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Happy Heart Observer's avatar

Thank you for sharing your thoughtful reflections. I agree that AI should not be viewed as a race.

I would add one more thought: AI gives humanity a unique opportunity to scale up civilization itself. As the scale of participation expands across cultures, disciplines, and communities, many issues once confined to nations or ideologies become part of a broader human perspective.

Perhaps AI’s greatest contribution is not simply providing better answers, but enabling humanity to learn, collaborate, and adapt at a much larger scale. Scale changes perspective, and perspective shapes civilization.

Thank you for continuing this important conversation.

Hiro's avatar

Not competition, but cooperation. We live in a diverse web. As long as the protocols match, everyone can cooperate, and society becomes better. This is also a form of symbiosis, isn't it?

Adi Gaskell's avatar

I really enjoyed this Audrey. I made a similar argument this week, albeit from a slightly different angle https://adigaskell.substack.com/p/europe-should-be-proud-of-itself

My essay is on state capacity as opposed to civil society, but it's important to push back against this "AI is inevitable" angle that the industry is pushing.

Happy Heart Observer's avatar

I really enjoyed your article “Mission, Not Race,” and I was glad I could leave a comment there.

When I started reading your more recent article, “Has AI Gone Critical?”, I noticed that commenting is limited to paid subscribers. I completely respect that choice and understand there may be good reasons behind it.

As an engineer and scientist, I’m naturally curious. May I ask what led you to use different commenting settings for different articles? Was it simply a community management decision, or were there other considerations behind it?

I’m especially curious because, throughout your writings, you consistently emphasize plurality, broad participation, and diverse perspectives. I’d be genuinely interested in learning how you think about balancing those values with different commenting policies across your articles.

Audrey Tang's avatar

It was a simple case of not manually overriding Substack's default consciously! It's now updated, thanks for the heads-up.