As the conversations rage about the impact of AI, I can’t help but think back to my son’s 6th birthday, which we lovingly call the Teddy Ruxpin birthday. If you don’t recall, Teddy Ruxpin was a teddy bear on the outside and a mechanical whiz (for that time) on the inside.
Brad dearly longed for Teddy Ruxpin. Teddy was expensive and cutting-edge. He talked and told stories. His mouth and eyes moved. For a six-year-old boy, there was magic in the stories and the moving parts.
As exciting as the much-anticipated Teddy was, his shelf life was not nearly as long as other stuffed animals that only had fluff on the inside and cuddly fabric on the outside. He was clearly not the type of toy that you snuggle with or that comforts you when you are sad. He was entertaining (for a bit) but was heavy and hard on the inside, and stiff. He never replaced me for telling bedtime stories or his velveteen rabbit for comfort and sleeping.
Technology has come a long way since Teddy Ruxpin days, yet I do think there are insights to be gleaned. AI is amazing. It can wow us with its speed, output, and prowess.
Yet at the end of the day, there is still a much-needed place for real human beings with real human wisdom.
Case in point: This blog is written by a real person. That would be me. As such, there will be my very own unique grammar irregularities. Incomplete sentences (I write that way). Actual stories. And most likely a few typos.
AI could write a perfectly fine blog on this topic with the right prompts. It would, most likely, not have awkward sentences or misspelled words. It is likely to be polished and have perfect grammar, with nary a misspelled word.
While it may be technically correct, like Teddy, it most likely has a mechanical tone. It is orderly, can sound authoritative, and at times is sheer nonsense. There will be nice lists, often preceded by an emoji.
That’s not to say that human-generated output is consistently good, let alone great. Or that it is always accurate. Or that it is error-free.
That is where human wisdom (HW) is needed. HW is a term I’ve coined as I’ve pondered the role of humans in a world where AI is being rapidly adopted. A key point is that there is a big difference between intelligence and wisdom.
Wisdom is the ability to make sound judgments based on experience, reflection, and ethical understanding. And that is the critical key ingredient that is missing in AI, at least today.
Human wisdom (HW):
- Has originality and creativity. It may be quirky. It most often reflects a personal style, just as our preferences, behaviors, dress, and manner of speech.
- Has situational awareness, especially in human-to-human interaction. Someone with HW asks the right questions using appropriate criteria. HW connects with people on an emotional level, using both head and heart.
- Has an ethical grounding by integrating values, longer-term thinking, and unintended consequences with reflection and deep expertise. As such, HW guides solid decision making, knowing that just because we can does not mean we should.
As we know AI in mid-2025, AI falls very short in these areas:
- Human to human connection – with real stories, conversations, and experiences that touch that deep emotional core we all have.
- Transformational insights – AI has yet to create a shift for me in my thinking. It has helped me organize my thoughts. It has created lists and plans and pulled information together for me more quickly and efficiently than I could. And it has never yet sparked a keen insight, an “aha” moment, or a transformational shift. HW conversations do that for me over and over again, often in a flash.
- Verifiable accuracy – AI generates lots of information, some right, some wrong, some just plain crazy. Some helpful, some irrelevant. People can do that too (think about the folks in your life who have a whole lot to say about a whole lot of things that don’t really matter). Yet the folks who have HW can summarize and offer insights with brevity and clarity. As Einstein noted: ‘If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.’
I believe that most professions will use AI to enhance their work. And that new careers will emerge focused on helping humans develop, train, program, and use AI. And I also believe that human-centric work will continue (although it, too, may be AI augmented).
Having HW will be highly valued in this new world, as it should be. Those who have integrity and an ethical framework (and backbone) will guide us. Humans who can create and innovate will, as one might expect, be even more creative and innovative. Humans who can connect powerfully with others will continue to be in demand, for care and communication are essential. Those who have deep experience will be needed to call BS on AI output, being able to discern fact from fiction, truth from fantasy. And those of us who can synthesize information, find the key insights from lots of data, and can then communicate with clarity will be in very high demand.
Now is the time to use some Human Wisdom to discern what jobs still require and benefit from a human touch, from human communication, from human caring, and most importantly from human wisdom.
And perhaps, in some odd twist of fate, AI may enable us to reconnect with our humanity. To find ways to amplify our human creativity, emotions, and intuition in new ways with new tools. To more highly value those around us who possess a great degree of human wisdom.
I certainly hope so!
