Even as I write this blog, I cannot help but appreciate the beauty of artificial intelligence – and I am using only its most basic offerings: spell-check, grammar-check, and the like.

 But although we humans take such pride in our intelligence, it might be that other aspects of our human nature are more worthy of our approbation. For myself, what I most appreciate about humans is our souls. 

Yes, I dare to use the word ‘soul’. Increasingly, I am finding that it is a useful concept for capturing elements of knowledge about ourselves that other concepts don’t capture. Through my study about ‘the construction of meaning’ I have become increasingly aware that there is always a Self beyond which we can see – because the very act of seeing, or of knowing, or of experiencing, is one from within that larger Self. The conscious self, that we are apt to call ‘self’ is necessarily smaller than the Self from which consciousness emerges. When we view humans in interaction with each other, building larger units of Communities, there is even a wider, deeper expanse of human energy that we cannot know. We can only enjoy its essence, the way that our bodies enjoy oxygen. This is my version of what Carl Jung called ‘the oceanic spirit’. 

I can easily imagine AI to take over many human functions. The ability of AI to mimic human behavior cannot be denied. I do not envision – at least yet- however, that AI will tap into that shared energy that is the source of our humanness. Harlow’s baby monkeys come to mind. If you are not familiar with the lessons that they teach, then watch this video on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrNBEhzjg8I.  You see the mammalian need for attachment, for communication, and for security are the essential aspects of connection.  

Machines do not need love. They need batteries. They need electric/chemical currents. If and when what we call ‘love’ or ‘nurturing’ or ‘care’ is reduced to physics, then perhaps we can envision machines creating ‘cultures’.  

In my view, each human can only thrive through attachment and human connection (or perhaps a wolf will serve if a human is not available).  Humans are connected through cultures, which are supported by some deeper shared species energy (I do like Jung’s term for this).  Is this not what really separates humans from other species? Is it not our capacity for creating social communities that have a past and a future that define us? 

So, perhaps it has been the human drive for social connection that has led to our developing those tools that we call ‘intelligence’. Do machines have that drive? Do they have ‘will’? Will they know ‘love’? These are the questions that I find myself asking.