Deepak Chopra Unveils Personal Insights on AI's Impact on Humanity - Is Artificial Intelligence Humanity’s Collective Karma?
In this Q&A, Chopra reimagines the impact of AI on art, health, and consciousness as he shares his vision to use AI for a more peaceful, sustainable, healthier, and joyful world.
Last May, for Mental Health Awareness Month, Deepak Chopra and Seva Love teamed up with Peace Inside Live, TIMEPieces, Grateful Giraffes, and several other players in the web3 and wellness sectors. Together, they unveiled the #JOMOeffect NFT art collection, emphasizing the "Joy Of Missing Out" that featured NFTs from 40 artists to support mental health charities. The charities included Aakoma Project, Half The Story, The MINDS Foundation, LOVELOUD Foundation, and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
A utility (perk) of purchasing multiple #JOMOeffect NFTs was an exclusive LIVE Q&A Zoom call with Deepak Chopra, which took place last July. The facilitators of this one-on-one virtual session were Shira Lazar and Jordana Reim from Peace Inside Live, a comprehensive mindfulness platform spanning web3, video, audio, and in-person channels, with an extensive network of over 100 wellness experts and influencers dedicated to fostering inner peace and connection for a global collective. The sought-after Q&A consisted of a serene meditation led by Chopra, followed by engaging conversations about Artificial Intelligence and its implications on total well-being, consciousness, and spirituality while encouraging artists to bond together and continue to create art from their soul amidst a more logical AI systems uprising.
“This is a time for artists, together, to be even more rebellious in order to bond together and say, “How can we actually use AI to our advantage?” Because AI can simulate your imagination, but it cannot imagine. Only awareness, only presence can imagine.”
Chopra even reveals his utilization of AI as a tool to ascend to greater heights of his own self-awareness and reflection to better illuminate his true motives so that he can change or shift his actions to be in alignment with the person he truly wants to become. He is also using AI to help write a new book on AI and consciousness, in which he interviews experts, including
, founder of ChatGPT.“AI systems are designed to be logical and to give you superintelligent answers, but still, they are algorithms and they are not designed to be fundamentally creative in that they will not cause paradigm shifts. They will actually, in a superintelligent way, tell us what humanity has thought up to now. I would say that AI represents our collective karma up until now.”
-Deepak Chopra
Q: “You mentioned there is no such thing as mental well-being. Can you elaborate on this?”
Deepak Answer: “I think we should get rid of the word mental well-being and just call it total well-being. Well-being is a state of awareness. It's not your blood pressure or your heart rate variability or any of those, although those are very good ways of measuring well-being. The word “well-being” implies a state of being. And unless we enter the state of being, we are trapped in the mind. And even though we say “I have a mind,” actually, we don't. What we have is what we call a “personal mind,” which is the “social mind” recycling through us. So, depending on where you were born, your economic status, your religion, your ancestral history, your race, your religion, that is all recycling old information. It’s not even original, every thought we have is the recycling of the collective mind. And I think you'll all agree that the collective mind right now is insane because it has engineered depression, has created war, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, climate change, extinction of species, poisoned our food chains, destroyed the ecosystem, chronic illness, and suicide. Why do we think this is sane? And why would we want to be part of it? So, I would say, “total well-being” is an integrated, unified process of awareness. And if we can transcend to that level of being with meditation, then that's peace. But it has been overshadowed by the insanity of the collective mind. And that collective mind keeps recycling, since medieval times, unfortunately, so now we have the same collective tribal, ethnocentric, racist, gender-centric, and on and on, with social injustices, economic injustices - that's the collective mind. Why would we want to recycle that and why would we call it “peace of mind?” That's an oxymoron. Peace is our fundamental state. The recycling of the collective tribal mind with modern capacities is making humanity sleepwalk to extinction. So we definitely don’t want peace of mind, we want peace that passes understanding.”
Q: “Are there any spiritual leaders in the current generation that you follow and appreciate?”
Deepak: “You put me on the spot there. There are a lot of spiritual leaders right now who are speaking very eloquently about paradigm shifts, awakening, transformation, etc. And so it's good. But also asking, are they living what they're speaking about? Because, once these ideas become commonplace, we can recycle them and then they become memes - they become part of our collective culture and mind. But are we living that? So I can't really answer your question. I admire all the spiritual leaders, but I don't really know because I'm not in their mental space, or know what their motivations are. So personally, what I've been doing is I've been using AI to question my own motivations, which is a very interesting thing. I'm beginning to learn how AI operates and how rich sources multiple forms of intelligence. I go there anonymously and say, “Can you share with me, what do you think of Deepak’s motivations?” I'm learning from it, it helps me to become even more self-aware than I think I am.”
Q: “What is your optimistic and pessimistic view of the future with AI and how can we take action collectively to make sure we end up in the optimistic scenario?”
Deepak: “That's a very important question. Thank you for asking. I have several comments. One is that technology is part of our evolution. It’s part of the evolution of our consciousness as well. Because who creates technology? we do. And every time there's a new technology, there are fears. It doesn't matter whether it was the automobile or airplanes or now intergalactic probes or the internet or cyber hacking. We've created weapons out of technology as well. We've created a lot of havoc with technology, so there's a diabolical side to technology, for sure. And that diabolical side is when we have these modern capacities and old tribal identities which are very primitive and have not evolved since the cognitive revolution, they have evolved to some extent, but having said that, technology is unstoppable. if we try to stop it, first of all, it's impossible. Secondly, you become irrelevant. you're not part of the Zeitgeist anymore. So technology is our creation. It represents again, our “collective mind.” And, AI is similarly unstoppable right now, and it does represent our “collective mind at the moment.” However, it is superior to any individual mind because of the way AI operates. There are two things in which AI operates which have two or three things that are very unique. Number one, it combines multiple languages so, it's not just linguistics, but artistic language, musical language, biological language, mathematical language, language of physics, quantum mechanics. When you combine these languages, what you get is a “superintelligence” that far, far exceeds our intelligence as individuals. But “superintelligence is not creativity.” Creativity is not born of the mind. Creativity comes from our awareness or our soul or presence or that part which is not mental, but is the background of all mental activity. Creativity is a disruption in logical thinking and AI systems are designed to be logical and to give you superintelligent answers, but still, they are algorithms and they are not designed to be fundamentally creative and that they will not cause paradigm shifts. They will actually, in a superintelligent way, tell us what humanity has thought up to now. And, you know, at the risk of being esoteric, I would say that AI represents our collective karma up to now because it’s everybody's mental exploration in different languages. But if you want to break that collective karma, then AI can't be trusted. There are two things in AI, that terms that only AI people are familiar with. One is called perplexity and the other is called entropy. Perplexity means how perplexed is the system or how surprised is the system by the questions you ask. And AI minimizes perplexity. It maximizes what we call entropy. So, you start to type out a word, ‘what is the origin of” and it will immediately say “life,” or “the universe.” It will guess what you are trying to say. In other words, it minimizes unpredictability and unpredictability is actually creativity. If you have a perfectly predictable system, then it's not creative, it's an algorithm, and there are theorems that describe this, Gödels Theorem, etc, etc. Bottom line, I think we can use AI to use superintelligence to address things like climate change, eco destruction, conflict resolution, elimination of war, creating healthy habits, increasing our self-awareness through motivation, and questioning our own motivations.
Everyone is questioning what we have created today. It starts with what we call “mental distress” because we are recycling the mental distress of the world. I think we can use AI if we, collectively, have a shared vision, and for me that shared vision is a more peaceful, sustainable, healthier, and joyful world. If we complement each other's strengths, if we are totally honest with ourselves and with each other, if we have integrity, we live up to our words, authenticity, we don't pretend who we are not, even spiritual authenticity is very important because there's a lot of spiritual mood-making. We want to be spiritual. You want to look spiritual, you want to dress spiritual, you want to eat spiritual. That's all mood-making. Spirituality in one word is self-awareness. That's it. And so, if we can do that if we can complement each other's strengths, then there's a good chance that AI can become “divine” instead of diabolical. Now apparently, what I'm hearing is 10% of people who are in the AI world, experts, think AI can cause human extinction. Now if 10% of aviation experts said there’s 10% chance of your plane crashing the next time you board it, then I don't think you would board it. But I don't agree with these 10% of people. I think you can build safeguards in AI to prevent AI from becoming diabolical. I've been trying to talk to Sam Altman in written communication about how AI can make us more self-aware to solve some of the big problems we have and to give us more time for reflection and more time for our soul so that we're actually helping each other become more self-aware. I'm enthusiastic about AI. I'm writing a book right now on AI and consciousness. And I'm actually using AI to help me write the book on AI, while I communicate with these experts. Some of them predict doomsday and others predict a Heavenly Earth. But the bottom line is technology is neutral and reflects who we are.
Q: “How can someone break free from the mental barriers of being stuck to cultivate a sense of empowerment and progress in their life or within their art, especially when they might feel like they are incapable of achieving those goals?”
Deepak: “First of all, I think artists ultimately, are, together, speaking for our soul. Science is an activity of the mind. And so is technology, but art is actually the language of our soul. Now, TS Eliot, when speaking about poetry said “Poetry is a raid of the inarticulate.” But so is any form of art, music a raid on the inarticulate. You can't get there mentally. Because artists by nature accept contradiction, paradox, and ambiguity. And without contradiction and ambiguity and paradox there cannot be true art. There just cannot be. Because our fundamental state is that. We are full of contradictions. And these contradictions are not really contradictions they are complementarities, just like you can't have an up without a down. You can't have pleasure without pain, you can't have birth without death. So art and an artist, really good artists, are comfortable with that. And therefore, sometimes, they're tortured as well. You know, and that's okay because a tortured soul seeks elevation and seeks transcendence. So much for art, now, as the language of our soul. And when you have tyranical regimes, you know, despots, whoever, name it. You notice two things about them. Number one, they have no artistic proclivities, zero. And number two, they have no humor. When's the last time you saw a world leader laughing or smiling, or even talking about their favorite song or their favorite piece of art? Tyrannical regimes are scared of artists. They're not scared of scientists. But artists, true artists, are always coming from a place that speaks with a rebellion in a way. They create charismatic visions, they are idealists and they are also not pretending to be happy all the time. Which is a kind of spiritual showmanship. So having said that, this is a very interesting time with technology because technology can simulate art. To say “Create something for me which represents a goddess or a god,” and suddenly it does that, produced by AI, so this is a time for artists, together, to be even more rebellious in order to bond together and say, “How can we actually use AI to our advantage?” Because AI can simulate your imagination, but it cannot imagine. Only awareness, only presence can imagine. This is a very pivotal time, we are at a crossroads. One road leads to sleepwalking to recycle the same mind, the cultural mind. The other says, “We need a new story. We need a new context. We need new ways of interpreting relationships.” And that's what makes us unique - as artists, and as human beings also. Our humanity depends on the quality of our relationships, to the context and meanings of our existence and most importantly, to the story we are telling TOGETHER. Because only humans have language for story. And if we can create a new meaning, new purpose, new context, new relationships, and fundamentally a new STORY for humanity, that could be our collective goal as artists, and I'm seeing it happening here. Otherwise, we wouldn't be having this forum right now. It's happening, and it's part of our evolution. But we need a death and resurrection. And that is true creativity. The old story has to die. It's not working. The story of competition, the story of me and mine, the story of “everything is all about me” is not working. We need a new story of a shared vision. If I could summarize that one formula, it would be LOVE IN ACTION. Love without action is irrelevant. Action without love is meaningless. But if we come together and harness our creativity with love in action, we’ll have a new story.”
In a world where technology is rapidly evolving, this unique blend of art, spirituality, and cutting-edge technology is not just a glimpse into the future but a profound exploration of the human soul's potential in an AI-driven age. Deepak Chopra's visionary perspective on AI and consciousness challenges conventional thinking, emphasizing the importance of total well-being over mere mental wellness. As he engages in thought-provoking discussions with the global community, the initiative serves as a catalyst for artists to harness the power of AI, shaping a new narrative and fostering a shared vision of a more peaceful, sustainable, and joyful world. It's a testament to the transformative potential of technology when guided by love in action, and it sparks hope for a harmonious coexistence of humanity and AI.
For more on the Joy of Missing Out - check out Peace Inside Live’s JOMO Journal out now!