The Real Threat to AI Is Us

On community, craft, and nature — the parts of us no algorithm can reach

Photo: 43rd Street Festival of the Arts, from this article.

There is a growing panic taking place over the rise of AI and how to mitigate the risk. And the argument usually centers around whether to focus on the existential risk of it and figure out ways to completely eliminate it (which while admirable is likely highly improbable), or whether to take the “rule of law” approach and focus on passing laws that basically keep it in check by doing things like keeping it from using copy-written material as a source of its language learning models.

And while I’m completely in favor of both, I want to focus on how we get out of this mess altogether. And as an herbalist, I look at things from the perspective of the natural world; the power of human connection, human ingenuity, and the regenerative power of nature. These three things, in my opinion, pose the biggest threats to AI because they are beyond its scope of control. And so that is where we must focus our energy.

Imagine for a second a society in which we used technology solely as a way to communicate with one another about upcoming events or community-based offerings - and nothing more. Knowledge and skill passed hand to hand the way they always were before there was this Goliath standing in between. So, the exchange is not built on what we “get” out of the exchange, but what we give and get. It’s reciprocity in action and it’s the lesson that nature teaches us over and over again.

Book talks and workshops on how to make your own food, build your own home, create your own medicine. Makers markets and farmers markets where we sell and trade our home-grown goods, hand-crafted tools, and natural medicine. Community gatherings that celebrate rites of passage and honor the wisdom of our elders. And so many other examples of humans connecting with humans, giving and receiving.

Each of these is slower and more deliberate. They take time and patience. And that time and attention in learning from one another and creating something completely new and unique is human owned, not AI owned. That is the power we have.

I see the seeds of this already being planted in my own community - in the gatherings of healers, the markets, the growing education on regenerative farming, the return to elders as our wisest teachers. But I also see the panic over our growing reliance on technology running right alongside it. And that panic is telling us something. There is an urgency begging for action.

So this is a call - to the teachers, the tradespeople, the farmers, the market organizers, the herbalists, the healers, the midwives, the elders, and everyone building something real in your own corner of the world; don't wait for permission. Start the workshop. Open the market. Host the gathering. Teach the trade. Every one of us who chooses to build in this direction is laying the foundation for a new paradigm that prioritizes community over profit.

It starts with whoever is willing to go first.