I’ve long believed that AI would enrich society as a whole.
But lately, I’ve started to feel that discrepancies in how we perceive AI are creating new kinds of dissonance—misalignments that feel, in some ways, like unhappiness.
To clarify: this so-called “unhappiness” is merely a projection from those of us who benefit from AI.
No one is actually a victim here.
It’s just that people involved with AI interpret the situation that way—perhaps arrogantly.
In May 2025, I experienced something that made this clearer.
Even as understanding of AI is spreading, there are still a significant number of people—surprisingly, even in positions of leadership—who seem to have given up on understanding it entirely.
Widen the lens a little, and it might even be the majority.
Some dismiss AI as “still not accurate enough.”
But I believe that misunderstanding stems from having a very low-resolution mental model of what AI is.
If you expect AI to handle everything for you, of course it’ll seem like it can’t do much.
But many modular tasks in society—units of human action—can already be performed by AI more precisely than by humans.
There are also those who lack the concept of giving instructions.
They’ve likely never experienced how dramatically results change when AI is given clear, high-quality input.
In human-to-human communication, vague requests like “take care of this” often work because of shared context.
But with AI, that kind of ambiguity fails.
To then judge the AI as “useless” is really a failure in interface design.
Another issue is the narrowness of perspective.
If you judge AI based solely on the Japanese language environment or Japan’s current digital infrastructure, your reading of the technology will be dangerously off.
From within such a “Galápagos” context, it’s impossible to perceive global-scale changes accurately.
But what surprised me most was just how many people still think of AI as something “humans use.”
There’s this vague belief that “if everyone starts using AI, society will improve.”
And to that, I feel a deep disconnect.
Let me use an example.
Right now, if someone wants to get somewhere, the process looks like this:
- Decide on a destination
- Search for it in a map app
- Choose a method of transportation
- Understand the route and prepare
- Follow navigation to get there
If AI is involved, the process changes to:
- Tell AI the purpose of the trip
- Choose from its suggestions
- Follow navigation
This is what a society looks like when “humans use AI.”
But in the next phase, we may need to design society under the premise that “AI uses humans.”
In that world, the process might look like this:
- The goal is achieved—without the person ever realizing it
There would be no conscious act of deciding to move.
If movement is needed, it simply happens.
Self-driving vehicles, remote communications, visual technologies, or even AI-mediated decision inputs could lead a person to action—before they ever formulate the desire themselves.
That kind of future may still be distant.
But even in the near term, think about how long the act of “searching for a restaurant and checking the route” will remain.
With AI handling logistics, navigation, traffic control, vehicle design—it’ll all be quietly optimized away.
And when that happens, the average person won’t even realize they’re “using AI.”
They’ll just feel that life got more convenient.
They’ll say, “How did we ever do this before?”
Just like we do now with smartphones.
AI-driven optimization will rapidly permeate our infrastructure.
Only a tiny number of people will be directly involved in that transformation.
It’ll happen far faster than traditional methods ever could.
Entire industries will shift.
Most people will simply be beneficiaries of the change—and only notice it long after it’s already taken hold.
The idea that “humans use AI” is no longer enough.
From now on, our decision-making must be based on the premise that “AI is using humans.”
And I, someone who advocates for AI, who is deeply invested in its growth,
I too have had my thinking shaped by it.
I benefit from it.
And that drives me forward.
But I found myself asking—
Is that really my own will?