Some believe artificial intelligence is humanity’s path to utopia. Others fear it will help bring about our end—through nuclear war, ecological collapse, or machines that outgrow and discard us. I take that possibility seriously, but it isn’t my subject here. What interests me isn’t AI as an external threat, but what its emergence reveals about us—how it’s reshaping what it means to be human.
I should say up front that I’m not an AI skeptic. I use it every day. It has transformed my work as a researcher and writer in ways that would have been impossible to imagine a few years ago. But what enhances thought can also erode it. The same tools that expand our reach can hollow out attention and empathy—a risk Zak Stein warns is already underway.
He argues that AI’s danger isn’t an explosion but a gradual decay. Like radiation, it seeps in quietly, weakening cognition and compassion without being noticed. Social media hijacked our attention; AI is going after attachment. He worries that it is reshaping the communication, education, and relationships that hold life together. AI isn’t just another tool. It’s a breakthrough that risks breaking what makes us human.