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On My Mind

Mrs. Aliza Feder's Newsletter

Imagine you would like to write a letter to your daughter on the occasion of her bas mitzvah.

You want it to be meaningful, personal, maybe a little funny, and, most importantly, to express something of what you feel about this daughter of yours and the new stage of life she's entering.

You sit down to write, and it's hard.

You know perfectly well what you want to say, or at least you think you do, but somehow the words aren't coming. You write a sentence, delete it, try another one, and then spend an embarrassingly long time staring at a blank page.

Or you could open ChatGPT, explain the occasion, provide a few details about your daughter, and ask it to write a beautiful, moving note.

It would. It might even be better than the one you would have written yourself.

So here's my question: If the computer can do it better, why shouldn't we let it?

I think we're going to be asking ourselves versions of this question with increasing frequency over the coming years.

Because AI is doing something that previous technology didn't do quite so convincingly. It isn't simply helping us perform tasks more efficiently. It's performing activities that we've always associated with distinctly human capabilities: thinking, creating, communicating, and even appearing to understand and respond to our emotions.

And that raises a fascinating question: What exactly makes us human?

I recently came across an essay by Bill Gates in which he considers the enormous changes AI is bringing to the world. Among the questions he raises is how we preserve our humanity in a world where machines can increasingly outperform us intellectually.

I thought that was an extraordinary question- and an interesting one coming from a goy.

As Yidden, we have a very particular understanding of what it means to be human, and I think that understanding has something important to contribute to this conversation.

Rav Ahron Lopiansky, in an article about AI, points to the Onkelos on the creation of Adam Harishon.

When the Torah tells us that Hashem breathed into Adam a nishmas chaim and that he became a nefesh chayah, Onkelos translates the latter phrase as ruach memalela — a speaking being.

Think about that for a second: of all the qualities that distinguish human beings from the rest of creation, why identify speech? Why is speech singled out as the defining characteristic?

Rav Lopiansky brings the Maharal, who explains that human speech has two dimensions: on one level, words communicate information. They tell us what happened, describe an experience, or convey an idea.

But on another level, a person's words communicate something of the person herself (this is one of the reasons why the tongue is a unique organ of the body, able to be both pulled inside and completely hidden, and also poked out to be seen. This mirrors the reality that speech is something that reveals something internal about ourselves in terms of what we choose to speak about and the language we use. Enter wordwatch plug here:)).

When someone tells us about something painful she experienced, we hear more than the facts of the story. We hear something of her pain. When a person speaks about something she deeply believes in, we can sense the conviction behind the words. Speech is not merely the transmission of information- it’s an expression of the person speaking.

And this, explains Rav Lopiansky, is connected to the extraordinary reality of our being created b'tzelem Elokim. We have a neshama, an inner spiritual reality that can be expressed through our words.

Now think about what happens when we ask AI to speak for us.

The computer may produce a beautiful note. It may know all the appropriate things to say about gratitude, love, dreams we may have for our child, and the special qualities of a Bas Mitzvah. But none of those words emerged from a mother thinking about her daughter.

And perhaps even more significantly, the mother never had to go through the process of finding those words.

She never had to sit with her feelings long enough to understand what she actually wanted to express. She never had to decide which memories mattered most, which qualities she especially admired, or what she most wanted her daughter to know.

She received a lovely finished product, and missed something important along the way.

What if the struggle to express ourselves is part of how we come to understand ourselves?

I find this idea fascinating because it applies to so many other areas of life.

When a student struggles to formulate an answer, she isn't merely trying to produce a correct response. The process of thinking, sorting, questioning, and putting ideas into her own words is part of how she develops her understanding.

When we're trying to write an apology, the difficulty of finding the right words may require us to confront exactly what we're sorry for (or not sorry for).

When we're preparing a thought to share with someone, the effort of figuring out what we believe and how to explain it may be part of what makes that thought meaningful to us.

And when we're learning Torah, the effort of understanding, questioning, and working through an idea is not simply an inconvenience standing between us and the answer. It's part of the learning itself.

We want the beautiful speech, the polished letter, the correct answer, the finished assignment. But we've become so accustomed to evaluating things by their outcomes that we sometimes forget how much value there is in the process. So if (when) technology can produce those results faster and more effectively, it seems rather foolish to spend time doing the work ourselves. (This conversation about Results vs Process is one of the first ones I have with my high school students. It’s the lesson that is the foundation of everything else I will teach them. I love it and you can find it here.)

Except for this small detail: If the entire purpose of an activity is to produce a particular result, then efficiency is a wonderful advantage. But if part of the purpose is to develop my own capacity to think, feel, create, articulate, or connect, then removing the effort may remove something essential.

Obviously, this doesn't mean that every task needs to be difficult or that we should refuse to use tools that make our lives easier. There is tremendous value in technology that frees us from unnecessary work (see my previous email about how much I love the internet). But there is a distinction worth making between work that is simply a means to an end and work that is itself part of our growth.

And I wonder whether we're giving that distinction enough attention as AI becomes an increasingly ordinary part of our lives. Maybe there are certain things we should choose to do ourselves even when a machine could do them more quickly, more easily, and perhaps even more impressively.

Not because the machine isn't capable- but because we need to remain capable. And maybe, in some cases, because something more than capability is at stake.

We want our words to be our words. Our thoughts to reflect our own understanding. Our relationships to be built through genuine human connection. We want to continue developing the uniquely human capacities that Hashem gave us, rather than gradually surrendering them in the name of convenience.

So the next time you're struggling to find the right words, or working through something that AI could resolve for you in seconds, perhaps it's worth asking a different question.

Not simply, "Could technology do this for me?" Rather, "Is there something valuable happening in the process of doing this myself?"

Sometimes, the answer is no. But other times the struggle isn't getting in the way of the point.

It is the point.

Warmly,

Mrs. Aliza Feder

P.S. This is one of the questions that fascinates me about technology: not only what it allows us to do, but how it quietly changes the way we think, relate to others, and experience our lives. These are the kinds of influences we'll explore in my upcoming live TechTalks series. Registration opens November 15, and I'll share more details soon!

P.P.S. 

• תרגום אונקלוס על בראשית ב׳:ז׳  ,  וּבְרָא יְיָ אֱלֹהִים יָת אָדָם עַפְרָא מִן אַדְמְתָא וּנְפַח בְּאַפּוֹהִי נִשְׁמְתָא דְחַיֵּי וַהֲוַת בְּאָדָם לְרוּחַ מְמַלְלָא: 

• נתיבות עולם, נתיב הלשון א׳--    אבל הלשון מסוגל לזה כי הלשון מוציא הכל אל הפעל, ולכך על ידי הלשון יצא אל הפעל לתלותו והוא המות ועל ידי הלשון יצא לפעל גם כן להחיותו. ומפני כך הלשון יותר במקום נסתר כי ע"י הלשון יוצא הדבור מן ההסתר אל הגלוי, וחשבו אליו דבר זה לשפלות שאמרו האיברים אליו את יושב במקום חושך, והוא מורה על מעלת הלשון שמוציא הכל מן הנסתר אל הגלוי. וכאשר היה מוציא אל פעל הדבור כמו שראוי הגיע לו החיים, וכאשר הוציא הדבור אל הפעל בהפך יש בידו המות, והרי יש בידו החיים והמות להוציא הדבר אל הפעל הרע והטוב דבר זה נקרא שיש בידו החיים והמות. ואמר ראה כמה גדול כח הדבור שהרי על ידי הדבור הוא נותן הודאה אל הש"י וההודאה היא על כל הקרבנות וכמו שמבואר במקום אחר.

• Rav Ahron Lopiansky, "Will ChatGPT Replace Us?" — the article that develops these ideas in connection with AI. I found this particularly worthwhile.

• (Feels funny putting this in the same pps, but for those who are interested) Bill Gates, "The Turbulent AI Era Is Here" — the essay that originally got me thinking about the question of preserving our humanity as AI becomes increasingly capable.

P.P.P.S. I've written before about the idea that being human means developing the capacities of our neshama, rather than simply pursuing whatever is easiest or most pleasurable. If you enjoyed today's discussion, you might also appreciate my earlier newsletter, Ruchniyus and Gashmiyus, Revisited. Again.