The Plow

Imagine that you and I live next door to Khufu in ancient Egypt, say around 3000 BCE. One day we’re standing along our fence, chatting about the weather and how our crops are doing, and Khufu rolls up behind his ox, Babe, with this funny looking wedge thing.

“Hey Khufu, what the heck are you doing? What is that thing you’re pulling behind Babe?”, you ask.

“That, my friends, is what I call a plow”, Khufu says. “Instead of using a hoe and digging up my field by hand, I’m going to use this thing to till the dirt and plant my crops. It’s going to be epic. I’m going to grow way more food for my family this year, so much that I might be able to sell some. Crazy right?”

You and I look at each other and shake our heads. Khufu is always trying crazy stuff, we think. The plow will never work, and besides, our hoes are working just fine, thank you very much.

Sure enough, Khufu’s first two or three plows break in the middle of the field. Khufu’s not having much luck, and is in fact a bit behind in getting his crops planted this year. Babe’s pulling Khufu all over the field. It’s a mess.

Meanwhile, you and I with our hoes are cruising along. We’re starting to see the first green chutes of our crops. Life is good.

A few weeks later, Khufu has figures out this whole plow thing and has planted his entire field. He’s able to plant 15 more rows than we were because he and Babe finally figured things out. Plus Khufu’s whole family also learned how to use the plow, so they share the load. By the end of the year, Khufu’s fields yield enough for him to fill an extra shed. He stores some of his bounty and sells the rest.

Our other neighbor, let’s call him Jimmy, had a bad year. All of his crops have failed and he and his family are struggling. Khufu offers to buy Jimmy’s farm with his excess profits from the year at a big discount. Jimmy and his family can live on the farm, but they now work for Khufu instead of owning their land. In addition, Jimmy has to get another job to help cover expenses.

You and I meet along the fence again in the fall. “I wonder if we should get a plow. Khufu crushed it this year, and he just bought Jimmy’s farm,” I say.

“Nah,” you respond. “Did you see how many plows he broke and how hard it was to teach Babe to pull that thing? Our hoes are exactly what we need. That plow thing is totally overrated. Plus, he only got a few more bushels than us. I don’t think it’s going to catch on.”

“Yeah, I think you’re right,” I say.

The next spring Khufu has two plows and another ox. Jimmy and his family learn how to use the plow so they can help. He plants all of his fields and all of Jimmy’s in a quarter of the time it takes us to plant with our hoes. Khufu and Jimmy come over and offer to help us plant the rest of our crops. We’re running behind because of the rains at the start of the season, so we agree.

For their help, we give Khufu 15% of our crops at the end of the season. Khufu does the same for our other neighbors who, like us, couldn’t get their crops in with their hoes. Things are going so well that Jimmy quits his second job. It turns out that knowing how to work a plow is way more valuable than knowing how to hoe.

At the end of the growing season, Khufu builds another shed to store the additional yield from Jimmy’s fields and sells the 15% he made from helping his neighbors to the market. Over the winter, we run out of food. Khufu has plenty and offers to sell us some from his sheds. We buy what we need, but then realize the following spring we don’t have enough money to buy seeds to plant our crops.

“No problem,” says Khufu. “I’ll make you the same deal I made Jimmy. You and your family can stay on the farms, but I’ll buy them and you can work for me.”

Khufu buys more plows and more ox, and teaches us how to use them. We start using the plow and realize “Gosh, this is so much better than using our hoes! We should’ve bought our own plows two years ago!”

So it will be with AI.