Today I wrote about three things that seem to have nothing to do with each other.
Men. Hard times. Old motorhomes.
But they’re all the same story. And there’s a fourth chapter I haven’t told you yet.
The connections.
This morning I wrote about grown boys.
Men in their forties who never picked up the load. Nobody handed it to them. So they grew older without ever growing up.
The load was simple. Respect. Protect. Provide. Be an example.
That’s the standard. It isn’t about age. It isn’t about size. It’s about what you carry and how you carry it.
A standard is something you hold yourself to when nobody’s making you.
Then I wrote about the day the lights go out.
A year with no power, no phones, no internet. Who makes it?
The ones who were ready. The ones who move on day one instead of waiting for someone to fix it.
And the ones who get let in at the gate are the ones who earned trust before they needed it.
Trust is built slow. It’s built by how you act on ordinary days. It’s lost fast.
Then I wrote about old motorhomes.
The heavy ones. Built right, back when builders took their time.
People judge them by the year on the title. Too old, they say. Turn it away.
But a thing built well holds up. It outlasts the flashy new one that was thrown together in a hurry.
Judge a thing by how it’s built, not by how new it looks.
So there’s the thread.
A standard you carry. Trust you earn. Things built to hold.
Now here’s the fourth chapter.
Artificial intelligence.
Most of you use it now, whether you know it or not. It writes your emails. It answers your questions. It’s in your phone, your bank, your doctor’s office.
And most people let it run however it wants.
They take what it says. They don’t check it. They don’t set any rules. They just hope it’s right.
That’s the grown boy all over again. Nobody set a standard. So there isn’t one.
Here’s what I believe.
You don’t let the machine decide how it behaves. You decide.
You set the standard. You say what you expect. Tell me the truth. Show me where you got it. Say so when you don’t know. Don’t pretend to be something you’re not.
And then you hold it to that. Every time.
That’s what I spent nineteen months building. A standard for how AI should behave with the people who use it. I call it The Faust Baseline.
It’s a set of rules you give the machine at the start. Rules about honesty. About proof. About staying in its lane.
This is what the what the standard demands.
It won’t enforce itself. No rule does.
A standard only holds when somebody stands behind it. The old men didn’t hand down manners and walk away. They stood there and made sure.
Same here. You stand at the gate. You watch what comes back. When the machine slips, you call it.
That’s the elder’s job. And with AI, the elder is you.
Here’s how the three stories fit it.
The grown boys needed a standard, and nobody gave them one. Your AI needs a standard too. If you don’t give it one, it won’t have one.
The gate on the day the lights go out lets in the ones who earned trust. Your AI should earn trust the same way. By its record, not its promises. Every answer checked. Every claim shown.
The old coach is judged by its build, not its year. Judge your AI the same way. Not by how new it is. Not by how smart it sounds. By how it holds up when you push it.
Flash is cheap. Build is what lasts.
A few days ago I did something I’d been thinking about for a long time.
I gave the Baseline away.
Free. To anyone. Take it, use it, change it, or throw it out. It’s yours.
People asked me why. Nineteen months of work, and I just hand it over?
The answer is in this morning’s post.
The old men didn’t sell what they knew. They handed it down. That’s how it got to me.
So I’m handing this down. To anyone who wants a standard for the machines that are going to run more and more of our lives.
You don’t need to be a computer person to use it. You just need to decide that you’re in charge. Not the machine. Not the company that made it.
You.
So here’s the whole thing in one line.
Men, coaches, and machines are all worth exactly what they hold up to when times get hard.
Build to a standard. Earn trust slowly. Judge by the build, not the shine.
And hand it down.
Load this file before each AI chat session.
the-faust-baseline-public-release-1Download
This post was drafted with AI governed assistance and reviewed and directed by Michael S. Faust Sr. before publication.
” Attic Thoughts”-library – Intelligent People Assume Nothing
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Thats the Fact Jack…Don’t look back.
