⚫︎Humans Began Trying to Become Machines
Adachi: Compared with wild animals, humans were burdened with weaknesses they could not overcome alone. Yet human history is the story of transforming those weaknesses into strengths through cooperation and ingenuity. The problem, then, is that we are beginning to lose that strength.
Yamagiwa: The major turning point was the Industrial Revolution. People became increasingly focused on efficiency and productivity. We create plans, manage every aspect of life according to those plans, and spend our days executing them. Isn't that essentially the robotization of human beings? Modern people, especially those living in cities, have become almost machine-like.
Adachi: And now AI has emerged—something capable of controlling and directing those machines. It almost seems as though AI is attempting to replace human beings.
Yamagiwa: Humans are becoming machines, while AI, which controls machines, is trying to become human. At the same time, humans who are becoming more machine-like are gradually losing their individual capacity for judgment. Human beings originally possessed unique perspectives and ways of making decisions. That individuality allowed each person to set goals and pursue new possibilities for the future. That was part of what made humanity fascinating. But today people are increasingly standardized and homogenized, all moving in the same direction under the guidance of AI as a central command system. If this continues, humans will become automatons, and individuality will disappear altogether.
Adachi: Perhaps that is why business itself seems to be changing so dramatically.
Yamagiwa: The most profitable businesses today are no longer those that make things. They are businesses that move people. Organizing events and gathering crowds has become one of the fastest ways to make money. This is exactly the kind of world that AI can dominate with overwhelming effectiveness.
Adachi: Is it really safe for society to continue drifting in that direction?
Yamagiwa: I believe it is extremely dangerous because we are forgetting something fundamental. Human dignity, as understood in the tradition of humanism, rests on the idea that every individual is different and therefore capable of making independent judgments. Yet we are increasingly outsourcing our thinking to AI and allowing it to make decisions for us. As a result, everyone begins moving in the same direction. If that happens, very little remains of what makes human beings truly compelling.
Adachi: What matters most to me is the human mind. If we are gradually losing that, then we are facing a very dangerous situation indeed.
Yamagiwa: As I mentioned earlier, the mind emerges when we encounter someone or something, and each person's experience is unique. Even when people encounter the same thing, different minds arise from that experience. Yet the modern era has consistently pushed toward standardization. When different people come together, their weaknesses are also different. To compensate for those differences, societies established principles of equality. In that sense, freedom and equality have always existed in tension with one another, yet society has also been built through the reconciliation of those two ideals.
Adachi: If that is true, perhaps our pursuit of freedom has come at the expense of equality. Globalization, which often accepts widening disparities, seems to reflect that trend.
Yamagiwa: Look at the United States, where inequality has reached extraordinary levels, or Europe, whose history was rooted in feudal systems. The internet appears to connect people who share the same beliefs, but those connections are often built on very fragile foundations. The internet itself is shaped by hidden forces such as filter bubbles and echo chambers. As a result, people may ultimately be guided in the same direction without realizing it. That is what concerns me.
⚫︎Human Strength Emerges from Human Weakness
Adachi: If humans are becoming more machine-like while machines and AI increasingly aspire to become human, then people may only become weaker. In that case, learning how to make use of our weaknesses becomes increasingly important. But humans have many weaknesses. Which ones should we pay attention to?
Yamagiwa: Human beings get tired. After all, we are living organisms. We have physical limits, and we have mental limits as well. Our concentration fades. We become bored. That is simply what it means to be human. Machines, by contrast, continue operating as instructed for as long as necessary. The longer a machine can sustain its performance, the more highly it is valued. Persistence is one of the defining differences between machines and humans. Humans lack that kind of persistence. Yet it is precisely because of that weakness that we are able to relate to one another.
Adachi: “Humans are creatures that grow tired.” That is a remarkably powerful phrase.
Yamagiwa: There is another issue that remains controversial: Can AI ever possess consciousness? Some AI researchers argue that consciousness is essentially a collection of information and that AI, as an information-processing system, will eventually develop consciousness. I disagree. Human beings receive information through the body. Whether through language, action, or perception, information enters through the five senses. Processing information means digesting it through bodily experience. If that is true, AI will never possess consciousness in the same way humans do.
Adachi: AI lacks the five senses, so it cannot develop consciousness in the same manner. That makes sense.
Yamagiwa: Furthermore, the information AI uses is often based on statistical averages or optimal solutions within a given category. That is fundamentally different from how humans think. Human beings do not operate solely according to concepts such as right and wrong. We also make decisions based on vague and irrational criteria such as likes and dislikes. Sometimes we know that something is ninety-nine percent wrong, yet we pursue it because we are captivated by the remaining one percent. AI cannot engage in that kind of irrational or absurd behavior.
Adachi: So not only fatigue, but imperfection itself is part of what defines humanity. It is not necessarily a weakness.
Yamagiwa: Human beings are human precisely because we carry imperfection within us. That imperfection appears in our relationships as well, allowing us to sustain complex social connections. Humans possess multilayered cognition. That is why we can watch films or plays and understand them. Gorillas and chimpanzees would not understand them at all. Humans can imagine events from the perspective of an observer, whether those events occurred in the past or are occurring in the present. That ability allows us to feel surprise and empathy. AI cannot do that. Which is why we should never allow AI to manage human relationships.
Adachi: Yet there is a growing tendency to delegate even administrative processes involving human relationships to AI.
Yamagiwa: That is a line we must never cross. The management of deeply intertwined human relationships should not be entrusted to AI.
⚫︎Humans Became Creatures of Cause and Effect
Adachi: If the ability to manipulate and interpret abstract concepts is one of humanity's greatest strengths, did it also emerge from some kind of weakness? For example, living within society requires us to think about other people. Is that what gave rise to our capacity for interpretation?
Yamagiwa: Language plays a crucial role. Human beings are obsessed with causality. We constantly imagine ourselves within narratives. And narratives are built upon cause-and-effect relationships. Something happens because of a particular cause, and that cause leads to a specific result.
Adachi: The ability to think in terms of causality certainly seems unique to humans. Does that mean animals live primarily through correlations rather than causal explanations?
Yamagiwa: Animals understand patterns through experience. When one event occurs, they learn to anticipate another. Humans, however, want to understand the causes even of events they have never experienced themselves. We are deeply attached to causality. This is both a strength and a weakness. Animals do not concern themselves with causal explanations. When observing gorillas, for example, I have seen individuals lose a hand in an accident, yet they continue living without becoming discouraged. They never wonder, “What if I had not lost my hand?”
Adachi: In some ways, not dwelling on such thoughts seems admirable.
Yamagiwa: Yet humans cannot help dwelling on them. Someone with poor eyesight compares themselves to people with normal vision. Gorillas and chimpanzees never think that way. Humans acquired language, and language enabled us to think in terms of causality. Then we began creating narratives, and with those narratives came various problems as well.
Adachi: Yet compared with machines, the ability to think causally and create narratives may become one of humanity's most important strengths.
Yamagiwa: I agree. In fact, narratives existed even before language. Human beings can create stories through dance, gestures, and performance. Technology has expanded those narratives dramatically. Today that expansion has led to virtual worlds, avatars, and the metaverse, where people can enter virtually any story they choose. Yet we must not ignore the possibility that the ethics of real human society could be undermined as a result. If we fail to maintain a connection between virtual and physical reality, there is a danger that the metaverse may begin to feel more real than the world itself.
Adachi: We already see signs of that among younger generations.
Yamagiwa: Some people have begun to feel that the physical world is the illusion and that virtual worlds are where they can truly thrive. If that trend continues, entirely new ethical systems and forms of logic may emerge. We are already confronting that possibility.
Adachi: It almost feels as though the logic of another world is beginning to intrude upon reality. Some form of regulation may be necessary.
Yamagiwa: When I think about modern society, I often return to Ivan Illich's concept of conviviality—a society in which people value individual autonomy while simultaneously supporting one another and growing together. Human beings live by connecting with one another and compensating for each other's weaknesses. Yet when we look at the reality around us, how close are we to that vision?
Adachi: It certainly feels as though we are far from realizing conviviality.
Yamagiwa: Consider people living in high-rise urban apartments. They can hardly be described as autonomous. Their lives depend entirely on infrastructure systems. Perhaps it is time to rethink concepts such as efficiency and productivity from the ground up. In some cases, a slower pace of life can actually increase autonomy. We need to reexamine assumptions we have long taken for granted and ask ourselves what truly autonomous living looks like. Only then can we begin considering what is necessary for genuine coexistence. The key to that process is metacognition—the ability to understand oneself. In that regard, tools such as the Mental Battery service and the Mentoring 2 smart ring may play an important role.
⚫︎Humanity Exists Because We Are Imperfect
Human beings grow tired. We become bored. We dwell on things and worry.
The weaknesses described by Yamagiwa are also uniquely human strengths. Because we are imperfect, we can support one another and sustain complex relationships. Yet that same imperfection is inseparable from our ability to think in terms of causality and to weave stories about ourselves and the world.
In the next conversation, held on a different day, the discussion turns to humanity's sense of time and the power of language, taking the exploration of the human mind even further.
Profile
Juichi Yamagiwa (Director-General, Research Institute for Humanity and Nature)
Born in Tokyo in 1952. Graduated from the Faculty of Science at Kyoto University and completed the coursework for a doctoral degree in the Graduate School of Science before withdrawing to pursue research. Holds a Doctor of Science degree. He has served as a visiting researcher at the Karisoke Research Center in Rwanda, a researcher at the Japan Monkey Centre, an assistant at Kyoto University's Primate Research Institute, and an associate professor, professor, and dean of the Graduate School of Science / Faculty of Science at Kyoto University, before serving as the 26th President of Kyoto University until 2020. A specialist in human evolutionary theory, he has conducted socioecological studies of wild Japanese macaques on Yakushima Island and of wild gorillas across Africa. He has also served as President of the Primate Society of Japan, President of the International Primatological Society, President of the Science Council of Japan, a member of the Council for Science, Technology and Innovation, and a Senior Advisor for Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai, Japan.
He currently serves as Director-General of the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature. He is a recipient of the Minakata Kumagusu Prize and the Academia Prize. His many books include Everything Important in Life I Learned from Gorillas (Ie-no-Hikari Association, 2020), The Children Who Want to Throw Away Their Smartphones: Learning How to Live in an "Age of the Unknown" from the Wild (Poplar Shinsho, 2020), What a Gorilla Scholar Thought About in the Jungle of Kyoto University (Asahi Shinsho, 2021), Saruseijingo (Seidosha, 2022), The Empathy Revolution: The Evolution and Future of a Socializing Humankind (Kawade Shinsho, 2023), The Voice of the Forest, the Eyes of the Gorilla: Carrying the Essence of Humanity into the Future (Shogakukan Shinsho, 2024), To Humans Who Do Nothing but Quarrel: From the Land of Gorillas (Mainichi Shimbun Publishing, 2024), A Way of Thinking for Growing Old (Bungeishunju, 2025), and Thinking in the Forest of Gorillas (Mainichi Shimbun Publishing, 2025).
Jun Adachi (CEO of MENTAGRAPH Inc. / Director of D-LAB, Japan Tobacco Inc.)
At D-LAB, the corporate R&D organization of the JT Group, Adachi has led the planning and development of new businesses and founded MENTAGRAPH Inc. Previously, he worked at a UX consulting firm before joining Japan Tobacco Inc. in 2018.
