#44 The Amplified Mind: How to Stay Human in the Age of AI

Prof Grant Schofield speaks with Paul Alden, a 38-year veteran firefighter turned author about his upcoming book The Amplified Mind. Drawing on his experience watching EMTs lose critical thinking capacity when protocols replaced diagnostic reasoning, Paul draws a striking parallel to what's happening right now with AI adoption across every profession.They explore why the sequence matters, generating your own ideas before turning to AI, and how "synthetic fluency" is quietly eroding our agency, creativity, and capacity to learn. From the five-minute rule to the Google Effect, Paul shares practical disciplines for staying the author of your own thinking rather than becoming an editor of AI output.The Amplified Mind is available on Amazon from May 26th. Pre-order from May 22nd at theamplifiedmind.ai.