Artificial Intelligence and Consciousness, Part 4
“Nothing living, conscious, and full of love can arise from the dead binary codes of artificial intelligence.”[1]
Ivan Antic
Artificial Intelligence (AI) may not be a threat to consciousness, per se, but it may become (and perhaps already is) a threat in our quest to be. The threat does not originate from anything about AI in and of itself but from our inability to resist how much easier it can make various mundane tasks in our lives, even at the cost of sacrificing the countless benefits we gain by struggling with those tasks. It is easy and natural to resist suffering and dull routines whenever possible, but certain aspects of AI may lull us into a complacent sense that struggle is no longer a necessary or useful aspect to life.
On the podcast, Chasing Life[2], host and neurosurgeon Sanjay Gupta, tells of when he walked by the bedroom of one of his daughters and heard an animated conversation behind the closed door. Both voices were equally matched in energy, laughter, and enthusiasm. He knocked on the door and asked who she was talking to. She said, “ChatGPT.” He was taken aback because it sounded like she was having a normal conversation with one of her best friends. Granted, human friendships and relationships can be messy and inconvenient. Real people cannot be available and receptive 24/7. They disagree. They sometimes drift apart. We all have personal needs that sometimes override the needs of our friends. Does make a friendship with an AI chatbot superior to a friendship with a real person?
Virtual reality can be amazingly life-like. I have had the opportunity to “fly” in a couple of flight simulators that train professional pilots. The flight experience is real enough that an experienced pilot must be either sitting in the seat beside the student or at the simulator controls to shut it down so the inexperienced flyer doesn’t become disoriented and hurt themselves or get sick. Virtual reality simulators are great for critical flight training scenarios as they can mimic situations that are dangerous to equipment and people to perform live. The same is true for training surgeons and other skilled professionals who need to practice in situations that no actual patient could ethically be unnecessarily placed in.
Virtual reality, of course, is a form of artificial intelligence. It is not real in the sense that it does not normally put a physical life in jeopardy. But if a pilot only always flew simulators, they would never carry passengers from one location to another. If a surgeon only always operated on simulators, they would never heal an actual patient. If a person only always maintained friendly relationships with ChatGPT, they would never know the comfort of a gentle hand during a rough time, a shoulder to cry on, or an empathic listening ear. They would never know the sensual joys of physical touch. They would not develop a shared history with another that might span decades. The joys, and sometimes sufferings, of knowing and being known would be replaced by an artificial and shallow knowing that would never require reciprocation. It would allow receiving without giving, thus sacrificing all that is received from acts of giving.
Various forms of AI can give us artificial and in some ways superior representations of intelligence, emotion, mercy, and even love – but only in descriptive and not deeply experiential forms (although the motion sickness from an unstable flight in a simulator is very real). Because we can have virtual friends, relationships, and experiences, the question becomes one of weighing the pros and cons. Perhaps Dr. Gupta’s daughter’s virtual friendship on ChatGPT is a healthy alternative for when her non-virtual friends are unavailable or cranky. But what if she comes to prefer the dependability and availability of ChatGPT to her non-virtual friendships? Is it even healthy to always have a “friend” available anytime we wish to chat – one who is always supportive and never pushes back? Non-virtual relationships and experiences are the domain of consciousness, which AI can tell us much about but cannot experience on its own, nor can it lead us to such an experience.
It will be interesting to see how AI’s capabilities evolve. It seems safe to me to believe it cannot lead us to higher levels of consciousness, which generally require a move away from anything that can be contained in the types of written information that fuels AI. Raising our conscious awareness is more of an experiential journey into the unknown and into uncertainty than it is about collecting and processing more information about people, things, places, and events – more about emerging into an expansive and mysterious future than rehashing and recombining descriptions from days past.
This is the 10thin a series titled The Perplexities of Consciousness. Life Notes are my explorations into mysteries that interest me. They are invitations for readers to explore more deeply into life’s mysteries. Engage with me or explore contemplative spiritual direction at ghildenbrand@outlook.com.
[1] Ivan Antic, The Physics of Consciousness, Samkhya Publishing LTD, London, 2021, p. 180.
[2] Chasing Life podcast, September 17, 2026, Is AI rewiring your kid’s brain?
Discover more from Contemplating Grace
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
