The Biggest Challenge of AI, Freeing and Nourishing Natural Intelligence
Israel has bombed 365 sq km of Gaza into death, devastation, and rubble. It is reasonable, on seeing such destruction, to think of “a heap of broken images, where the sun beats, / And the dead tree gives no shelter; the cricket no relief, / And the dry stone no sound of water.” Donald Trump, however, saw the possibility of building a Riviera of West Asia.
It was characteristic that he saw real estate possibilities rather than the reconstruction of Gazan life to the extent possible. However, Trump is superior to those who see only destruction and terrifying loss caused by AI. The contrast is instructive: one can see only loss, or one can imagine new possibilities.
AI will probably not just enhance the productivity of existing jobs but also make several jobs redundant, such as simple coding and spotting and fixing bugs in legacy software. When AI gets a physical body to inhabit—that is, when robots become intelligent—many manual jobs could also disappear. Polishing diamonds, cutting fabric, stitching garments, and shelling cashew nuts could all be automated.
How would we be able to survive and find jobs for those displaced from their traditional occupations? Should we tax the companies that deploy AI and robots at additional rates to compensate for the loss of personal income tax from employees who have been displaced, and distribute the proceeds to the displaced? Or should we prepare for Gen Z uprisings every now and then as the loss of jobs and incomes spreads discontent?
Natural Intelligence to the Rescue
We do have one shield against such a fallout from the rise of AI: NI, or Natural Intelligence. It is NI that came to humanity’s rescue when previous waves of paradigm-shifting technology emerged: when the steam engine displaced animal power, when electricity replaced steam power, when the printing press made scribes redundant, and when computer-driven word processors stripped stenographers of function.
The human brain and its capacity for creativity, innovation, and imagination will come up with new things to do with AI, and new ways to spend the time freed up by AI agents. This pattern has held for centuries. There is no reason to believe it will suddenly break now.
AI has created AlphaFold, the family of programs currently in its third iteration, which can predict the shapes of proteins, including, with AlphaFold 3, how proteins interact with DNA and RNA, making drug discovery easier. Discovering new drugs would be a new line of activity opened by AI. This is not displacement; it is expansion.
New Frontiers of Possibility
Coffee connoisseurs pay fancy prices for coffee beans that have been eaten, digested, and excreted by different creatures: the palm civet in Indonesia, the elephant in Thailand, and the Jacu bird in Brazil (up to $2,000 per kg). What if AI could innovate chemistry that performs in the factory the function these digestive juices perform on the coffee bean inside the intestine? The exotic becomes reproducible, and luxury becomes accessible.
Heroin and cocaine might be stripped of addictive properties, and an LSD high rendered no more harmful than the suspension of belief entailed in watching a superhero movie. The pleasures without the perils—this is not utopian fantasy but the direction of pharmacological research.
Climate change might be reversed by removing CO2 from the air and converting captured CO2 into gritty particles of carbon that would put an end to sand mining from riverbeds, apart from its conversion into that allotrope of carbon which, when synthesised on a large enough scale, would put DeBeers out of business. The problem becomes the solution; the waste becomes the resource.
AI might enable the infinitesimal recalibrations of the magnetic field required to contain the raging plasma in which hydrogen atoms fuse to produce helium and massive energy. Limitless, cheap energy might enable re-greening the Thar Desert and growing saffron on tailor-made soil at tailor-made temperatures in tailor-made weather. Energy abundance transforms the possible.
AI could open new avenues in entertainment, allowing audiences to become active participants in what they see. Not passive consumption but active co-creation.
All this, of course, is conjecture, at least for now. The point is that many things the White Queen believed before breakfast could turn into practical options through the advance of tech with the help of AI deployed in different streams of knowledge.
AI Must Be Deployed
AI has to be deployed; it will not deploy itself—not unless the dystopia of artificial superintelligence materialises. NI is the agent that will deploy AI in this area or that task, to this end or another.
This is the crucial point that is often lost in discussions of AI. The technology is not an autonomous force; it is a tool. It does nothing by itself. It is deployed by human intelligence, for human purposes, according to human values. The question is not what AI will do to us, but what we will do with AI.
The answer to that question depends entirely on the quality of our natural intelligence.
The Real Challenge
The biggest challenge of AI is the cultivation of NI. Schooling, as practised in India, smothers NI. A culture that holds all knowledge to be finite and pre-existing, as contained in the Vedas, kills critical thinking. Changing that culture without uprooting the civilisational ethos that defines the subcontinent beyond geography—that is, rejecting what is toxic in the tradition and embracing what is wholesome—is a major challenge not just to democracy but to freeing and nourishing NI.
Teaching the mind to be free, and to roam outside narrow domestic walls without getting bogged down in the dreary desert sand of dead habit, on a population-wide scale, so that every man, woman, and child can be a master of AI rather than its victim—that is the challenge presented by AI.
This is not a technical problem. It is an educational and cultural problem. It is about how we raise our children, how we structure our schools, how we value curiosity and creativity, how we balance tradition and innovation. It is about whether we produce minds that can only follow instructions or minds that can imagine new possibilities.
The Cultural Question
The reference to the Vedas is pointed. A culture that believes all knowledge is already contained in ancient texts has little incentive to seek new knowledge. The task is already complete; there is nothing left to discover. This attitude is profoundly anti-innovation.
But Indian civilisation is not monolithic. It has also produced extraordinary innovators, from Aryabhata to Ramanujan. It has a tradition of scepticism and debate. The challenge is to draw on those traditions while rejecting the aspects that stifle inquiry.
This is delicate work. It requires distinguishing between what is essential to identity and what is merely habit. It requires holding onto the valuable while letting go of the toxic. It requires teaching children to respect their heritage without being imprisoned by it.
Conclusion: Masters, Not Victims
The promise of AI is not that it will solve all our problems for us. The promise is that it will give us powerful tools to solve problems ourselves. But tools are only as good as the hands that wield them.
If we produce generations of passive consumers, trained only to follow instructions and accept received wisdom, AI will indeed be a threat. It will displace them, and they will have nothing to fall back on. They will be victims.
If we produce generations of creative, critical, curious thinkers, trained to imagine new possibilities and to use every tool at their disposal, AI will be an opportunity. It will amplify their capabilities and open new frontiers. They will be masters.
The choice is ours. But it must be made now, and it must be made deliberately. The challenge of AI is ultimately the challenge of NI. And that challenge begins in our schools, our homes, and our minds.
Q&A: Unpacking the AI and NI Challenge
Q1: What is the distinction between AI and NI in this article?
AI refers to artificial intelligence—machine-based systems that can perform tasks typically requiring human intelligence. NI refers to natural intelligence—the human brain’s capacity for creativity, innovation, imagination, and critical thinking. The article argues that NI is humanity’s shield against job displacement and other negative fallout from AI, and that cultivating NI is the biggest challenge posed by AI.
Q2: What historical precedent does the article cite for NI coming to humanity’s rescue?
Previous waves of paradigm-shifting technology—the steam engine displacing animal power, electricity replacing steam, the printing press making scribes redundant, computer-driven word processors replacing stenographers—all led to fears of mass displacement. In each case, human creativity and imagination (NI) came up with new things to do, new jobs, and new ways to spend time. The pattern suggests NI will do the same with AI.
Q3: What new possibilities does AI open up according to the article?
AI enables drug discovery through programs like AlphaFold that predict protein structures. It could innovate chemistry to reproduce luxury products affordably. It might strip addictive properties from drugs while retaining pleasure. It could help reverse climate change by capturing CO2 and converting it to useful products. It might enable limitless clean energy through fusion. It could transform entertainment into active participation. These are not predictions but illustrations of the kinds of new frontiers NI can explore using AI.
Q4: What is the cultural challenge to cultivating NI in India?
Schooling as practised in India often smothers natural intelligence. A culture that holds all knowledge to be finite and pre-existing—as contained in ancient texts—can kill critical thinking. The challenge is to change this culture without uprooting the civilisational ethos—rejecting what is toxic in tradition while embracing what is wholesome, so that every person can be a master of AI rather than its victim.
Q5: What is the ultimate choice facing humanity regarding AI?
The choice is not about AI itself but about how we cultivate natural intelligence. If we produce generations of passive consumers trained only to follow instructions, AI will displace them and they will be victims. If we produce generations of creative, critical, curious thinkers trained to imagine new possibilities, AI will amplify their capabilities and they will be masters. The outcome depends on decisions made now in education, culture, and society.
