The On Being podcast with Krista Tippett remains one of my favorite podcasts, but the episode with Michael Pollan gave me a huge pause. It wasn’t because of anything Michael said. I’m in the middle of reading his new book, A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness and I’ve always enjoyed hearing him speak. They touched on the topic of AI in the episode and Krista discussed her conversations with Claude. I was so taken aback at how taken she was with Claude’s answers to her questions and her gushing giddiness about it all. It rattled me. Not because I was at all surprised that she was using AI, but because of her reaction to it. Perhaps I was mistaking her infatuation with Claude when what she was really trying to express was wonder and amazement. I don’t know, but I can’t shake this feeling of disappointment at what I interpret as her being fooled in a similar way as Richard Dawkins.