The Think slogan goes back to Thomas Watson, Sr. In 1915, as a sales manager for NCR, he developed the saying after becoming frustrated that no one on his executive team seemed to have any ideas. He argued, “The trouble with every one of us is that we don’t think enough. We don’t get paid for working with our feet — we get paid for working with our heads.”
This lack of thinking is what we’re not addressing when it comes to AI.
Like any powerful tool, AI is neither good nor bad. Like nuclear technology, it depends on how the technology is used. Currently, there is a lot of focus on building ever more powerful AI weapons, some of which are pretty scary. This drone-delivered weaponized Chinese robotic dog could be a scene from “The Terminator,” and that is far from the only example.
Back at the Beginning and IBM Watson
When IBM started Watson, it was accidentally focused on winning game shows to demonstrate its capabilities. However, much of the initial work was on providing better and more timely medical advice.
While IBM’s inability to reliably access medical data and the potential liability of getting that wrong forced it to pivot away from this market, it did highlight that IBM was following the “Think” process because better medical care should be an exceedingly high, if not the highest, priority. It should come way before AI weapons systems.
Medical costs, particularly here in the U.S., are incredibly high, while medical quality is largely deficient, which seems like the worst of all worlds. AI could address the cost and the quality of medical services, but right now, that does not appear to be a top priority, giving way to the more troubling uses of AI.
I think rather than focusing on throwing AI at everything, we should have a priority list of things we want AI to do. Toward the top would be a far better digital assistant.
Lunar Lake vs. Snapdragon X Elite
Your digital assistant will need to be with you while you work, and much of our initial AI use will be tied to making us more productive. However, we need to push up the quality requirements of this effort because, in the last head-to-head comparison, Microsoft Copilot ranked last. It is interesting to note that the current iteration of ChatGPT, which is the basis of Copilot, ranked second while Perplexity ranked first. We don’t only need AI with us; we need the information it provides to be accurate and useful, and right now, Copilot is falling short.
Copilot+, which includes Recall and Cocreator, was designed to work on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite processor, and initially, both AMD and Intel were bypassed. However, both companies have put in a ton of work to close this gap, and it looks like the next big AI chip drop will come from Intel and its high-end client processors code-named Lunar Lake.
Lunar Lake represents a massive effort from Intel and brings to market a level of capability we weren’t expecting until 2026. Still, it will also be more expensive, allowing Qualcomm to likely own mainstream notebooks until AMD’s more affordable alternative comes to market.
However, and this again goes to priorities, you’d think workstations and desktop PCs would have been prioritized because that is where professional creators still live, and even workstation laptops aren’t included in the initial Copilot+ efforts. The closest thing to a Copilot+ workstation is the Qualcomm Snapdragon Dev Kit for Windows which people who want this AI functionality in a desktop are buying up.
Given that desktops and workstations don’t require the power of laptops and are used by developers, who are more Microsoft’s primary customers than end users, you’d think desktop and laptop workstations would be a priority. Nvidia prevailed on Microsoft to embrace their platform, and AMD is right there with them, but with a gaming focus.
Focusing on gaming is important because smart non-player characters (NPCs) could make an enormous difference in games, both as opponents and partners. Imagine, for instance, having a bonded pet like a dragon that could fight and protect you intelligently, let alone an in-game helper who could guide you through some of the more challenging puzzles (I hate puzzles in games).
Wrapping Up: AI Priorities
Back to priorities: I think AI should first help us make better decisions and then focus on those things that take the pleasure out of life, like cleaning, doing the laundry, driving in traffic, checking our work (but not doing it for us), and helping us form better relationships or make relationships work.
In the end, AI could make the world a better place or one that was much, much worse. Personally, I’d prefer the former over the latter. I don’t need more difficulty in my life, but I could certainly use more help.
Trustworthy: The Family Operating System
On the topic of where I think AI should be focused, it is helping us manage our personal and family life.
From maintaining documentation so that, should something happen to us, those left behind can more quickly and easily manage our estates and bills, to keeping track of critical records like mortgages, birth certificates, credit cards, retirement accounts, insurance, and passwords, the Trustworthy Family Operating System helps with the annoying tasks that can take the fun out of your personal life.
