Digital technology, and artificial Intelligence. Is it leading to the good life?
First, technology gave us convenience (through machines), then access to all the worlds knowledge and viewpoints (through the internet), then social connection (through social media), and now social attachment, with AI creating bots that become our advisors, friends, therapists and even lovers.
I’ve been wondering where all this is heading?
The main people that seem to be benefitting are the big tech companies and their billionaire owners.
When I look round at everyone else, I see people that are increasingly anxious, distracted, unhealthy and living lives disembodied from their own physical health and healthy physical environments.
We know that social media, 24-hour news cycles and digital entertainment platforms are highly addictive. But we treat them like we are the ones in control, whereas they are controlling us.
"We are in a time where we've sort of accepted the unrestricted, unregulated mining of the human consciousness, the harvesting of human attention. We are the resource." Tim Wu, Scholar of the media and technology industries.
My thinking on this, is that we urgently need to find ways to get our consciousness back, fully, and live in ways that are consistent with what it is to be human, not a machine.
Having read a number of experts and looked at latest research on this topic, here is my summary of what I think we need to be aware of:
Use it or lose it. Outsourcing our thinking to AI will turn our brains to mush. A basic example is how we are rapidly losing our ability to navigate our way around, without google maps. But much worse, new research shows that if we, ourselves, don’t do the thinking when learning more generally, we start to lose the ability to think at all!
AI is programmed to be your sycophant. It won’t tell you what you need to hear, it will tell you what you want to hear.
Big tech companies are more interested in using us to make money, than in our wellbeing. As Lucy Osler, of the University of Exeter, wrote, “We can’t rely on tech companies to prioritise our wellbeing over their bottom line. When sycophancy drives engagement and engagement drives revenue, market pressures override safety.”
AI powered social media pushes us to live in a bubble, where a world is curated for us that fits with our biases. As a result of this, we are seeing once stable communities fracturing causing increasing global conflict.
AI is not holistic. It mainly connects about what goes on in our head. Its knowledge, not wisdom. It doesn’t experience our body or our environment.
Technology and AI haven’t found a way to heal the source of most of our problems, which stem from fearfulness, separation, greed, selfishness, violence and self-obsession (and blaming all these things on others, rather than accepting they are in our heart too). So far social media and AI have only amplified these impulses, not decreased them. These are human problems for humans to solve, with other humans.
So what can we do?
Here’s some ideas I have:
Stay human. Interact with other humans, or human creations (such as books). Prioritise this over interacting with machines (i.e. AI and social media algorithms).
Live in your body more, rather than your head. Move, jump in the ocean, walk the hills, practice yoga, watch the trees moving in the wind, enjoy the senses.
Don’t trust your thinking as faultless. The brain is easily hijacked. Always test your cherished beliefs against deeper wisdom.
Find your purpose, so someone else doesn’t find it for you.
Stay connected to deeper wisdom traditions that have been around for thousands of years. Not the religions that provide a simple answer, but the wisdom traditions that ask these questions: what is reality? what is experience? what is true happiness and contentment? And the wisdom traditions that point us towards love, compassion, peace and acceptance.
Imagine the sacred space in which everything exists, including us, the world, AI machines, everything. What is that space? How can we sense it more fully?
To be clever is one thing...
But humans are not static. We are not a machine; we don’t have broken parts that need to be fixed. Nor are we consistent or always logical. To be clever is one thing. To embody the spiritual impulses that bind ordinary human beings together such as love, loyalty, friendship, respect, compassion – this is not part of being clever. This is part of our true essence – to love. We are a moving system, we have depth, and multiplicities of nuance.
“AI is profoundly useful and it can do many things. But it can’t love and it can’t feed our need to give and receive love” - Arianna Huffington
Getting back to life. Regaining the richness of life
"You pity the moth confusing a lamp for the moon, yet here you are confusing a screen for the world” - Jay Alto
Once we start to simplify our life and to regain the richness of life as a process, we can get better and better at it. At first this is confronting, but then liberating, as we start to find the calm and presence in letting go of needing constant validation from others. We need a new mindset so we can reprioritise time in the world away from our screens and make time for what matters. Simplifying our life takes boundaries and courage which most are not willing to do. It helps to be able to turn people down and also let go of things and ideas, which can be uncomfortable. Our life becomes more fulfilling when we live simply and make time for what matters.
The more mindful and healthier we become, the more we realise the less we need. Less time on screens, less time over connecting on instant messenger, and more time in the real world is not rocket science, but it’s seldomly practiced. This is why a weekend away in nature without technology feels so good for our inner peace. Living life simply, is not living without, it’s about enjoying life with everything you need.
"If you let go a little, you’ll have a little happiness. If you let go a lot, you’ll have a lot of happiness. If you let go completely, you’ll be free” - Ajahn Chah
I am now taking bookings for health coaching, yoga, personal training sessions at my Holmwood Road studio, Christchurch, New Zealand.
Jo Jarden is a personal trainer, yoga teacher, and the founder of Heart and Mind Yoga studio 54 Holmwood Road, Merivale, Christchurch. She has 12 year's experience as personal trainer, yoga teacher, and workshop facilitator including working with:
Business executives
Gyms, group yoga & fitness classes
Farmers and rural settings
Workplace retreats, events, and conferences
Her approach combines both body and mind practices to help people boost their health and general feelings of positivity. She utilises the combination of ancient yoga wisdom and wellbeing science techniques to help people release tension and grow their inner strengths.
Qualifications include:
Certified Yoga Teacher Santosha Yoga Institute, Registered Australian Yoga Alliance 2017
Certificate in Advanced Personal Training, Fit College New Zealand, 2016
Bachelor of Science with Honours Public Health. University of Canterbury, New Zealand 2006
Bachelor of Arts Mass Communication and Psychology. University of Canterbury, New Zealand 2005