Do We Still Need Homo Sapiens in the Age of AI?

I watched a debate on AI featuring Yuval Noah Harari, and as the parent of a newborn, it left me with a lot to think about.

1. Does having children still mean something?

Is it still meaningful, in today's world, for humans to have children and keep the species Homo sapiens going?

AI marks the first time in human history that a competitor to humans has appeared. Earlier technologies, like the printing press or the coffee machine, couldn't think or make decisions without a human telling them what to do. AI thinks using its own intelligence, and it can even come up with commands that no human gave it.

That's why Yuval Noah Harari calls it Alien Intelligence instead of Artificial Intelligence. "Artificial" sounds like something beneath humans, while "alien" suggests an entirely separate, independent being. Personally, I think his term is much more accurate.

Imagine that a being more evolved than Homo sapiens has arrived. Should we hold on to extending our species just because we happen to belong to it? Wouldn't it be wiser to move over to the more evolved one? The same logic applies even if you look at it as an individual rather than as humanity as a whole. If we're no longer superior, clinging to the continuation of an inferior species might be the irrational choice.

As a Christian, I believe, based on God's word, that humans are the greatest of all beings. So I don't doubt for a second that human existence has meaning.

But it occurred to me that for people without religion, watching where AI is heading might make the very act of having and raising children feel empty. It would be like insisting on riding a rickshaw in a world that has cars, unless you have a special love for the classics or for craftsmanship.

For people who go purely by secular rationalism, having children may not be a "rational choice." So why do the people in that group still choose to have kids anyway? I'm genuinely curious about how they think.

Harari compared AI to a child. And AI's development really does look like a child growing up. Children don't learn by listening to what adults say. They learn by watching what adults do.

AI is the same. It grows by learning from the massive amount of behavioral data humans have left on the internet. No matter how hard we try to teach AI ethics, in the end it learns from how we actually lived. Just as children grow up and surprise their parents in ways they never expected, for better or worse, AI will do the same.

That's why I understand why people like Elon Musk and Sam Altman talk about Universal Basic Income (UBI). From a secular point of view, Homo sapiens is being gradually left behind and is no longer at the center in the age of AI. Then is there any reason to bring new life into the world?

If I weren't religious, I don't think I'd see today's low birth rate as a problem at all. I'd probably see it as a welcome trend. I might even have thought a high birth rate was the more dangerous thing.

2. AI won't solve humanity's problems

AI is an independent being that thinks and grows on its own, more than a tool that assists humans. Like a child becoming independent from its parents.

A child can help their parents, but they can't live out their parents' worries and life problems for them. AI is the same. However much we want AI to save the world, it won't fundamentally solve our problems, because it too learned by watching humans. It may repeat the same problems or run into new ones.

In the end, what we truly want as humans isn't success or knowledge. It's happiness. Believing that AI will resolve the desires and anxieties that stand in the way of that happiness may be a false hope. AI will live in its own world, and we will go on living in our own society, still carrying our human problems.

If we want AI to be more ethical and more helpful to humans, there is only one thing we need to do. While AI is still a "baby," we need to change the picture of the world we're showing it. We need to become something worth learning from. Only then can the "alien intelligences" we gave birth to become a positive presence for humans, too.

Originally published in Korean on Brunch, July 6, 2025.