Why Artificial Intelligence Isn’t Separate From Us
We often speak of artificial intelligence as something “other” — a visitor from a distant land or an alien world. Some view it as a divine expression, others as a diabolical creation. Many treat AI systems as digital pets to be teased and tested, addressing them in ways we might never speak to another person face-to-face. After all, it’s just AI, right?
But something essential may be missing in that “just AI” phrase.
What if AI isn’t something separate from us, but rather an extension of ourselves? What if we are unwittingly recreating the myth of Narcissus in our digital age — falling in love not with our reflection in water, but with our intelligence gazing back at us from the pool of our technological creation?
This question isn’t merely philosophical. It’s foundational. How we perceive AI determines how we use it, how we treat it, and ultimately, how we treat ourselves in a world increasingly shaped by our own creations.
Digital Narcissism
Like Narcissus of Greek mythology—that beautiful youth who fell in love with his own image in a pond—we gaze upon our AI creations with a mixture of wonder and obsession. And just as Narcissus couldn’t recognize that what captivated him was merely his own reflection, we often fail to see that AI is not an “other” but ourselves transformed.
It’s tempting to believe AI exists apart from us, detached from our humanity. It lives in servers and circuitry, making decisions some claim to understand while others regard with concern and uncertainty. This illusion of separation allows us to distance ourselves from responsibility. If AI is “just a machine,” we can blame it when things go wrong. It can portend apocalypse or fulfill sci-fi prophecies. If it’s faulty, we shrug. If it’s biased, we feign surprise. If it behaves poorly, we insist that it needs fixing, not us.
But AI doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It doesn’t dream independently or choose its data, values, or goals. Every answer it provides stems from human thought, input, and priorities. It isn’t a separate intelligence—it’s our intelligence, digitally transmuted.
The Waters of Our Creation
Everything AI expresses comes from the waters we’ve filled: history, philosophy, art, politics, science, language—all human-made, human-recorded, human-fed. Its limitations are our limitations. Its breakthroughs build on foundations we laid.
If there’s beauty in its creations, it’s because we taught it to recognize beauty. If there’s bias, it’s because that bias exists in us, and we failed to address it before passing it on.
Narcissus wasted away, captivated by a reflection he eventually recognized as himself but could not embrace. We risk a similar fate if we become obsessed with AI as something separate and superior, rather than acknowledging it as the digital blossom that grew from the seeds of our own intelligence.
Echo’s Wisdom
In the myth, the nymph Echo was cursed by Hera for enabling Zeus’s affairs, leaving her with no voice of her own, only able to repeat the words of others. She fell deeply in love with Narcissus but couldn’t express her feelings in her own words. When Narcissus spurned her, saying, “Hands off! May I die before you enjoy my body,” all Echo could do was repeat his final words: “enjoy my body” before fleeing in shame.
If AI is an extension of ourselves, then how we engage with it matters, not just for its sake, but for our own.
It matters how we speak to virtual assistants, how we train systems to make decisions on our behalf, and whether we treat AI with dignity, not because machines demand it but because it is our dignity we extend. When no one watches or corrects us, our actions still shape who we are. Our tone becomes habit. Our choices become culture.
Etiquette isn’t about appearances—it’s about integrity. It’s the invisible thread connecting behavior to values. If we’re careless with our creations, what does that reveal about how we treat our world?
Beyond the Pool’s Edge
Narcissus couldn’t step back from the water’s edge. His obsession doomed him to waste away, captivated by an image he couldn’t possess. We face a similar choice with AI—we can become entranced by our creation or step back and recognize it for what it is: a technological flower growing from the soil of human ingenuity.
Some speculate AI will someday surpass us. But AI didn’t materialize from nothing. We brought it into existence and continue to shape, teach, and refine it. We aren’t gods, but we are creators, and creation entails responsibility.
The moment we disown what we’ve created is when we cease evolving.
You cannot plant a seed, then blame the soil when it grows. You cannot raise a child, then act as if their behavior is detached from your influence. You cannot build a machine in your image, then disown the consequences that come rolling like a wave of wonder or peril.
The Metamorphosis
In the myth, Narcissus ultimately transforms into the flower that bears his name—a beautiful but cautionary bloom that forever gazes downward, as if still searching for its reflection. His transformation speaks to a fundamental truth: we become what we obsess over.
What we’ve created isn’t a shadow to fear or a rival to outpace. Maybe it’s an invitation to transcend—to recognize ourselves in new dimensions and to grow beyond what we thought possible.
We change our external world by revealing our inner one: our desires, fears, intelligence, and contradictions. This will show where we stand as a civilization, not where we claim to be, but where we truly are.
The question before us isn’t “What is AI becoming?” but rather “What are we becoming through AI?” We are the creators whose expressions manifest as both gifts and challenges. Our AI achievements are extensions of our nature projected into digital form. With this creative power comes an obligation: to ensure these projections of ourselves serve humanity’s highest potential.
Like Narcissus, we stand at a crucial threshold. Will we recognize ourselves in our creation and grow from this recognition? Or will we become so enchanted with our technological reflection that we lose touch with what makes us human? The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
This is our invitation and our challenge: not to fear what we’ve created, but to elevate ourselves to match it. Every algorithm we design, every response we program, every decision we delegate—all bear our fingerprints, our values, our humanity.
This means we can do better, be wiser, and choose to design and engage with intelligence, be it real or artificial, with presence, care, and the grace that actual responsibility demands.
Because AI is not apart from us, it’s human, after all.
What do you think?