AI Search for best hearing aids

@Bonaprof said:

My sons have been trying to get me to use an AI app on my iPad. I finally did yesterday asking three apps to tell me the best hearing aids in 2026.

I think you should be disappointed that your sons didn’t also help you to use AI in a more productive way. Simply prompting for the “the best hearing aids in 2026” seems designed to produce the worst possible response.

My two cents / tuppence…

AI is a misnomer which is unfortunately believed by perhaps over 90% of the population. It is nothing more than a search engine on steroids. Unlike real intelligence, it cannot produce anything that hasn’t already been produced by real intelligence. It is good at harvesting information then sorting through the information to give a reply that is related to the search query. It is poor at fact checking and even worse at sorting out factual references from the fiction. Does AI give results that are correct - yes, in some circumstances it does give correct information but often the response isn’t the best response it could have supplied. There are many ways to resolve life’s issues in every sphere, some of these will be excellent ways of resolving a particular problem but many others will be nothing more than a ‘quick fix’ which will resolve the issue in the short term but later in down the line the issue will return but be much worse. AI is like this in that it will provide answers to the query BUT it is up to the individual to do further research so they can determine which response is the correct one for them. When AI can invent something new without input from an expert in that particular field - that is when AI actually becomes intelligent and at the point it is on the cusp of achieving that goal then it must be shut down. People are already losing the ability to think for themselves with AI in it’s infancy. When AI becomes the thing that researchers are aiming for the planet will be populated with idiots who cannot make a decision for themselves.

I usually want the best of everything that I buy. Lately I have been using different AI searches before shopping typing “best” and the product. I just bought some rice and the recommended brand, Daawat Ultima, is actually much better than what I have been using. I did the same for pasta but the recommendation was not as good as the one i have been buying for years, Rummo. Who you gonna trust?

Don’t trust AI completely. Many times they are wrong, it cannot even find the correct words that I was looking for since it only contains so much information and leaves out the rest that you could benefit from. It is man-made programming and not human touch. It is best that you treat it as a suggestion and try it out. Every hearing aid is different for different people. This is coming from a guy who has been wearing hearing aids for 60 plus years and I still love the analog Phonak brand that has a better range compared to my digital Phonak.

My point to you is that when you query AI about a subject you already know the answers to, the information you get in return is often not accurate. It’s good for collecting a subset of data, but not verifying that data. And, considering the hoops people go through for SEO, AI is only as good at finding things as the sources permit. When it can return at least 80% accurate data for me is when I will trust its results. Until then, it’s really just a nicely worded Google search, with all the good and bad information found when you do one yourself.