AI as a tool: is it time to stop talking about dependence?

A little while ago I wrote about how AI is making us more dependent and about the knowledge debt we pile up when we delegate everything. I still think there’s some truth in those thoughts. But I’ve been turning it over in my head lately, and my mindset is shifting. Today I want to tell you why, now that I see AI as a tool like any other, talking about “dependence” on it makes less and less sense to me.

Don’t we already depend on the internet?

Let’s start with an uncomfortable question: aren’t we already completely dependent on the internet?

I am. My businesses are online and I make my money online. And I do it because I trust the internet will still be there tomorrow. But if it went down worldwide one day, my business and half the planet’s would go under, and we’d all have to find something else to do.

And yet nobody tells us we’re “becoming dependent” on the internet. We accept it for what it is: the infrastructure we work on. And let’s be honest: do you really know how the internet works under the hood? I don’t, and neither do most people. And that’s fine.

AI is here to stay

I see exactly the same thing with artificial intelligence. It’s the new industrial revolution, the new internet revolution: a completely different way of working. And we’re going to adopt it because AI will still be here tomorrow, and the day after that too.

In 10, 20 or 50 years it’ll still be with us, probably far more powerful, better and more efficient. So asking whether we’re becoming dependent on AI is starting to sound like asking whether we’re becoming dependent on electricity. That’s not the point anymore. The point is to adapt, whether we like it or not. And not just freelancers: big companies are changing the way they work too.

From 16 to 12 pixels: mouse or AI?

This thought came to me while I was talking with a colleague about using AI to design websites. I told him about something that had crossed my mind months ago: “I even have to ask AI to change a font from 16 to 12 pixels.” At the time, it struck me as a worrying symptom.

But then you flip it around: don’t you depend on Figma for your designs? What happens if Figma disappears tomorrow? Your whole workflow falls apart and you have to switch tools.

So what’s the difference between grabbing the mouse, clicking on some text and changing it from 16 to 12 pixels, and telling an AI “change this text from 16 to 12 pixels”? I don’t see any. The medium changes, but the result doesn’t. And, above all, who makes the call doesn’t change: you’re the one asking for that change, because your judgment tells you that text needs to be 12 pixels.

From stone to hammer

I like to think about it with a very simple example. Imagine you’re a carpenter and you use a stone to drive nails. It’s uneven and inefficient: you’re slow, you don’t hit the nail cleanly, sometimes it goes in crooked and you have very little control.

One day someone invents the metal hammer. And suddenly, instead of driving 4 nails a day, you drive 40. Faster, more precisely and with a better result.

Would anyone say that carpenter has become “dependent on the hammer”? Well, it’s the same with AI. We’re swapping one tool, like Figma, for a more powerful one, like artificial intelligence. But the goal is the same and the judgment is still yours.

Nobody pays you for the tool

And this, for me, is the key to the whole thing. Nobody pays you to use Figma, or to use AI, or for any particular tool. They pay you to design a website. They pay you for the result, for your judgment and for what you know how to do, not for moving things around a screen with a mouse.

Once you see it that way, the question changes. It’s no longer “Am I too dependent on AI?” but “Am I bringing judgment that’s actually worth something?” That’s the part you need to take care of.

What doesn’t change: learn the craft

That said, there’s one thing I still stand by just as much as before: you have to learn the craft. A hammer doesn’t turn anyone into a carpenter; it just makes someone who already knows what they’re doing better and faster.

The same goes for AI. If you understand design, typography, hierarchy or code, AI multiplies your work. If you don’t understand any of it, it only multiplies your mistakes. Judgment first, tool second.

Conclusion

The way I see artificial intelligence has changed. I no longer see it as a threat that makes us dependent, but as the next tool in a long line: the internet, the computer, Figma… and now AI. The future runs through it and we have to adapt. What matters isn’t the tool you use, but the judgment you put behind it. That judgment is what makes you valuable, and no hammer can replace it.