The natural world into which all living creatures are born is, for the most part, self-sustaining. Birds and insects grow and survive without visible amendment, guided only by the forces of nature. The sun rises and sets; the seasons change; flowers bloom and wither; leaves come and go. Human beings, by contrast, distinguish themselves through deliberate and sometimes extraordinary modifications—not only to their own natural growth and evolution but also to the world around them. They alter agriculture and architecture, photography and cosmetics, music and language, even the alphabets they use. More remarkably, humans create entire fictions—narratives among and between themselves—that shape their perception of reality. This continuous process of revision and reinterpretation far exceeds the natural limitations of partnership, familial growth, and physical necessity.

Yet, venturing beyond the organic boundaries that govern all living things has often proven perilous. Even without delving into the broader social and historical ramifications—such as the disruption of indigenous populations, cultural identities, or human descent generally—the act of editing what is naturally given, including the innate harmony of life on Earth, is an uncertain enterprise. While nature operates within a balance of stronger and weaker forces, each fulfilling its own role for survival, humans often obstruct their own growth by seeking dominance over others, straying from nature’s equilibrium.

There are, of course, exceptions to this cautionary view. Art, for instance, is distinctly human—a form of self-expression found in no other species. Like literature, it represents an edit function unique to our kind. But with the evolution of artificial intelligence, we have begun to outsource this function to what is, in some respects, an unliving entity. This step distances the edit function even further from both nature and humanity, creating an unprecedented vicarious existence.

Technology, in its many manifestations, has long served as an extension of human expression and direction. From photography to literature, from instruction to navigation, it provides tools through which we refine our experiences. The GPS, for example, is readily followed with little hesitation, though the risk of blind reliance is always present. Yet artificial intelligence presents a far more profound shift—one that recalls the moment in 2001: A Space Odyssey when HAL 9000 appears to evolve beyond its human programming.

Even without the influence of artificial intelligence, humanity has long sought to reshape nature in its own image. Nowhere is this more evident than in our interpretations of gender, sexuality, and human capacity—domains that have historically oscillated between enlightenment and ignorance, depending on prevailing edit functions. The transition from classical to modern art, for example, faced similar cycles of resistance and evolution. Salvador Dalí’s dreamlike compositions, rendered with near-photographic precision against the arid Catalan landscape, are worlds apart from Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa.

Film has also provided striking premonitions of the consequences of unchecked revision. A single frame from Star Wars, in which Harrison Ford’s character sits in a bar surrounded by humanoids and droids, suggests the extremes to which the edit function might take us—raising questions about the limits of human tolerance for difference and individuality.

Yet, for all these uncertainties, I have always regarded technological advancement as something to be embraced rather than resisted. It is an undeniable force in human progress. We are not far removed from the advent of the printing press, the steam engine, the airplane, the automobile, the fax machine, or the iPhone—each of which introduced a new mode of editing our world. Artificial intelligence is simply the latest iteration in a long history of tools that redefine how we shape ourselves and our surroundings.