Artificial Intelligence Is Here. Make Sure You Learn to Use the Tractor

First There Was the Plow, Then There Was the Tractor

The idea of the first gasoline-powered tractor was conceived by John Froelich in 1889 in Clay County, Iowa.¹ Designs allowing for commercialization followed, and by 1910, there were 500 tractors in service in the US. By 1935, there were nearly 1 million.² Imagine trying to be a successful farmer with only a horse and a plow by the time World War II rolled around.

The Fourth Evolution in Human History

The written word was the first signification of nonbiological evolution in our shared history as a species. Prior to words or pictographs written on walls, scrolls, or pages, information, knowledge, and insights traveled by the spoken word. Religious texts were the first form of mass education and collective knowledge (even if created manually by handwriting). Then, around 1440, came the Gutenberg printing press, a machine that could mass-produce texts at a pace nearly 100 times faster than monks or other dutiful beings could “spread the word.” Then, in the 1990s, the World Wide Web matured for

the everyday person, resulting in a boost in communication, information sharing, and collective know-how. We are now at the fourth evolution of the confluence of information and know-how—and even reasoning—with artificial intelligence (AI).

Don’t Wait, Start Now

As a student, resident, or young career pharmacist, you will witness what may be the most profound change in how our species works, plays, and prays. Use it (properly) for daily tasks that are repetitive or require tedious attention, publicly (free) or commercially (“pro” or “private” editions) for a small monthly fee. Take a master class or one of the many online courses for certificate programs through universities around the world. Or find a free course among the many offered by popular software companies of many types and stripes that want to train a generation of AI practitioners on their software. Create an AI group among peers who share which tasks can be done and which programs can be built, and identify new opportunities, links, and methods—like a “book club” of the modern world.

Clinical Practice, Not Clinical Knowledge, Will Save Your Job and Define Your Career

Above all else, hone your people skills. Volunteer to coach a sport, interview patients at the pharmacy, or train as a counselor. Your medication knowledge will be far less important than your medication know-how. Relate each patient’s circumstances to their specific plan of care as AI shepherds both practitioner and patient through pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics, polypharmacy, and behavior change. The “pharmacy consult” will first support the pharmacist through the speed and thoroughness of their consult, but will eventually be a relic of the past. The application of the findings of the AI agent consultation will remain in demand for many more years to come.

REFERENCES

1. Macmillan D, ed. John Deere Tractor Legacy: The Complete Illustrated History From Tractors and Machinery to Deere’s Role in Farm Life. Voyageur Press; 2012.

2. Jasny N. Tractor versus horse as a source of farm power. The American Economic Review. 1935;25(4):708-723. Accessed March 1, 2025. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1807806