Opinion: The importance of ‘whole intelligence’

Finito World

Donald Trump’s decision to replace “artificial intelligence” with “super intelligence” in the language of his administration deserves more scrutiny than a presidential rebranding might ordinarily receive. Words shape expectations. They influence what we admire, what we fund and, eventually, what we believe ourselves to be. In this instance, a change of terminology threatens to smuggle in a considerable philosophical assumption: that the machine stands above the person.

At Finito, we have good reason to question that assumption. Our work begins with human beings, frequently at moments when their confidence has faltered or their direction remains uncertain. We are interested in their capacity to flourish. That involves knowledge and qualifications, certainly, but also courage, attentiveness, social confidence, judgment and the ability to enter a room without feeling that everybody else possesses some mysterious advantage.

A computer may process information more quickly than any of us. It may identify patterns we overlook, assist research and perform particular tasks with extraordinary proficiency. These are substantial achievements. But superiority at a task does not establish superiority as an intelligence in every meaningful sense. A calculator has long outperformed its owner at arithmetic. We have never therefore thought it better qualified to decide how its owner ought to live.

The distinction recalls the imaginative world of P. L. Travers, the creator of Mary Poppins, and her interest in forms of understanding deeper than intellectual explanation. We might call the latter head knowing: the ability to describe, categorise and explain. There is also the understanding acquired through experience, affection, imagination and responsibility. Knowing what grief means in a dictionary is different from knowing how to sit beside someone who is grieving.

Mentoring occupies precisely this larger territory. A young person may know perfectly well that eye contact matters, that preparation is essential and that an interview requires listening. Yet knowing these things does not necessarily make them possible. The mentor helps knowledge become conduct. Through encouragement, practice and sometimes an uncomfortable conversation, the mentee begins to inhabit abilities which previously existed only as instructions. Development happens through a relationship and mutual trust.

This is why our ambition must be the improvement of the whole person. Employability cannot sensibly be detached from the person who is seeking employment. Social skills, resilience, consideration for colleagues and an understanding of one’s own strengths belong together. A polished application is useful; a growing capacity to contribute is more consequential. The best mentoring helps someone become more capable of participating in the world, with greater freedom and responsibility.

The philosopher Mark Vernon offers another helpful perspective through his discussions of Dante and intelligence. He challenges the tendency to understand intelligence principally through patterns and usefulness. Read in that light, Dante’s Inferno suggests a disturbing analogy: a world in which people remain caught in repetitive dispositions, unable to open themselves to a larger reality. There is intelligence there, often considerable ingenuity, but it has become enclosed within its own compulsions.

The analogy need not imply that computers are wicked, or that technological progress is an infernal undertaking. Its force lies elsewhere. We can become trapped ourselves when we allow one model of intelligence to govern every other. If education becomes the accumulation of answers, and work becomes nothing more than measurable output, we may produce highly efficient systems while impoverishing the lives those systems are meant to serve.

There is every reason for mentors and employers to use these technologies intelligently. They can help a mentee research an industry, rehearse questions or discover possibilities previously hidden from view. But their usefulness depends on the purposes we bring to them. An answer still requires assessment. Advice still requires context. And the person receiving it must gradually develop the confidence to disagree, rather than merely accept whatever arrives with the appearance of authority.

As we begin our twentieth issue, this seems an appropriate moment to reaffirm what Finito exists to encourage. We want people to discover their capacities, develop their judgment and find worthwhile places in working life. That requires a generous vocabulary of intelligence, broad enough to include the head, the heart and the learning that comes through doing. “Super intelligence” narrows that vocabulary while appearing to enlarge it. Before declaring the machine superior, we should remember the extraordinary range of knowing already present in the person sitting opposite us. The future will ask us to master powerful tools. It will also ask us to remain answerable for what we do with them, and for the people whose lives our decisions will shape.