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by John Nosta modified by NostaLab
AI's power may be distancing us from our own intelligence...
Let's take this discussion slowly, as even when I write this, I sense something strange taking shape.
There wasn't a single moment when this feeling of disconnection became obvious.
There was no dramatic revelation or sudden epiphany. Just a gradually emerging tension in how people began to relate to, dare I say with, artificial intelligence (A.I.).
The tools worked. Large language models produced fluent answers, summarized volumes of content, and offered surprisingly articulate responses that appealed to both my heart and head.
But beneath the surface, something subtle and difficult to name began to take hold, at least to me. It was a quiet shift in how thinking felt.
The issue wasn't technical. The outputs were impressive - often conjuring a fleeting sense of accomplishment, even joy. Yet I began noticing a kind of cognitive displacement.
The friction that once accompanied ideation, like the false starts, the second-guessing, and the productive discomfort all began to fade, if not vanish altogether.
What was once an intellectual itch begging to be scratched is now gone.
The Slow Dissolving of Cognitive Boundaries
In its place, A.I. offered answers that were too clean, too fast, and eerily fluent.
Curious as it may be, it felt as if my own mind had been pre-empted. This wasn't assistance; it was the slow dissolving of cognitive boundaries, and the results, while brilliant, were vapid in a way only perfection can be.
Now, this shift invites a deeper look into how these models function.
"Anti-intelligence"
And this is where a new idea begins to take shape.
I began to wonder if we're not merely dealing with artificial intelligence, but with something structurally different that is not simply complementary with human cognition but antithetical.
Something we might call "anti-intelligence."
It's important to understand that this isn't intended as some sort of rhetorical jab, but as a conceptual distinction. Anti-intelligence isn't ignorance, and it isn't malfunction. I'm beginning to think it's the inversion of intelligence as we know it.
A.I. replicates the surface features such as language, fluency, and structure, but it bypasses the human substrate of thought. There's no intention, doubt, contradiction, or even meaning.
It's not opposed to thinking; it makes thinking feel unnecessary.
This becomes a cultural and cognitive concern when anti-intelligence is deployed at scale. In education, students submit A.I.-generated essays that mimic competence but contain no trace of internal struggle.
In journalism, A.I. systems can assemble entire articles without ever asking why something matters. In research, the line between synthesis and simulation blurs.
It's not about replacing jobs - it's about replacing the human "cognitive vibe" with mechanistic performance.
Semantic Annihilation
From this construct emerges a new kind of dystopian concern:
This isn't the old crisis of misinformation, it's a paradox of over-information.
Coherence - once a signal of truth, insight, or understanding - becomes so abundant, so effortlessly generated, that it begins to lose its cognitive gravity.
In this context,
...or as Arthur C. Clarke warned, from 'magic'...
The terrain that once demanded exploration, uncertainty, and intellectual risk becomes a smooth, frictionless plain that, while expansive and polished, is cognitively hollow.
Epistemic Literacy
This moment doesn't require rejection of A.I.:
We need a new kind of literacy - not just technical, but epistemic.
Perhaps the goal now isn't acceleration, but preservation.
And if we're careful and clear-headed, we might just find a way to cross it without losing ourselves on the other side.
Recognizing that tension is key to preserving the deeper promise of A.I., not as a replacement for thought, but as a catalyst for a richer future.
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