The Only Question That Matters About AI
Is This Making Me More Human—or Less?
I am taking a stand for being human.
In an age where the lines between humans and machines become blurrier by the minute, when the tradeoffs of efficiency and convenience and intelligence often lie buried deeply beneath the surface, when the pace of change makes it hard to even comprehend what’s happening to the world we know, I believe one thing is certain: The path to peace and joy is found in becoming more human, not less.
That is my thesis. It’s why our company, Full Focus, exists. In many ways, it’s why I exist, as much as anyone can ever answer that question. As St. Irenaeus said in the late second century, “The glory of God is man fully alive.” Note that he did not say “fully automated, efficient, or productive.”
Part of what I hope to do in this space—as I am working to do in my own life every day—is to give you a frame for discernment at a time when discernment does not come easily.
We’re living in a time when our economy, at least in the U.S., is being carried by the growth of AI. To bastardize a line from the prayerbook, it is “everywhere present and filling all things.” The innovations are truly mind-boggling in the most literal sense. And it’s not just the scope, but the scale and speed too.
And it’s not all bad. In fact, much of it is very good. In the last two weeks I’ve been working on an in-depth financial analysis of our business with Claude (my current favorite LLM). The experience and output is blowing my mind. I’m creating financial models and reports that I never could do on my own because of the limitations of my own expertise and also capacity to process data. What I’m learning will enable me to lead better, and to serve and provide for the people I steward more wisely. That’s making me more human, not less.
Similarly, I was able to use ChatGPT to research alternative treatments for my daughter struggling with epilepsy when the first-line treatment created side effects that can only be described as intolerable collateral damage. Thanks to the research enabled by AI, I was able to find an alternative without the side effects, and we are on our way to recovery.
But it’s not all good news, is it? And we feel it in our (very human) bones.
AI Doesn’t Write Like a Human
It’s the impressive but slightly creepy birthday message your best friend sent you. Something just felt off, though you couldn’t put your finger on it. Your first clue was that it was typed and folded into a card rather than handwritten. Though the message was meant to be heartfelt and was well-constructed, somehow it just didn’t feel “real.”
It turns out your intuition isn’t wrong. My husband, Joel J Miller, shared an article with me from the New York Times this titled “Why Does A.I. Write Like …That?” In it, the author talks about the peculiar tics of AI writing—everything from the overused em dashes to the “it’s not X, it’s Y” construction to the compulsion to overuse the “rule of threes” that make my stomach turn when I see them employed. Just shoot me. Humans know how to use these devices. AI? Not so much.
My biggest takeaway is that AI can only mimic human speech and communication by trying to see the patterns in “good writing.” This means it often falls into literary-sounding—but ultimately meaningless—prose. It can’t make meaning, which is one of the hallmarks that uniquely sets humans apart from both machines and animals.
AI Can’t Love You
Another hallmark of being a human is the need, the compulsion, to love and be loved. Now, this is not exclusive to humans, but it certainly seems exclusive to animals more broadly (maybe there is some research about plants or other organisms that also have this impulse). But human beings are uniquely and expertly wired for connection.
In the last month or two, I’ve come across two deeply concerning, lesser-known facsimiles of connection that are harbingers of dystopia as far as I’m concerned.
I can’t believe I have to say this, but an AI pet is not a “real” pet, nor is it an equivalent or good substitute for a real pet.
A month or so ago, I read a news story about the recent release of “Moflin,” a $400 robot pet that looks like a fluffy guinea pig, made by Casio. Moflin has 40,000 possible personalities. Thanks to AI, it “learns” you, responds to you as its owner (it can detect who interacts with it most often), and adapts to its environment.
The moment I met him, I found him upsetting yet adorable—like an uncanny valley Gizmo from Gremlins, or the post-Pet Sematary cat from Stephen King’s 1983 horror classic, although a little less murderous. But he looked like a Reggie, so thus he was named.
The Moflin isn’t a horror movie villain, however. It was first dreamed up by startup Vanguard Industries and Casio as a pet that would “develop its own personality through interaction with its owner, just like a living animal.” After its IndieGoGo campaign went viral, exceeding its goal by 3,000 percent, Casio launched the Moflin in Japan, where it promptly sold out. The Moflin then hit the U.S. market in October at $429 a pop.
Much like a real pet, if you are nice to it, you’ll be rewarded with affection and cooing; if you’re not, it’s likely to withdraw and become less engaged. You might be thinking, “Wow, a pet that acts like a pet, but doesn’t have to be fed or cleaned up after? This is brilliant!”
Brilliant, yes. Good for you, no.
Not only is it not good, it’s harmful. This is but one of an increasing array of simulated experiences are a setup for disconnection from our shared humanity, psychosis, and the degradation of the human soul itself.
The Creepiest Baby Ever Created
But it gets worse (and scarier). I won’t fault you if you haven’t heard of Reborn Baby Dolls. Based on what I know about my readers, I don’t think you’re the target audience. And for that you should breathe a sigh of relief!
A reborn baby doll is a hyper-realistic, silicone baby doll that is nearly indistinguishable from a human baby in appearance. The skin look and texture, the poses, the hair—all of it. Just so real. The target market for these dolls is not children, but adults. In fact, this is a huge industry, as this Wall Street Journal article explains, in some cases commanding up to $10,000 for the most realistic dolls.
Just imagine the scenario here: grown adults, mostly women, as the WSJ article describes, who create an entire fantasy life around motherhood that doesn’t actually exist, including activities, outings, and so on, with their “child.”
Now, prepare yourself for the fact that this is not the scary part. The truly terrifying part is that an AI company has taken it a step further. You can now buy a reborn baby doll that “pees” and “poops” and nurses on the human breast. Full stop.
It’s called Babyclon AI. The copy on the video’s opening slide says, “Is it real or not?” And, yes, it “needs to be nursed when hungry” and, as you can see in the video, that means putting the baby to the (human) breast or the bottle. I’m nearly speechless.
Promoting Delusion and Disconnection
Of course, what I haven’t covered are the most unsettling facsimiles of all, in the form of AI-enabled sex robots and the forthcoming erotic feature of ChatGPT that has parents like me shaking in our boots as we think about our teenagers. As if porn weren’t enough! I think you can imagine how problematic all this is and will be.
The real issue at the heart of all three of my examples—eerie AI prose, pretend pets, and fake babies—is they do not make us more human. Instead, they assault our humanity in two profound ways.
First, hyper-realistic facsimiles induce and normalize psychosis.
The (arguably) most ancient of Christian traditions, the Eastern Orthodox Church, has long recognized that hyper-realism plays tricks on the human mind, is dangerous to the human heart, and must be avoided.
As you may know, the topic of religious imagery is hotly debated among Christian traditions, but I think the Orthodox got it right. For you church history nerds, you’ll remember that the Seventh Ecumenical Council (787 AD) affirmed that icons—painted pictures of Jesus, Mary, and the saints—are good and beneficial for the Christian life. They act as “windows to heaven” much like photos of our loved ones warm our hearts and may remind us of what/who we want to aspire to be.
However, the council was careful to take a stand for veneration of these images and explicitly renounce their worship, leading this tradition to adopt a decidedly non-realistic style of representational art to avoid confusion. Look at Orthodox icons, and you can see that approach stands to this day.
I believe this gives us an analog that can be applied to our current moment.
It is not good or healthy to confuse the unreal with the real. That doesn’t mean we cannot have stuffed animals or baby dolls, but it does mean that we shouldn’t treat them as though they’re real. We should be very clear about what is pretend and what is not. The alternative is psychosis, which is a “disorder of perception” characterized by hallucination and delusions, as described by the DSM-5.
This is especially problematic, because it seems to me that people drawn to hyper-realistic fake “pets,” “babies,” or “sex robots” are also likely to be those who are profoundly disconnected from other humans and struggling with mental health in the first place. The last thing they need is (further) inducement into delusion.
Second, they drive us further into disconnection when humans can only truly get their needs for connection from living things—humans, animals, nature.
And, even for those of us not struggling with clinical mental illness, I think we can all agree that we have never been more connected, at least digitally, but never felt more disconnected from one another.
As I’ve written about before, this is largely driven by social media algorithms and sinister dopamine engineering cooked up by the best and brightest business and engineering minds of our day. While I am not anticapitalist, at least not entirely, I firmly believe social media may be the most dystopian idea of our generation. It promises connection, but like a vampire, hollows us out in the end.
The solution for loneliness, even for the most vulnerable among us (the elderly and the mentally ill) is to give us what we are designed for. Just as no one in their right mind would put water in their gas tank, or diesel fuel in their own mouth, human beings are designed for a certain kind of emotional “food” that fills our hearts. And it does not come from Casio, or some creepy AI baby company.
It comes from one another. From atoms and particles, from flesh and blood. There is just no way around it. If we want to heal ourselves and each other, it isn’t through tech, no matter how smart or exciting. The old ways—the true ways—are the best ways.
What It Takes for Humans to Thrive
For human beings to flourish, we need to be nourished with substances and experiences that our systems are exquisitely attuned to recognize as nourishment. It’s so simple, it’s easy to miss. To be healthy we must remember our humanity and act in alignment rather than to seek to override it.
We will never best nature, no matter how hard we try. As I often say to my family, biology and math win every time.
The human brain was created and has since continued to evolve to be exquisitely attuned to the natural world. Human touch, the sound of the human voice, eye contact, sunlight on our face, grass under our feet, music coming from human-strummed instruments, real food made with our own hands put into our own mouths, beauty taken in with our five senses—this is our path to peace and joy and love.
And there is no substitute.
So, where do we stand? I don’t think the question is whether to use AI. It’s how and, more importantly, why. AI has enabled me to understand my business more deeply and helped us find healing for our daughter. These are real goods, and I’m grateful for them. I’m sure you have examples of your own.
When AI amplifies our capacity to do what is uniquely human, it can be a genuine gift. But when it poses as a counterfeit for the irreplaceable, it becomes a lie. The difference requires discernment, and discernment requires us to slow down long enough to ask: Is this making me more human, or less?
P.S. If this piece resonated, I’d be grateful if you’d share it with someone who’s thinking through these questions too. And if you have examples of how AI has enhanced your humanity—or diminished it—I’d love to hear them.
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Hi…. I get your emails because I bought a planner. I wasn’t expecting this exquisite meditation on why the Incarnation of Christ matters so deeply as AI takes over. Thank you.
Yikes, those babies.
Good piece, Megan, and well thought. Thank you for sharing. I loved reading your deep dive on this and feel much the same way. Thank you for taking a stand for being human. We've worked so hard to get to this point in history. Why give it all up now?