AI is a Mirror

There is understandable fear around the takeover of AI.

And.

I wager that the deeper fear is that humanity may become indistinguishable from it. AI, like so much else happening around us, is an invitation to look in the mirror and assess what is going on within.

Though the defense of the em dash as a perfectly human punctuation mark remains worthwhile, we are also being invited to wake up in the morning and actually choose how to feel and act. If your house is falling on your head, then, indeed, that might be cause to panic. If it is not, perhaps there are other things to feel beyond those listed on the limited menu of social scripts within one’s chosen identity or cultural group.

I have noticed that those in institutions in most distress about AI also reward human actions that resemble AI coding. Note: how the academic job goes to the best mimic of a certain theorist; when the publishing industry invests on the writer whose works may provide the highest marketability; and the many economies fueled by the question “what will get the most likes?” None of these should even be considered “spicy” critiques of academia, the publishing industry, and the influencer economies; these institutions would not exist as we know them without their reliance on humans mimicking each other.

This issue is not only a question of capitalism . . .

To finish the rest of this pulse, in reciprocity, go through the threshold.

If you wish to reprint (part of) this pulse or to engage for another reason, feel free to reach out here.

Image: Technik by Minya Diez-Dührkoop (ca. 1924).