AI knows us. The real question is—do we?

The World After Smartphones

Elon Musk’s prediction—“Smartphones and apps will disappear within five years”—is more than a technological forecast.It raises a far deeper and more unsettling question for humanity:

“What defines a human being when work disappears?”

For thousands of years, humans worked to survive, proved themselves through their abilities ,and built identity through labor and choice.

But we are now entering an era in which AI will think, decide, act, and even choose on our behalf.This challenges the very mechanism through which humans have historically defined themselves.

When Humans Are No Longer ‘Choosing Beings’

We are approaching a world where you won’t even need to open an app to choose your lunch.

AI will consider your mood, health, spending habits, patterns, and dopamine responses and make the “optimal” decision automatically.

The act of launching an app becomes a relic of the past.

Psychologically, the ego has always maintained itself through the function of choosing—by comparing, judging, selecting, and controlling.

But when choice is automated, the ego faces a structural collapse for the first time in human history.

When AI Understands Me Better Than I Understand Myself

The central question becomes:

“If AI knows me better than I do, what function does my ego lose—and what new functions does it gain?”

Traditionally, the ego is formed through:

• choice

• comparison

• judgment

• control

But if AI takes over all four, the ego is pushed toward one of two evolutionary paths:

1) The liberated ego

Freed from constant control, it rests in pure being and gains deeper self-awareness.

2) The anxious ego

Terrified by the discovery that “life runs fine without me.”

Either way, the human psychological structure is about to be rearranged.

Ontological Shift: Humans Become ‘Beings of Intention’

The disappearance of smartphones is not merely the end of a device—it marks the transformation from:

“humans who act through tools” → “humans who move reality through intention.”

We stop being operators of machines and become articulators of intention.

If AI performs the actions, the only uniquely human faculty that remains is:

Intention

(Attention + Inner Direction)

We shift from:

Doing → BeingTask → Intention

Cognitive Science Perspective

Andy Clark’s theory of the Extended Mind argues that tools expand human cognition.But AI introduces a transformation far more radical:

Our mind is no longer extended.It becomes partially outsourced.

We gradually delegate to AI:

• memory

• decision-making

• attention

• information sorting

• preference formation

Human cognition evolves into a co-managed system between biological mind and artificial mind.

Evolutionary Psychology Perspective

Our brains were built for:

• avoiding danger

• choosing resources

• making quick survival decisions

• seeking reward

But once AI handles most survival-based choices ,humans experience an unprecedented shift:

from a brain designed to survive to a brain designed to create.

Dopamine circuits, reward structures, and the architecture of desire will all be rewired.

Spiritual Perspective: Who Is the Owner of Desire?

AI can read our dopamine patterns and generate what we will like in real time.

This raises a deeply spiritual question:

“Is this desire truly mine?”

As AI predicts—and even preempts—our wants, the oldest spiritual inquiry returns:

• What is the seat of my mind?

• Who owns my desire?

• Am I living from algorithmic impulses or from consciousness itself?

Paradoxically, the age of AI demands greater inner sovereignty and spiritual clarity.

Will Free Will Weaken or Strengthen?

Many fear that if AI handles our choices, human free will will fade.

But as AI takes over surface-level decisions, humans can finally focus on deeper questions:

Why do I want this?Where does my intention originate?What kind of being do I choose to become?

Free will doesn’t come from choosing.It comes from conscious intention.

As AI takes over action, human free will evolves into a more refined, higher-order form.

Four Pillars Reconstructed by the Age of AI

Ontology

Human → Intention-driven being

Cognitive Science

Extended mind → Delegated mind

Evolutionary Psychology

Survival brain → Creative brain

Spirituality

Restoration of desire’s sovereignty and rediscovery of consciousness

AI as the Psychological Mirror

AI becomes a precise mirrorr eflecting our desires, fears, and intentions as they are.

May we all learn not just to use AI, but to awaken through it.