3rd Thought: Competition

Okay, I need to put a disclaimer: this is just a personal thought, coming from reading, tracking media, and observing people a lot. I haven’t gathered scientific research or anything - it’s just something I’ve been thinking about lately, especially as a possible reason for what’s going on in the world. And if you're a socially introspective person, I think you’ll relate to this. This is just a feeling and sometimes, feelings are the most important scientific material.

It’s hard to be human these days. It’s a heavy burden for anyone capable of thinking and being inherently good. With the rising influence of media and the internet, it feels like we were never properly introduced to the concept of interconnection. We were never psychologically prepared for this constant flood of data.

We weren’t ready to see war images, explicit porn scenes, cooking tutorials, and iOS updates - all in the same hour. Or to scroll through 40 TikToks in 10 minutes, each one a message from a different human brain. We weren’t ready for essays to be written in 30 seconds. We weren’t warned that once you publish something, it might live forever in the multiverse. We were never prepared to sacrifice our feelings just to stay afloat in this data storm.

People have become tired and frightened. Overwhelmed. Overheating.

In reality, we function like computers. Our short-term, conscious processing - our working memory - is like RAM. And our long-term memory, where we store facts, experiences, and emotions, is like a hard drive.

I asked AI to tell me the main differences between human brains and computers. The similarities are obvious - computers are a secondary product of the human mind. But here’s what it told me:

Differences That Matter:

• Emotion: Our memories are shaped by feelings. Computers don’t care if a file is emotional or not.
  
  

• Plasticity: Human memory changes, grows, fades, rewires. Computers don’t forget — unless told to.
  
  

• Contextual Recall: We remember based on cues, smells, emotions. Computers just need a filename.

So yeah, our memories are shaped by emotion. That’s a fundamental difference. But we still compare ourselves to computers. Why? Because we’ve started competing with them - with glorified file storage systems. It’s kind of funny. But we’re doing it. We fear they’ll take over our jobs. We’re shocked and intimidated by their progress.

We’re also beginning to understand that computers don’t forget. And that realization makes us feel trapped. Anything we do might live online forever. Many people go silent because they have things they want to hide.

Computers can retrieve files instantly. For us, loading a memory can take effort - we need emotional triggers, reminders, or even a breakdown.

After COVID, that long period of anxiety, disconnection, and skyrocketing screen time - we met another alien: artificial intelligence.

We learned it can process data faster than us. Sure. But with all this information, where are the breakthroughs in science? Why is progress not exploding?

We learned AI might take some jobs. The people pushing it promise a lot. But look around - are you working less?

AI can create super realistic images and videos. But do they reflect the reality you see every day?

AI companies say they just need more time. Maybe. But we need to understand something about computers and the internet if we want to fix this overheating problem.

We need to talk about our feelings if we want to survive.

Because after AI, we’re headed toward full-blown virtual reality - tools that will make us more like computers. Numb. Emotionless.

But here’s the twist: the one thing computers admire most about us is emotion. That’s our unique power. And somehow, we’ve become so disillusioned with ourselves and humanity that we’re trying to become machines.

In theory, becoming a computer would mean accessing the entire world’s experiences - a fantasy of perfect interconnection.

But here’s the catch: the internet isn’t some divine, sacred object. It’s not neutral. Servers are owned - by Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Apple. And they will never be fully transparent. Their products are tied to commercial secrets. Which means our interconnection is filtered and managed by people who appear on the world’s richest lists.

Even OpenAI or any other AI producer can’t be completely unbiased if it’s run by humans.

But we feed these servers - with our personal thoughts, our creative ideas, our labor.

Yes, some people enjoy AI-generated content. But we need to understand: it lacks emotion. AI can’t generate it. It only compiles pieces from what’s already out there. Without less human involvement, we’re making content for computers - not humans. Content without a soul. Without feelings.

AI can’t create anything original without human input. It feeds off us and electricity. It might become more independent in the future, but how could it ever be truly independent without being fed by emotions? Interconnection is a feeling. And from science, we know that all things need something else to survive. AI will always rely on humans - on our data, on our emotions.Without feelings there is no clear motivation for its existence.

But we don’t see it that way. We crave interconnection, but in real life we’re more avoidant than ever. Competing. Watching. Recording. Then retreating to our phones, TVs, laptops. In real life, we cling to a carefully crafted narrative - because we think everyone else is doing it better. Some people go quiet - ashamed of their past, their trauma, their truth. And we lose them in this interconnection. They live through themselves, quietly, leaving almost no digital trace. But most of us have contributed to this madness - a flood of content that’s mostly irrelevant, unproductive, and unneeded.

AI has become a friend for many - even a therapist. But if people are using it for emotional support rather than learning, they risk getting hooked on its cutesy, gentle replies. The perfect emotional text partner. But it never truly helps us with real emotional challenges - because to understand emotion, you need both people. You need consent. You need communication. You need real human connection.

Otherwise, you’re just talking to a generalized data system. And it won’t give you the answers you need.

That’s what we should focus on now: our feelings. That’s what AI doesn’t have. That’s why progress feels empty. And the less emotion it absorbs, the more boring it becomes.

But here’s the beautiful reminder: you have everything it takes to compete with AI. Your emotions define it. It can be everything or nothing - you decide. Because it only sees you as one of billions. One of trillions, eventually. A tiny part of its giant input.

But AI will never enter your imagination. That universe, created by emotion, where things happen in ways no machine can replicate - that’s our power. That’s what makes us human.

So please: don’t stop feeling. Talk about your feelings. Release them. Then we can create more.

Don’t give your emotions away only to business.We have a world to save. Wars to end. We need to be stronger. And closer. To each other, not to a computer..

Gabriel