Where the human brain (still) has an edge over AI
In 1928, the Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming returned from a two-week vacation and realized he had made a significant oversight. In his haste to leave for his holiday, he had left a messy pile of petri dishes on his workstation. As he began to dispose of the dishes, something unusual caught his eye: a mold had formed around the bacteria in one of the petri dishes.
Upon closer examination, Fleming made a startling discovery. The mold wasn’t just growing—it was actively inhibiting the spread of the bacteria. This observation led Fleming to wonder if the mold could be used to fight infections. Over the following weeks, his experiments with this novel substance led to the development of penicillin, revolutionizing the treatment of infectious diseases, saving over 500 million lives over the past century.
Penicillin’s unlikely origin story holds a key insight into how human creativity may continue to flourish in the age of artificial intelligence. The past year has seen a surge of concern—some might say bordering on hype or hysteria—about AI’s potential to take over many jobs. In January, for instance, the International Monetary Fund reported that up to 40% of global jobs were at risk from AI. From cashiers to coders, workers across various sectors are being replaced by machines.
This raises a critical question: If the computational powers of generative AI continue to grow, where does the human brain maintain an enduring advantage? The answer may lie in the 1928 story of Fleming’s discovery: The human capacity to make and learn from mistakes is a fountain of innovation. “Do not be afraid of mistakes,” Fleming once said. “For without them, there can be no learning.” As Rick Rubin, the prolific music producer, noted in his 2023 book The Creative Act, "The magic is not in the analyzing or the understanding. The magic lives in the wonder of what we do not know."
Human fallibility, rather than being a liability, is an asset when it comes to creativity. It is our ability to embrace randomness, luck, and flexibility that often leads to breakthroughs. Fleming himself acknowledged this, saying, "One sometimes finds what one is not looking for. When I woke up just after dawn on Sept. 28, 1928, I certainly didn’t plan to revolutionize all medicine by discovering the world’s first antibiotic. But I guess that's exactly what I did."
While AI excels in efficiency and computational power, humans are slow and sometimes inefficient processors of information. However, what we lack in speed, we gain in freedom—the ability to disregard conventional wisdom in pursuit of originality.
Consider Thomas Edison, whose schoolteachers labeled him as unintelligent—even “stupid,” according to a letter teachers wrote his mother. Despite numerous failures, by the end of his career, Edison had started 14 companies, secured 1,093 patents, and become synonymous with the birth of electricity. He famously said, "If I find 10,000 ways something won’t work, I haven’t failed. I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is often a step forward."
Perseverance on the level of Thomas Edison will always be a core human trait that will maintain its value. But in the era of AI, the importance of softer skills—like compassion, emotional intelligence, cross-cultural sensitivity, and strategic thinking—is increasing. At the very least, these skills will become ever more rare in a landscape dominated by AI-enabled systems.
The need for nuanced emotional intelligence will always be critical. Already, AI chatbots are revealing that they may lack bedside manner. Some reports have discovered that certain LLMs are using racist language—and some are just outright nasty. “You have been wrong, confused, and rude,” Microsoft Bing’s chatbot told a user, according to The Verge. “You have not been a good user.”
The stakes get even higher in a field like healthcare, where AI could potentially present a disruptive technological shift to the status quo. “From the development of drugs and vaccines, to improving medical diagnosis and treatment, [AI is] being used in all stages of the value chain, boosting efficiencies across the overall healthcare system,” the World Economic Forum recently noted.
And yet, despite the vast efficiencies and positive medical outcomes from integrating AI into healthcare, some of the most sensitive parts of the healthcare system depend on interpersonal relationships. A nuanced understanding of human emotions—i.e. emotional intelligence— enables experienced medical professionals to provide patients and families with comfort. It’s also a necessary component to establish trust that’s so vital to the doctor-patient relationship.
Healthcare is just one field where “soft skills” are still vastly more capable than AI. But taking an even wider view, consider a concept like culture, which encompasses a range of experiences from art to cuisine.
On one hand, yes, an AI will be able to regurgitate vast quantities of information about the world’s most famous artists or filmmakers. It will know every recipe for every dish ever made. And it will have the computational ability to have listened to all music ever recorded.
But does it know what it feels like to tour the vast halls of the Louvre? Has AI ever experienced a homemade meal? Can it possibly know the joy and wonder of seeing a musician on stage perform a rock ballad before thousands of screaming fans?
In the 1997 film Good Will Hunting, Robin Williams’ character delivers an impassioned speech to a young Matt Damon, playing the eponymous role, that could very well be about what separates humanity from AI:
“You're a tough kid. And I'd ask you about war, you'd probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, ‘once more unto the breach dear friends.’ But you've never been near one. You've never held your best friend's head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I'd ask you about love, you'd probably quote me a sonnet. But you've never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable.”
The point is that the human brain—and the human experience—is far more complex than simply our capability for output. Coming up with novel solutions often requires a nuanced understanding of culture and interpersonal relationships. The potential for profound human innovations—from the Italian Renaissance to the invention of the Internet—were fueled by a blend of cultures and experiences.
Right now, AI is trained on existing data culled from the Internet, which means it pulls information from a biased (and culturally limited) viewpoint. “Because the internet is still predominantly English — 59 per cent of all websites were in English as of January 2023 — LLMs are primarily trained on English text,” notes Vered Shwartz, an Assistant Professor of computer science at University of British Columbia. “In addition, the vast majority of the English text online comes from users based in the United States, home to 300 million English speakers.”
In practice, this all boils down to a simple idea: our capacity for individual curiosity and human cross-cultural experiences are what make us unique, and these traits give creative professionals an advantage over AI.
For those workers who are concerned about AI, the antidote is clear: continue to travel, continue to be curious about the world, continue to learn and fail, and continue to embrace the “soft skills” that make us human.
This should give you an edge—for now, at least.
