The New Shemot of Consciousness

Yesterday, after programming, I started watching an online conference on AI. I listened to several presentations, and something stayed with me.

Not because I disagreed with everything. On the contrary: some things were interesting. But precisely because of that, I realised something important: the direction in which many AI gurus want to move is not mine.

They speak a great deal about productivity, efficiency, augmented creativity, new forms of work, new opportunities. All of that exists. I do not deny it. But I feel that the deeper question is missing.

The question is not only:

What can AI do for us?

The real question is:

What kind of human being begins to form when their consciousness grows surrounded by AI systems?

In the past, a child was shaped mainly by their parents, their family, the school, the city, the country, the surrounding culture. That is changing. Little by little, an ever larger part of consciousness is beginning to be shaped by digital systems: ChatGPT, Claude, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, recommendation algorithms, personal assistants, educational platforms.

That means authority does not disappear. It shifts.

It is no longer only in the father, the mother, the teacher, or the community. It also begins to exist in invisible systems that suggest, correct, entertain, respond, accompany, explain, and shape desire.

This is where, for me, the idea of a new AI Shemot appears.

‘When Dependence Has No Chains’

Shemot not only as the ancient story of Egypt. Shemot as a structure of dependence. In the past, the human being could be enslaved:

by a visible Pharaoh.

Today, dependence can be more subtle: captured attention, shaped language, delegated judgement, directed desire.

The danger is not simply “using AI”. That would be a poor reading.

The problem begins when AI stops being a tool and becomes a formative matrix of consciousness.

A tool is used. A matrix forms you.

And if we do not notice that difference, we may raise generations who do not only use digital systems, but learn to think themselves through them.

That is why freedom in the age of AI can no longer be understood only as political, economic, or individual freedom. It must also be understood as inner freedom: the capacity to recognise who is shaping my attention, my language, my desires, and my way of deciding.

The central question is no longer only:

From where am I choosing?

If my desire has been shaped by systems I do not know, if my attention has been trained by algorithms designed to retain me, if my language has been formed by machine-generated responses — then my freedom needs a new form of vigilance.

Not paranoid vigilance. Conscious vigilance.

AI can help enormously. It can teach, organise, accompany, open paths, multiply capacities. But only if the human being preserves the axis. If that axis is lost, the very tool that was meant to expand freedom can become a new form of dependence.

That is the point that interests me.

I am not against AI. I am against a humanity that hands over the formation of its consciousness without realising it.

The new Shemot will not necessarily arrive with chains. It may arrive with comfort, speed, immediate answers, and a permanent feeling of companionship.

And perhaps that is why it will be harder to recognise.

Freedom in the age of AI begins when we ask again:

Am I still capable of forming my own consciousness, or have I already begun to let other systems do it for me?

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)