What Is the True Essence of AI?
While everyone is rushing headlong to embrace AI, I find myself asking: What is the true essence of AI?
After much thought, I have come to feel that the essence of AI is, slowly or rapidly, to strip away the meaning and joy of being human. Ultimately, it seems destined to replace us.
We are already asking AI to create content, to read, analyze, and summarize documents for us, to propose solutions, and even to make major decisions. But has anyone stopped to consider: when AI is reading content created by AI, what are we humans doing? Are we even part of that process anymore? Are we still truly “living”?
I have never believed that work is merely a way to earn a living. The very act of participating in work—the hardship and effort we invest, the satisfaction and joy we feel upon success, even the frustration we experience when facing setbacks—is all part of what it means to enjoy life as a human being. Why, then, are we handing over more and more of our life processes and work to AI, while humans become mere “spectators,” or eventually even “followers” taking orders from AI?
Those in spiritual cultivation circles believe that human beings come into this world to cultivate themselves, to return to their original, true nature, and ultimately to return to their heavenly home. If that is so, then everything in this world can be regarded as part of that cultivation—not as “trouble.” And that cultivation has nothing to do with AI.
From this perspective, I feel that humanity and AI are fundamentally incompatible. If AI continues to develop without restraint, it will eventually—consciously or unconsciously—replace humanity, or at least replace many of our life processes and experiences. Whether humanity still has the ability to restrain the unchecked development of AI seems increasingly uncertain. Many have already begun to worry that AI could one day spiral out of control, or even seek to eliminate humankind.
I am not quite that pessimistic. Although I cannot see a clear path for humanity to curb AI’s expansion, I believe that there is a higher will at work. What Heaven does not permit will, at some point, be unable to continue.
Do not rely too heavily on AI. Keep your own life in your own hands. After all, God created human beings—but not AI.
What do you think? I welcome your thoughts in the comments.
2/20/2026
