As AI gets more capable, trust becomes the scarce thing. That is the idea futurist Dan Burrus keeps returning to. Tools will do more of our searching, writing and deciding. The people and sources we can believe will matter more, not less.
Why trust gains value as AI advances
Burrus starts from a simple view. We live in a technological world, but it is still a human one. Relationships rest on trust, and trust rests on shared values, kept promises, honesty and integrity. In his words, “as AI advances trust becomes more valuable.”
He runs his own research company and says he checks everything he publishes several times. His reason is plain. Trust is easy to lose and hard to earn back.
He names two risks. The first is that AI can sound right while being wrong. Burrus expects systems to hallucinate less, and he says that is a problem, because people will stop checking. Then the rare big error slips through.
The second risk is that we talk to AI more and to people less. His reminder is that when you talk to a chatbot, “nobody’s home.” The research is early, but an MIT Media Lab and OpenAI study found that heavy chatbot use is correlated with loneliness and reduced socialization. The authors cautioned that this does not prove chatbots cause harm, and the work had not been peer reviewed. Burrus’s point is simpler. A network of trusted friends matters, and you can’t keep one if you stop talking to them.
What verification looks like
Burrus favors trust with verification. Check the original source of any news item that grabs you. Set up a family password, because a cloned voice can sound exactly like your nephew asking for bail money. Treat any text or email that claims to be from your bank as untrusted until you confirm it another way.
He also wants AI output to be easy to spot. Europe is moving that way, and the EU AI Act requires providers of generative AI to mark outputs in a machine-readable format. Burrus would go further and ask for a visible watermark, so a teacher knows whether she is grading a student or a machine.
His advice for schools applies at work and at home. Grade the prompt and the reasoning, not just the finished text. Use what AI gives you as a starting point, then use your own analysis and judgment to take it further. He calls this keeping a human in the loop, or better, in the lead.
If you want to go deeper on keeping your own judgment intact, I explored a related question in this episode on staying in control of your choices when using AI.
Here is one thing to try this week. Take one answer an AI gave you and trace it back to an original source before you act on it or share it. Then pick one question you would normally type into a chatbot and ask a person you trust instead.