Keeping the record straight

I am not a fan of paperwork. Dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s doesn’t do much for me in terms of intellectual stimulation.

Unfortunately, record-keeping is an important part of life as an adult. So I do it. Begrudgingly perhaps, but I find a way to fill out the forms, record the transactions, and pay the bills that keep showing up in my life.

You’re probably in pretty much the same boat. The universally felt ennui that hangs over those of us who have to perform necessary, but simple, tasks is undeniable. As a result, the more curious of us, the more creative, have for many years tried to find ways to ease our collective suffering.

Founding Father Thomas Jefferson did his part by tweaking the polygraph, a device that created a copy of letters he wrote, as he wrote them. It was a bit messy, perhaps. And, as with all copies, the results were often imperfect.

But progress is progress and having the ability to make two copies at a time was far better in terms of time and effort expended for a man who wrote and received literally thousands of letters over the course of his life.

Those of a certain age will recall the utility of carbon paper — a slender black sheet that was inserted into our typewriters between two pieces of white paper. With each stroke of the keys a letter or symbol or number would show up on our original, while a slightly less distinct but perfectly readable mark would be made on the second sheet of paper, the copy. Errors and all.

Technology has a tendency to seek out opportunities to ease the drudgery of our daily lives. Inventive individuals and groups work tirelessly for years on end to imagine and refine labor saving devices. The public will rejoice, they hope. They will pay, too. Profit is at the core of any industry after all.

Invent, promote, sell, profit. In that order.

Not long ago I began the laborious process of transferring the records of my several pilot logbooks to digital format. There are a variety of products on the market that offer the option of recording flight time, number of landings, day time, night time, single time, multi time, solo, dual, PIC, and all the various permutations of documentation we are required to maintain.

For me, my paper logbooks hold an emotional connection to a lifetime of effort. Notes in the margins tell the tale of wonderful flights and at least a couple terrifying incidents. They carry the signatures of pilots I’ve flown with and respect. Some are gone now. Some remain friends.

These logs aren’t just the fulfillment of a regulatory requirement. They contain the spark that ignites memories that might otherwise be lost. The date of my first lesson, it’s in there. My first solo is noted with pride. The signature of the DPE who conducted my first checkride, the inimitable Tommy Savage, is in those pages. My first flight as a professional pilot being paid to operate an aircraft. All there. All treasured moments. On paper, in books, stacked and stored for decades.

The digital version of these logs have the great benefit of not being at risk of natural disaster. I’m a fire, a flood, or a hurricane away from losing them. The doors of a hangar I was using were removed by a hurricane not long ago. Every scrap of paper in that building was soaked, windblown, and tattered beyond usefulness.

The technological advancement of the digital versions remove that risk — a notable improvement over the hard copies I’ve maintained all these years.

Most of the old guard I’m familiar with still keep paper logbooks. Partly out of habit. Partly because, like me, they’ve found the effort to transpose all those hundreds or thousands of entries on a computer keyboard is an enormous amount of work.

The younger crowd has embraced the digital format, as might be expected. Thirty years down the road, I’m not sure those entries of text will have the same emotional impact the handwritten entries we old folks have. But maybe they will.

In any case, these high-tech logbooks comply with the regulations, make keeping redundant copies a breeze, and don’t take up any space in the flight bag or on shelves at the house.

Artificial Intelligence can’t be far behind in this quest to keep accurate, reliable records. Computing power has increased by leaps and bounds over what was possible at the beginning of this decade, let alone what was realistic at the beginning of this century. AI has a place in our future.

AI also has its limits, as all productive tools do. It is not all things to all people at all times. It can’t be. That’s a bridge too far. What it can do is impressive. What it will learn to do is amazing. What it can’t do is legion.

How we interact with AI now and in the future remains to be seen. In the short term at least, there will be a great deal of distrust.

A reader recently commented that a column I wrote for General Aviation News was, in fact, AI generated. It was not. Nor will anything with my name and photo on it ever be.

If I sign my name to it, that work is mine. Whether it’s a flight, a maintenance activity, or a column in this fine publication.

I do my own work.

The suspicion is understandable, however. At least one major publication felt the wrath of readers and subscribers when it came to light some of their columnists were, in fact, not human. They were AI creations.

Thankfully, what writers and content producers like me have that AI creations cannot is a past. A documented history of work that can give readers and viewers the comfort of knowing they are dealing with a real person.

I am a human being. And I’ve got the records to prove it.