Issue 142

WELCOME

A lot of the AI conversation is still framed around capability: what the systems can do, where they outperform, how quickly they’re improving. Useful, to a point.

But the question I keep coming back to is different: what do these systems make easier for us to stop doing?

In some ways, that’s the path from Being Designerly to Undelegatable.

Being Designerly explored human-centered ways of seeing, making, and deciding. Undelegatable is a sharper lens for this moment: the human capabilities that matter even more as AI gets woven into work, decisions, and meaning.

That’s the thread running through this issue. Not just what AI is getting better at, but what we may quietly get worse at if we’re not paying attention.

FEATURE

The risk isn’t that AI becomes curious. It’s that humans become less so.

As systems get better at exploring, testing, and generating possibilities, we may start outsourcing the very discomfort that makes curiosity valuable.

Not the answers. The questioning. That’s the tension.

When exploration gets cheaper, it becomes easier to mistake volume for insight. More paths explored. Less thought about which path matters.

The undelegatable version of curiosity isn’t just trying more things. It’s resisting premature closure. It’s asking the better second question. It’s staying with ambiguity long enough to make better decisions.

AI may expand exploration. Humans still have to protect inquiry.

That feels like one of the skills that matters more, not less.

CURIOSITY

What Artificial Curiosity Reveals About How AI Is Learning To Explore

Interesting article about artificial curiosity. But it’s not the same as human curiosity. AI can now explore what it doesn’t expect, learn from error, and keep probing the unknown. That matters.

But the undelegatable part of curiosity was never just wandering into novelty. It’s deciding what’s worth exploring, why it matters, and who bears the consequences of what we find.

Machines may get better at exploration. Humans are still responsible for meaning.

CRITICAL THINKING

Movements Need the Critical Thinking That AI Destroys

This piece gets at something deeper than “AI hurts critical thinking.” It points to a stranger risk: we may start replacing the friction of thinking with the comfort of being affirmed. That matters because the undelegatable part was never just producing a point of view. It was forming one through experience, tension, and judgment.

AI can simulate a voice. It still can’t own a perspective.

EMPATHY

I asked ChatGPT if AI can be empathetic: The answer surprised me

This article is framed around healthcare, but the point is much broader. What struck me here is how easily we confuse the performance of empathy with the practice of it. AI can mirror tone, recognize emotion, and generate reassuring language.

Useful? Yes. Equivalent? Not even close.

From an undelegatable point of view, empathy isn’t a communication style. It’s a human responsibility. And the more convincing simulation gets, the more careful we have to be about the difference.

ADVOCACY

Advocacy groups urge YouTube to protect kids from ‘AI slop’ videos

This article is about kids and AI slop. But the deeper issue is advocacy.

Because once content can be generated endlessly, the real question is no longer can we make it? It’s who is still willing to argue for the people on the receiving end of it?

Advocacy is what steps in when optimization ignores harm, when engagement outruns judgment, and when the most affected users have the least power in the room.

AI can flood the feed. Humans still have to protect what matters.

COLLABORATE

Sophisticated AI collaboration: An inside look at high-impact use

What I find most useful in this piece is the reminder that better AI use is not just an individual skill. It’s a collaborative one.

Because once AI becomes part of everyday work, the real question is not who can prompt best in private. It’s how teams build shared habits, shared standards, and shared judgment around what good use even looks like.

AI can help everyone move faster. Collaboration is what makes sure they’re still moving together.

UNTIL NEXT TIME

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I love your thoughts, suggestions and feedback, positive or negative—just reply or email me at lycerejo (at) gmail.com - thank you!