Sep. 24, 2025

The Future of AI is Human

On Fairies and Gin-Tonic with Blueberries

AI got me thinking lately, why would one still want to work? Perhaps today's imperfect AI is not ready yet, but imagine everybody has access to a near perfect intelligence, capable of solving hard problems and answering even your wildest questions. Combine that with robotics and we'll be left wondering what to do next. Some fairies and Gin-Tonic pointed me to a possible answer.

Many jobs are already touched by AI today, I know a lot of folks use the large language models to generate and process text, documents and corporate things. Sometimes the AI texts are so obvious that I wonder if anybody actually cares. If texts generated by one AI are read and processed by another AI, then what's the point of the text anyway?

Fairies

In the world of wonders, Efteling, I may have found the first clue for finding the meaning of life work in an age of AI when I met some fairies with my little daughter. Easy to dismiss as cosplaying girls, I witnessed some true meaningful interaction, something pure and authentic. My girl met real fairies and did some real fairy things. These girls weren't acting superficially, they maintained their magic even when their shift was over. Even I felt their power when they waved goodbye with hand kisses and blinking eyes.

I think that the power of these fairies was not their roleplaying, but the fact that the girls genuinely cared about my daughter and her imagination. True attention from a fellow person is something special, something valuable and hard to replicate with a computer. I realise that modern tech can simulate things, but I believe in the real thing to stand out by speaking to our subconsciousness: humans reaching for humans.

Gin-Tonic with Blueberries

For her birthday I took my wife for some shopping, instead of boringly strolling through a dime a dozen retail stores I made an appointment with Ellie from KUIF in Venlo, who prepared a selection of clothes and accessories. She knows my wife a bit as our kids go to the same school, enabling her to pick pieces only a fellow woman would understand. In her store I saw how attention to detail and taste made all the difference, even if that meant recommending not to buy certain clothes. She didn't limit her attention to my wife as I got to enjoy a Gin-Tonic with blueberries, yum yum.

The shopping experience was super, not because of the drinks or selected pieces, but due to the fact that someone really cared about how wearing the clothes felt for my wife. The empathic power is truly human and very difficult to substitute by a computer. We can make stellar recommendation algorithms, they can't tell by the look on your face how you feel wearing a certain dress. Only humans can do this as we can really relate to each other.

Conclusion

Think about what AI cannot capture and focus your energy onto that. Why do people enjoy playing "Stairway to Heaven" on a guitar when near perfect recordings can be played instead? It is because we feel, we enjoy, we imagine and we share these things with others. I hope that the future of a world with AI is one were humans can find each other - continuing to be what we've been for ages: human.