AI IS DAZZLING, BUT THE HUMAN MIND IS UNMATCHED

THIS WORK IS AN URGENT CALL TO ACTION FOR HUMAN MINDS

AI has entered the domain of intelligence, a realm where human beings reigned supreme until recently. This development elicits both enthusiasm and fear. Yet, it also provides an epochal opportunity to focus on the most exquisite phenomena known to us: the human mind and relationships among human minds. The human reasoning mind possesses what we call ‘common sense,’ a humble term that belies the unfathomable depths of human reason, unattainable to any AI technology.  

Human babies are born with innate endowments of consciousness, reflective functioning, and the capacity to relate meaningfully and affectionately to other humans. It is understood that these faculties form the foundation of human reason. Building on them, human minds can acquire reasoned knowledge and ‘common sense.’ Cognitive scientists realize the depth of the mystery of such endowments. Modern AI machinery can demonstrate raw intelligence, but to reach the capacity for reasoning, to have ‘general intelligence,’ as babies do, there is another universe to cross.   

In its quest for the science of human agency, this book adopts a wide interdisciplinary approach spanning disparate fields such as AI, philosophy, history, economics, developmental biology, child development, psychodynamic theories, cognitive science, and Perennial Philosophy. It explores what we know, what we believe we know (our beliefs mistakenly accepted as scientific knowledge), and what humanity knew at the dawn of Western civilization, in classical antiquity, when the human reasoning mind first attained prominence as a sovereign and trustworthy instrument capable of engaging in philosophy and science. Beginning with the pioneering philosophers, we observe our increasing reliance on and trust in human reason. How did it all start, and how did we manage to leave behind irrational beliefs and harmful traditions? We understand that philosophy began as a discipline aimed at developing inner virtue and cultivating an ‘intimate and affectionate receptivity for wisdom’ through a set of ‘spiritual exercises’ (as termed by Pierre Hadot, a renowned scholar of classical antiquity). For its pioneers, philosophy was not a spectator sport. It was something one actively engaged in, not just something one talked about. What they did held profound transformative power: it reshaped their intimate inner experiences, fostered inner stability, curbed the irrational aspects of human reason, and limited the influence of raw self-interest. In doing so, they enhanced the trustworthiness of human reason and heralded a new era of humanist ethics.  

Modern humanity seems dazzled by 21st-century technology and has largely forgotten these age-old faculties, even if they have been preserved in Perennial Philosophy and are knocking on our doors again. We had better answer the call. We need effective global cooperation to meet the challenges coming our way, but it is becoming obvious that, on the whole, humans are way too selfish, glaringly unwilling to cooperate on a global scale, and utterly unprepared for impending global challenges (including AI, climate change, increased societal polarizations, and anti-democratic nationalism.) This sentiment is echoed by Gus Speth, one of the leaders in the environmental movement, who realized that, in fact, ‘the top environmental problems are selfishness, greed, and apathy, and to deal with those we need a cultural and spiritual transformation’. The centrifugal forces of raw self-interest, combined with the power of modern technology, threaten to gradually dismantle civilized society. 21st-century technology demands 21st-century ethics, one that enables human beings to truly become aware of and willing to care for other human beings. Primitive ethics — based on raw self-interest or externally imposed ethical rules and imperatives — will not be able to sustain civilization in the face of modern challenges. 

We can draw on the age-old wisdom — radical by today’s standards — on how to embrace and become sovereign masters of our own minds once again. To usher in a new era of the 21st-century Humanist Renaissance, which we so desperately need, we must elevate human reason to a new level.