When I prepare for a topic, I really want to understand it. I don't just want to quote a few figures. I want to know what's behind them - where the figures come from, how they are calculated and what they actually mean.

Recently, while preparing for a webinar on the topic of Zero Trust, there was the wish that I should start with Microsoft Digital Defense Report in my presentation - a 385-page document with countless statistics, charts and technical terms. And although I realized relatively quickly which figures I could use (because there were a few top facts right at the beginning), I wasn't 100% sure what these figures actually meant.

How does Microsoft define an „identity attack“? How is it measured that Germany is the fourth most affected country? And what does this mean in practice?

I need to be sure of what I'm saying when I'm on stage. Otherwise it would be difficult for me to convey it credibly.

Efficient access to knowledge

So I searched, read, scrolled - and at some point I realized: it takes a lot of time. And it's also annoying. I didn't want to read the whole report. I just wanted to know what the background to these few figures was.

So I did something that I now do quite often: I used ChatGPT in demand.

I gave him the report, asked my questions - and received answers in just a few minutes. Comprehensible, precise, with context and sometimes even with cross-references that I hadn't expected. I was able to ask questions, delve deeper and suddenly had a sense of overview.

That was impressive - but also instructive. Because, of course, I realized that these answers are not the source, they are the orientation. I double-checked all the points I wanted to use in the original document. Only then was it reliable for me.

Between speed and depth

But this experience also made me think again: because AI will not only change over time, how fast we find knowledge, but how we approach knowledge in the first place.

Understanding„ used to mean “understanding": read, read, read - until you arrived somewhere at the core. And on the way there, you may have picked up one or two unexpected insights.

Today it's more like: ask, check, combine.

And these things have to be learned and acquired as skills.

With AI, only those who ask the right questions will get good answers. Only those who check their answers can protect themselves against hallucinations and false information. And only those who sensibly combine the use of AI and other tools will be able to achieve real added value. If you only rely on one thing, you will soon be lost.

AI as a tool - not as a source of truth

AI is a great tool for structuring complexity. However, it does not replace a source, a critical mind or real judgment. It only helps to find the way there more quickly.

But this is precisely the point at which our relationship to knowledge is changing and which we need to think about: how does a world work in which we have access to knowledge practically in our pocket? But not like Wikipedia, where we can read pages of explanations for everything. But in the form of a mega-smart assistant that knows the answer to every question. Whether it's how a nuclear reactor works or what kind of insect is crawling across my balcony table.

The future belongs to the curious

Accordingly, how curious we are will become even more important in the future. We can know everything if we want to. But if we are not interested or we think that we are omniscient anyway, then we will be left behind. This new age belongs to the curious and inquisitive. Those who want to work with inexhaustible knowledge.

However, the change in our relationship to knowledge is also happening on another level: in the way knowledge is processed. Will we still be writing 385-page reports in the future? Will we optimize them for readability for humans or rather for interpretability for AI agents? Many people and companies will have a lot to think about in the coming years.

I, for one, am very happy about this new technology. Because on the one hand, I'm very curious and eager to learn, but on the other hand, I also get annoyed quickly when things don't get to the point and it feels like it takes forever for my question to be answered. That's why ChatGPT is a real quantum leap for me. And that's why I really enjoy working with it a lot. And I'm looking forward to everything that's yet to come.