That aside, there is an avalanche of concern and fear porn about AI and its capabilities. Many assume AI is so ‘intelligent’ that it threatens the value of human consciousness. Yes, in a worst-case scenario, homo tech may turn against homo sapiens and seek to extinguish them. Realistically,  it will probably just make life complicated and inspire us to find ways around it because AI is limited far past the irritation of being addressed by chatbots and automatic subtitles misheard and written up. Let me elaborate.

At its root, AI is dependent on homo sapiens continued existence. First, how will machine intelligence, homo tech, keep running without a homo sapien to maintain it? Machines are made of parts separately produced and put together—they are made, not created. There are industries built around that. Homo sapiens created homo tech. AI’s potential is, therefore, less than than that of its creator in the same way as homo sapiens are less than their Creator. Second, from where will homo tech access power. Batteries do not last forever. They have to be charged and replaced, and access to electrical charge is becoming a problem the world over, Gas lines break for whatever reason, manufactured components are subject to trade and weather events, and the electrical power grid is vulnerable to being fried by a solar flare. I mean, what could go wrong with machine intelligence under those conditions?

In the same vein, how will the homo tech endure the nonsterile and hostile conditions that are the foundation for an organic realm? Earth is an evolving and creative process that has unfolded over billions of years. Being organic requires creations to rot so other, more evolved creations can grow, which is a messy process. How will homo tech, or the transhuman dream for humanity, endure hail storms and floods, the fine dust in Africa gumming up the moving parts, and the searing heat that brittles the insulation that keeps the former two away from the moving parts and its circuits?

Of course, it is not just the pseudo-human robots people worry about but also the algorithms that control human consciousness; however, there is always a choice. I work on a freelance platform. If I look at the possibilities the algorithms suggest, I would be completely off track—it has no idea what I have done on its platform in the last two years based on the gigs I have completed (with 100% success and mostly stellar ratings) because it is designed to collect specific information rather than my experience of the job. Moreover, algorithms, if they work, are easy to manipulate: You have a choice. After losing Buddy, my canine travelling companion, in an accident, I watched how my Facebook wall filled with animal stories and animal rescue concerns begging for funds. So, AI may limit its offerings and censor posts and information on social media platforms, but it is not in control of what I see—it is just very limited. Besides, if I do not want to see something, I do not give a jot about clicking the X in the corner of a post. 

Finally, AI does not have a heart. For example, I receive an email thanking me for attending a meeting from which I was absent or being invited to pay for a product I am already using. The programming that processes the information did not consider who attended the meeting, nor did AI understand the contents of the email it was programmed to send. AI does not have a personal touch, and in the future, that is what will make the difference.

Like it or not, AI is here to stay, and I concede it is brilliant at gathering information and can process that information, the bytes, faster than any human. However, intelligence is not just about processing information. It is also about relating to others, feeling inspired to think or do, and creating something new from the information processed. The human brain is organic, a pulsating spiral of connections and constellations, not a linear series of 1s and zeros. So, to survive the avalanche of AI, corporations, economic collectives, and vocations will need to focus on their hearts: They will need to be entities that relate personally and whose service is humanized.