What Our Choices Around AI Say About Who We’re Becoming
How we build our AIs reflects who we are. The shortcuts, blind spots, and quiet biases—we’ve encoded them in. We train AI on our past, on histories told by winners, shaped by power, and filtered through incomplete records. Then we act surprised when it reproduces inequality, manipulation, invisibility. But this isn’t just about how AI is built. It’s about how we use it—and what we’re willing to hand over.
We give AI the work we’d rather avoid. Not just the repetitive tasks, but the soft, vulnerable, uncomfortable ones. The weak muscles we avoid training. The skills we feel awkward practicing in public. Everyone wants to train their biceps. No one wants to wobble on a balance board.
AI becomes the perfect excuse. Let it write the email. Let it make the decision. Let it speak for me. It lets us stay confident—and unfinished. So yes, AI doesn’t have ethics. We do. And when we hand over our thinking, we’re not just delegating. We’re dodging.
Every system makes assumptions. Every prompt carries politics. Every output is an argument about how the world should work. The real question isn’t what AI can do. It’s what we’re willing to give up—and who gets to decide that.
This makes me think about freedom. Or more specifically—Ibiza. I’ve visited several times during the off-season. To walk empty beaches. To swim in cold water. To do yoga with local people. To breathe. To think. One day after a class, a woman told me why she came to the island. “For freedom,” she said. The same freedom, she added, that brings others for chaos, parties, and escape. I told her I don’t drink. I’ve never done drugs. That kind of freedom wasn’t mine. She smiled: “No. That’s the point. You’ve chosen to use your freedom differently.” That moment stuck with me. Because freedom isn’t just what you’re allowed to do. It’s how you choose to use it.
AI Is the Same
We have freedom in how we build, train, and use AI. That’s power. But power isn’t the same as wisdom. The question isn’t whether we can use it. It’s how we choose to. Do we numb ourselves—or challenge ourselves? Do we hand over control—or grow into it? The tools are here. And if we’re not careful, we won’t just automate tasks. We’ll automate understanding. We’ll become excellent at delegation—and worse at being.
