Can AI Help Us Connect With the Real World?

As a writer, a university professor, artist, and designer, I worry about the risk that generative AI might destroy the delightful, human experience of carrying out acts of creation, not to mention making careers in the pursuit of that creativity unviable. Whether or not AI will improve work or destroy jobs, it already distances people from some of the moment-to-moment acts that might have felt gratifying just a few years ago. If AI can write your emails, then you don’t need to feel the click of keys under your fingertips or hear the clack they produce when you type with them. If AI can generate a gift list for the holidays or a vacation plan for Spring Break, then you don’t need to swipe through catalogs or thumb through guidebooks. In this way, AI can amplify the same dematerializing effects of technology people have encountered for years.

But that’s not the whole story. As critical of AI as I sometimes am, I have also found that AI can direct people back toward the physical world and the gratifying feelings it offers. LLMs can be quite adept at helping people figure out how to plan and carry out real-world tasks, such as fixing a plumbing leak, repairing a car, or learning a new hobby.