the only thing cut. The current administration used its power to destroy a solar energy program of quite a large size in Ohio. Note the link below.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to end the “Solar for All” grant program – created by the Biden administration – has eliminated cash that would have provided solar power to over 900,000 homes nationwide. For Ohio, the impact is severe.
But don’t the American people want solar energy? What’s happening here? What happened to the a government “of the people, for the people?”
According to the report, Big Oil’s total known spending in the last election cycle amounted to “an astounding $445 million.”
“Importantly, however, the oil and gas industry also routes undisclosed funds through dark money groups that do not have to reveal their donors, making it nearly impossible to understand the full scope of their impact,” the report notes.
So, not so much a government of the people as a government purchased and operated for the benefit of giants corporations like the associated group know as “Big Oil.”
That explains a lot.
It explains why the President and his crawling minions in the House and Senate are entirely comfortable with defying the will of the people.
In terms of business ethics, it is a catastrophe. Morally wrong, it not only subverts democracy, it has the government enacting laws that results in policies that make money for contributors but in the long term are disastrous for the nation and the larger planet as well.
And it is a symbol to every student in the United States who sees that human beings educated in the finest institutions and elected by the American people sell themselves, their honor and their votes for money.
Hardcore Culture, a shift away from company loyalty to a “market based” culture. That doesn’t sound too bad, does it? Market based: Yeah, based on market forces, that’s okay, right? Or is it?
John Stankey has been making people “return to the office.”
(Quoted directly from the article linked to below.) The increasingly strict return-to-office mandate that AT&T has rolled out in phases over the past year has also resulted in further reductions, multiple employees have told Business Insider, and Stankey signaled in his memo that he’s fine with more people leaving if they’re not on board with the company’s new direction. (End quote.)
The information that we have, that is, the facts, say that working from home and other such flexible work ideas have led to greater employee satisfaction and productivity. So, why would you make people return to the office. It’s pretty clear, isn’t it. It is a return to the dictator style boss, the kick them in the teeth style boss epitomized by the yuppies in the 1980’s.
Apparently the investors are eating this stuff up. They love reduced work forces, corporate mandates and divesting the company from previous endeavors. And none of it has to make any sense, they are like toddlers strapped in a car seat, they enjoy the motion of the vehicle and that is enough. Thinking logically, critically or even trying to protect their money is hard while reacting positively to the supposedly alpha male characteristics of hard charging decisions, commands rather than cooperation, lots and lots of forced resignations and an emphasis on the perceived toughness of the CEO, well, that’s easy.
If you get the impression I don’t think much of the investment community, you would be right. But there is something far more alarming here but first let me quote my article about our star of a CEO.
(Quoted from article above.) As the company moves to sunset most of its copper network in the US by the end of 2029, Stankey has also instituted a broad cultural shift internally. He’s moved away from prioritizing 20th-century corporate values like loyalty and tenure in favor of a tech-style, “more market-based culture,” the AT&T CEO wrote in a sweeping memo last week that was first reported by Business Insider. (End quote.)
So, here’s my concern. Where are Western Values in all of this? A giant corporation like this one is also a political and cultural entity. In this article, there is an almost complete absence of any issue or topic related to Western Values save capitalism and market economics, and then only in its cruelest and simplest form.
What are Western Values? They fall into six categories: (From Wikipedia with my thanks!)
Does AT&T have any stance on obeying the law or participating in democracy or pledging to pay its taxes like a good citizen?
Why is a bald statement celebrating naked power and greed a positive for investors? And at the same time, the absence of any commitment to a better society, a greater nation or an improved civilization, and this absence does not trouble the investors at all. In face, I think they regard the evasion of human and moral values as a positive.
I think every corporation in the United States has a duty to the law and to its fellow citizens. I think we should all be invested with the responsibility of creating and maintaining a civil society and a program for human and cultural development because that is what a great people do and we should above all things strive to be a great people.
(Quoted directly from the article above.) The statistics are surprising. While psychopathy affects about 1% of the general population, the numbers are significantly higher in the business world. According to research cited in “Philonomist,” psychopathy affects 4% to 20% of employees, with a particular concentration in leadership positions. Simon Croom, a professor and researcher at the University of San Diego, claims that about 12% of senior corporate leaders exhibit psychopathic traits, meaning “psychopathy is up to 12 times more common among executives than in the general population.” Recent studies suggest an even higher percentage: about 20% of CEOs may exhibit psychopathic traits. This overrepresentation is not accidental – psychopaths are attracted to power, and some of their personality traits can actually aid in advancing through the corporate hierarchy.
Twenty percent of CEO’s is a very high proportion of working CEO’s with a serious personality disorder. What are the implications? I have had the misfortune to encounter psychopaths in my work in criminal justice. As you might imagine they were wrongdoers, remorseless liars and miscreants without a shred of human feeling. It was best to lock them up and remove them from the larger population. And while we have this choice when their behavior results in criminality, what choices do we have when their behavior produces corporate success?
Not many. We live in a CEO worshiping culture where it is assumed that CEO’s are geniuses and swashbuckling entrepreneurs. I do find any of this to be true and my opinion of American CEO’s is barely printable or speakable in polite company. But in a culture where CEO’s are given free rein to commit economic havoc (and they do), the psychopathic CEO and all others are well protected from interference or any form of justice. I could point to hundreds of examples but Boeing’s decisions resulting in the crashes of two aircraft with more than three hundred dead resulted in no criminal charges.
You might say a psychopath functioning as a CEO has found his natural environment much like a lion on the plains of the Serengeti.
America’s wars have been a study of mine for some years. In the military it often said that you learn a great deal about a nation by the people who serve, their willingness to act bravely and on behalf of others. I can’t help but believe that our willingness as a nation to use psychopaths to run important organizations says a lot about us as a nation.
A sort of a post religious world sort of decision would be one conclusion. An utter emphasis on success measured in dollar amounts would be another.
It would seem that for much of our leadership in the United States, any consideration of religion, patriotism, or any other human quality like empathy or kindness is simply irrelevant. The only thing that matters is narrowly defined set of personal economic goals, you know, so much money, so many houses, the trophy spouse and the political influence. It creates and maintains a cruel and rapacious word where spouses age and must be replaced, neighborhoods go out of style so you have to move and friends and allies are little more than simple pawns to be discarded when convenient.
And of course, the planet itself is to squeezed like an orange for every last bit of use without any regard for sustainability or our posterity. In the world of the psychopath, things and people exist only for use.
From my point of view entrusting societal resources to the mentally ill is a bad idea. But apparently for many of our “leadership” class, they are too useful to give up.
I will return to the topic of psychopaths in business in later posts. The subject fascinates me and should concern you.
James Alan Pilant
The article above that was linked to and quoted from is entitled:
Is Psychopathy an Asset in Business? Facts and Myths About Ruthless Leaders
(Quoted from the article linked to above.) Multiple boycotts of major corporations have taken place this year, many of which have been led by Schwarz and The People’s Union USA. These have been driven by backlash against certain companies amending or scaling back their commitments to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies, but also a wider groundswell of anti-corporate sentiment.(End quote.)
It is vital that we show the government and corporate leadership that individuals matter and our anger and dis-satisfaction are manifesting more and more over time.
This week in Business Ethics is marred by the death by ovarian cancer of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. She died during the week of Rosh Hashanah which in Jewish lore means she is particularly blessed. Here is a guide for my readers unfamiliar with the surrounding concepts.
Currently that American Institution, the Post Office, is under attack. Don’t believe me? A federal judge called the changes: “a politically motivated attack on the efficiency of the Postal Service” It is very poor business ethics indeed to sabotage a public agency, a public good for all Americans, for private gain. I found a good article on the importance of the sorting machines which I include here as well as the article I got the federal judge quote from.
Tragically there appears to be increasing violence surrounding requests that people wear masks and practice social distancing. In a particularly callous attack, a 67 year old gas station worker suffered a fractured skull after being assaulted with a pipe. It is a particularly bitter reality that during a worldwide pandemic, many Americans are unwilling to pull together in the wake of the viral threat to protect each other from infection. This generation of Americans is half helpless to act on behalf of the common good. Many believe in the crass nonsense of libertarianism and similar beliefs that the only interest is self interest. The generations of Americans that sacrificed in the face of war and epidemic must be astonished at this willingness to sacrifice our fellow Americans out of simple pig headedness.
Are we entering the Pyrocene, the age of fire? Stephen Pyne suggests in the High Country News that is indeed the case. He says that in previous ages we had ice ages and this current situation is the other side of the coin, that is, ages of fire. It’s a good read and a fairly brief one. It is attached below.
Over the last twenty years, financial institutions including the often mentioned five, HSBC, JPMorgan, Deutsche Bank, Standard Chartered and Bank of New York Mellon (BNY Mellon), conducted about 2 trillion dollars in suspicious activity. Rest assured this is a developing story and we are going to hear more as the particulars work their way to the surface.
Federal charges of among other charges, commercial bribery, were filed against six individuals who are charged with bribing Amazon employees to gain an unfair advantage. The bribes totaled about $100,000. Temporary suspensions of competitor accounts was one of the means used to gain advantage.
This kind of crime causes people to buy inferior or even dangerous goods. Let’s hope Amazon acts to clean up its staff.
New York filed a 2 billion dollar lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson for its role in the opoid crisis, that is, encouraging opoid use and downplaying the risks of addiction. Since Oklahoma has already won a case and 500 million dollars from the company, one has to wonder why the state has waited this long and is that the correct amount?
How is it that a video in which a man committed suicide live on Facebook does not violate their standards and is still up? Facebook says it has a policy against suicide and videos showing self harm but isn’t enforcing it.
Movie Theatres have been open for about a month but the economic returns have been disappointing. Mulan’s crash at the box office could not have helped matters.
We begin with the wave of fires creating waves of destruction in the American West. Governor Gavin Newsom says the debate over climate change is finished. He says in these California fires you can see the results of climate change with your own eyes. I strongly agree but I felt that the fires in Australia last year should have ended the debate. This is further evidence.
Climate change is going to be a continuing issue in business ethics. How are businesses, particularly, the international corporations, going to act on this issue? Their responses will be as important as that of many medium size nations.
Sir David Attenborough tells us in his latest documentary that 60% of the vertebrate animals have disappeared since 1970 and the rate of natural extinction has been accelerated 100 times.
Many businesses impact species extinction. The international trade in animals and animal parts is savagely destructive of the earth’s species. And we have only a limited time to act.
Let’s segue to a somewhat nostalgic and yet current note, that is, vinyl records have outsold CD’s for the first time since the 1980’s. That may be just a chimera though since streaming services are seizing the lion’s share of the market.
There is a famous insurance fraud case making the rounds on social media. A woman in Slovenia cut off her hand with a band saw claiming it was an accident that happened while cutting branches. Unfortunately for her claim, she had just taken out five insurance polices which would have resulted in an award of more the equivalent of more than a million US dollars. This was certainly suspicious but her boyfriend’s internet searches on artificial hands done before the loss clinched the case for fraud.
Apparently another case of stupid criminals but a very sad one (although the hand was reattached).
California’s legislature faced with a shortage of firefighters and inmates showing bravery and tenacity fighting the wave of fires has passed a law making it easier for them to expunge their records and become firefighters.
As a form of positive business ethics, I am impressed by the act. It seems to me simple justice that those on the frontline of fighting these terrible and now increasingly regular fires should be rewarded.
Rio Tinto’s CEO Jean-Sébastien Jacques, is going to resign following the destruction of sacred aboriginal sites. The company attempted to deal with the crisis by canceling bonuses but considering the harm done this was a non-starter.
This was an appalling crime and there is no real penalty. Under the law, they could destroy at will any cultural artifact on the land they controlled. The Juukan Gorge rock shelters had shown evidence of continuous human habitation for 46,000 years. They were an irreplaceable evidence of human history completely unique.
What kind of people are these to disintegrate and destroy cultural artifacts at will? And what kind of nation allows its cultural treasures to be annihilated without a hint of caution or penalty?
And finally, I would like to add my voice to Emily Stewart‘s writing in Vox. She is calling for providing all citizens of the United States with Internet. I strongly agree. If we are going to advance as a nation, that is a minimal requirement. Further, in a crisis like the current pandemic we have already seen the importance of being connected.
But please read the article, the author is detailed and impressive.
This week had some interesting aspects. After a deluge of foreign seeds began arriving in the United States, Amazon was caught without an appropriate policy. Well, now they have one. You can’t send seeds by Amazon. Looks like they went for simplicity in their policy making.
John Oliver’s feud with Danbury, Connecticut is reaching a crescendo. Will the city rename its sewage treatment plant in his honor? Will the feud come to a peaceful outcome? Stay tuned.
The Atlantic story about our president’s general contempt for veterans has made major waves in the political world. However, the editor of the magazine says there is more to come! More dramatic news than this is hard to imagine but nothing about our current political climate can be described as normal. Next week should be interesting.
An alligator skin handbag worth roughly $26,000 was destroyed in Australian customs for lacking a permit. This calls attention to the crime of animal parts being marketed to our jaded upper class. The struggle against this kind of nonsense is critical to preserving endangered species.
Americans appear to be obsessed with self-improvement. They want to be smarter, better looking and more confident. And to satisfy this need, there are books, films, courses, and the occasional cult.
The Nxivm cult used its clients’ needs for self-improvement, in particular the quest to find meaning in their lives, against them.
Sometimes I walk through the self-help sections of bookstores and marvel at the offerings. The books say you can be better at any worthwhile goal, often immediately. I am a Black Belt and it takes years (in my case – seven) to learn martial arts. This has given me a healthy skepticism about claims of speedy success. There is no golden road to improving yourself.
For instance, weight training. I learned a lot about lifting weights when I was using it to supplement my body development. Many of the books promise powerful benefits in six weeks of training and they are very often illustrated with before and after pictures. In actual fact, it takes about six months to get visual results with weightlifting and only with a strong routine. There are good internet articles on how the before and after pictures can be manipulated.
So, I have a healthy skepticism about claims of speedy improvement, etc.
But Nxivm got around the skepticism. Your first intro was someone of the first rank in society, often an heiress or a leader in a field. (The same method of recommendation is often used in Ponzi schemes.) And as you progress in the training you meet more and more opinion leaders and everything is designed to appear professional and well organized. The elements that in America are the epitome of our ruling class were used to sell what eventually turned out to be a tawdry sex cult where women were systematically degraded and manipulated in the name of liberation.
I would love to name a simple cure for cult recruiting, but there is none. We are taught or more correctly sold on the idea that self-improvement can be made easy and that it is purchasable. The fact is that we develop meaning in our lives by focused thinking, by experience and by our actions. Each of us can generate self-worth in multiple ways.
I know — I know. Relying on our own efforts seems like such a slender reed when confronted with our often-overwhelming reality of pandemic, bizarre politics and global disasters. But that is where the struggle for meaning takes place. You can quit, embrace a cult, settle for a religion, do just whatever your group does, conform, …
But the battle for who we are is always going to be internal, intensely personal, and dependent on our own struggles.
Climate change is going to be a continuing issue in business ethics. How are businesses, particularly, the international corporations, going to act on this issue? Their responses will be as important as that of many medium size nations.
Pilant's Business Ethics Blog 
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