Thank you for this article. You’ve articulated what many of us have been feeling but haven’t been able to name, how the AI narrative has morphed from curiosity into a cultural myth that shapes our behavior, values, and sense of agency. This isn’t just about technology; it’s about the kind of future we want to co-create.
I like your idea of reframing the utility of AI away from artificial thinking towards assisted thinking! This is powerful. It has themes of enablement and empowerment instead of suppression and paternalism.
YES! This needs to be on billboards and discussed in all the podcasts. (Are you pitching yourself to podcasts? Please doooooo it!)
The inevitability narrative and panic are at an all-time high, and people need to understand (as you say) that AI can “create space for reflection, depth, and originality. Not just do things faster, but help us do the right things, better.” And yes, business leaders should ideally have an understanding of AI adoption with intentionality…not just “optimization” that delivers quick wins for the bottom line and burns their remaining folks.
yes Cat! Agree hard. Gil’s thinking needs as wide an audience as possible. We need to be having different conversations at scale. If we don’t the only thing AI will be accelerating is our demise. Collapse signals are everywhere. You can only stretch these old brittle systems so far before they break. I don’t see enough discourse about what happens when they do — and what we want in their place.
Maybe we will all laugh that I was just about to try to connect you two via one of Cat’s recent posts 😂 I’m glad to see you’ve already found each other!
This cuts to the heart of what so many are sensing but struggling to name: that the real risk isn’t just AI itself, but the story we’re letting it tell for us — about value, agency, and what work is for.
What resonated most for me was the reframing of AI’s promise: not speed for its own sake, but space — space to think more deeply, design more intentionally, and reclaim what makes us human. That’s the shift I want to see more of.
Hi 👋 I felt a lot of resonance in your post here it’s touching on a lot of the things I think about and that keeps me up at night. What you said here struck home for me and feels like to core tension I’m navigating in my own consciousness —> “Real transformation is rarely efficient. It’s messy. Slow. Human. But that’s not a flaw, it’s a feature.”
I’ve felt and experienced this deeply and I’m super curious (and diving on practically) on how we integrate AI to support us to BE more rather than DO more.
Thank you for your writing and reflections. - Sarah
Thanks for your thoughtful comment, Sarah. Since writing this post, I’ve been connecting with others in the field, and what strikes me is how many of us are feeling the same dissonance … between what we can do and what we’ve been conditioned to do over the past decades. We’ve inherited a legacy that wasn’t really ours to begin with. Let me know if you have any thoughts about this. I’d love to read.
I agree with the many responses here: this is an important and necessary reframing.
I’m trying something related in Mind Revolution, arguing that the emphasis in the myth (in your terms) on external changes has blinded us to the internal changes that AI and related technologies are creating.
I love your point that AI’s “true impact will be shaped by how we choose to use it.” AI can certainly increase efficiency and impact how you communicate. I started using it to wordsmith my blunt and direct American style of writing emails to resonate more with my Nigerian colleagues. In just a few months, I’ve gotten to the point where Copilot rarely suggests changes.
But there is also great opportunity to increase your depth. I’m a middle-aged lawyer with a full-time day job. Not someone you would expect to be reading scholarly papers on the “Automation of Systematic Reviews with Large Language Models.” But here I am, doing just that because I have a tool that can help me translate complex technical information into terms that I understand. In one of my threads, GPT referred to it as “cognitive scaffolding” which seems quite apt.
I am not certain, however, that it will be the industry or the AI developers who will lead the change in how we approach AI. It must be done at the grassroots level, by individual users who decide to reframe the narrative for themselves and harness the powers of AI for more than just … more work.
This is great real world examples of how AI can be put for good use, Alyssa. Share more of your examples and personal stories so we can all learn. To your point, we have to be intentional with this technology. Otherwise this will become another “social media” moment where tools optimized for mindless engagement that trap us, instead of helping us to become better at our craft. It won’t come from the top. That’s the message I want to spread
I’ve noticed a small, quiet and growing group of people who are all seeing the same AI opportunity.
I see AI use in 3 broad categories:
Augment (what you so beautifully outlined above)
Automate (what most people are obsessed with or terrified of)
Audit (what we must do in either above case - to our ideas, ai output and ourselves)
When I started working with LLMs I was surprised to find almost no one else using my default “Augment”.
I struggle to Automate, maybe because somehow I’ve been lucky to arrange my life and business around activities I love to do. So I push myself to Automate what I can so I can invest more time in Augment.
For example, I’ve just spent 2 days developing an email campaign with o3 pro that before Ai I would have scheduled by now. Far from increasing my speed, I’ve slowed down by at least 3x!
Is this a waste of time? I don’t think so, because through the back and forth I uncovered false assumptions, expanded my understanding and clarified my direction way beyond this campaign.
So thank you for this. It’s another signal that this small, quiet group is growing.
While I use it in various Ai workshops, I’m so focused on creating/delivering them I’ve not written on Substack as much as I’d like. That is about to change though (with the help of o3pro Augmentation). Your piece is stunning btw.
Thanks for this great piece. It’s great to see more and more of us arriving at these conclusions. I’ve been “doing the tech thing” since 1992, and I’ve seen more than my share of hype cycles. This one is different. Everything is different.
Thanks for sharing this, Kay. I’d love to hear more from your perspective as it relates to this tech cycle. I’ve been e joying your writing a lot and highly recommend to others
Oh thank you so much! I’ve been seeing folks sharing quotes from your writing, which I have enjoyed, but I’ve been in a pretty intensive development cycle, so last night was really the first that I had a chance to dig in, and I love what you’re doing. Let me see what I can share that relates to what you’re doing…
This deeply resonates with me. As someone who spends a lot of time reflecting on how we truly integrate AI into our lives and work, your perspective cuts to the heart of what truly matters. It’s not about speed or automation for its own sake, it’s about purpose, intention, and placing humanity at the center. We need more conversations exactly like this, pushing beyond the myths and hype, toward meaningful design choices that elevate human judgment, creativity, and dignity.
I recently explored similar themes in my blogpost “Augmentation: The New Strategic Frontier”, highlighting how human-AI collaboration should not be about replacing us, but about expanding our cognitive and creative potential.
I’m very much aligned with your vision and would be excited to connect and join the conversation you’re shaping. Thank you for opening this crucial dialogue.
Much of the fear around AI hinges on the question of whether AI will be a complement or substitute for human labor. This is one of the best articulations I’ve seen of an argument for the former.
Thank you for this article. You’ve articulated what many of us have been feeling but haven’t been able to name, how the AI narrative has morphed from curiosity into a cultural myth that shapes our behavior, values, and sense of agency. This isn’t just about technology; it’s about the kind of future we want to co-create.
I like your idea of reframing the utility of AI away from artificial thinking towards assisted thinking! This is powerful. It has themes of enablement and empowerment instead of suppression and paternalism.
YES! This needs to be on billboards and discussed in all the podcasts. (Are you pitching yourself to podcasts? Please doooooo it!)
The inevitability narrative and panic are at an all-time high, and people need to understand (as you say) that AI can “create space for reflection, depth, and originality. Not just do things faster, but help us do the right things, better.” And yes, business leaders should ideally have an understanding of AI adoption with intentionality…not just “optimization” that delivers quick wins for the bottom line and burns their remaining folks.
Exactly Cat. We need to shift this narrative and push for a change in the industry before it’s too late.
yes Cat! Agree hard. Gil’s thinking needs as wide an audience as possible. We need to be having different conversations at scale. If we don’t the only thing AI will be accelerating is our demise. Collapse signals are everywhere. You can only stretch these old brittle systems so far before they break. I don’t see enough discourse about what happens when they do — and what we want in their place.
Maybe we will all laugh that I was just about to try to connect you two via one of Cat’s recent posts 😂 I’m glad to see you’ve already found each other!
You’re the best. Thanks for the connection, Jenn. ❤️
@Negin Sairafi you and Gil are thinking along similar lines, you might enjoy each other’s work around myth making. Super timely and important.
Oh thank you for this! Looking forward to reading their work.
Really amazing piece. Thank you.
This cuts to the heart of what so many are sensing but struggling to name: that the real risk isn’t just AI itself, but the story we’re letting it tell for us — about value, agency, and what work is for.
What resonated most for me was the reframing of AI’s promise: not speed for its own sake, but space — space to think more deeply, design more intentionally, and reclaim what makes us human. That’s the shift I want to see more of.
Thank you for putting language to this moment.
Hi 👋 I felt a lot of resonance in your post here it’s touching on a lot of the things I think about and that keeps me up at night. What you said here struck home for me and feels like to core tension I’m navigating in my own consciousness —> “Real transformation is rarely efficient. It’s messy. Slow. Human. But that’s not a flaw, it’s a feature.”
I’ve felt and experienced this deeply and I’m super curious (and diving on practically) on how we integrate AI to support us to BE more rather than DO more.
Thank you for your writing and reflections. - Sarah
Thanks for your thoughtful comment, Sarah. Since writing this post, I’ve been connecting with others in the field, and what strikes me is how many of us are feeling the same dissonance … between what we can do and what we’ve been conditioned to do over the past decades. We’ve inherited a legacy that wasn’t really ours to begin with. Let me know if you have any thoughts about this. I’d love to read.
I agree with the many responses here: this is an important and necessary reframing.
I’m trying something related in Mind Revolution, arguing that the emphasis in the myth (in your terms) on external changes has blinded us to the internal changes that AI and related technologies are creating.
https://mindrevolution.substack.com/p/mind-revolution-manifesto
This is an important distinction. Let me read it.
I love your point that AI’s “true impact will be shaped by how we choose to use it.” AI can certainly increase efficiency and impact how you communicate. I started using it to wordsmith my blunt and direct American style of writing emails to resonate more with my Nigerian colleagues. In just a few months, I’ve gotten to the point where Copilot rarely suggests changes.
But there is also great opportunity to increase your depth. I’m a middle-aged lawyer with a full-time day job. Not someone you would expect to be reading scholarly papers on the “Automation of Systematic Reviews with Large Language Models.” But here I am, doing just that because I have a tool that can help me translate complex technical information into terms that I understand. In one of my threads, GPT referred to it as “cognitive scaffolding” which seems quite apt.
I am not certain, however, that it will be the industry or the AI developers who will lead the change in how we approach AI. It must be done at the grassroots level, by individual users who decide to reframe the narrative for themselves and harness the powers of AI for more than just … more work.
This is great real world examples of how AI can be put for good use, Alyssa. Share more of your examples and personal stories so we can all learn. To your point, we have to be intentional with this technology. Otherwise this will become another “social media” moment where tools optimized for mindless engagement that trap us, instead of helping us to become better at our craft. It won’t come from the top. That’s the message I want to spread
I’ve noticed a small, quiet and growing group of people who are all seeing the same AI opportunity.
I see AI use in 3 broad categories:
Augment (what you so beautifully outlined above)
Automate (what most people are obsessed with or terrified of)
Audit (what we must do in either above case - to our ideas, ai output and ourselves)
When I started working with LLMs I was surprised to find almost no one else using my default “Augment”.
I struggle to Automate, maybe because somehow I’ve been lucky to arrange my life and business around activities I love to do. So I push myself to Automate what I can so I can invest more time in Augment.
For example, I’ve just spent 2 days developing an email campaign with o3 pro that before Ai I would have scheduled by now. Far from increasing my speed, I’ve slowed down by at least 3x!
Is this a waste of time? I don’t think so, because through the back and forth I uncovered false assumptions, expanded my understanding and clarified my direction way beyond this campaign.
So thank you for this. It’s another signal that this small, quiet group is growing.
Hey Mike this framework you’ve laid out is extremely clear and useful. We should share this across. Let me know if you’re writing anything about it.
Thank you THP! I’ll PM you.
While I use it in various Ai workshops, I’m so focused on creating/delivering them I’ve not written on Substack as much as I’d like. That is about to change though (with the help of o3pro Augmentation). Your piece is stunning btw.
Thanks for this great piece. It’s great to see more and more of us arriving at these conclusions. I’ve been “doing the tech thing” since 1992, and I’ve seen more than my share of hype cycles. This one is different. Everything is different.
Thanks for sharing this, Kay. I’d love to hear more from your perspective as it relates to this tech cycle. I’ve been e joying your writing a lot and highly recommend to others
Oh thank you so much! I’ve been seeing folks sharing quotes from your writing, which I have enjoyed, but I’ve been in a pretty intensive development cycle, so last night was really the first that I had a chance to dig in, and I love what you’re doing. Let me see what I can share that relates to what you’re doing…
This deeply resonates with me. As someone who spends a lot of time reflecting on how we truly integrate AI into our lives and work, your perspective cuts to the heart of what truly matters. It’s not about speed or automation for its own sake, it’s about purpose, intention, and placing humanity at the center. We need more conversations exactly like this, pushing beyond the myths and hype, toward meaningful design choices that elevate human judgment, creativity, and dignity.
I recently explored similar themes in my blogpost “Augmentation: The New Strategic Frontier”, highlighting how human-AI collaboration should not be about replacing us, but about expanding our cognitive and creative potential.
I’m very much aligned with your vision and would be excited to connect and join the conversation you’re shaping. Thank you for opening this crucial dialogue.
https://open.substack.com/pub/aihumanity/p/augmentation-the-new-strategic-frontier?r=supoi&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
Thanks for sharing Roi. We need all voices pushing for this direction. Happy to read your article too
This resonates deeply. Thank you so much for taking the time to synthesise your insights.
I like this article. It asks good questions and frames AI well. You may be interested in a 3-part article I wrote recently. https://open.substack.com/pub/georgewford/p/taking-in-hal?r=2muwg&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
thank you for this article. Can’t agree more. Raised some related questions in this recent article : https://patricecochin.substack.com/p/the-age-of-ambient-ai?r=4jgiu5
Much of the fear around AI hinges on the question of whether AI will be a complement or substitute for human labor. This is one of the best articulations I’ve seen of an argument for the former.