Sixty-four years ago, J.B. Rhine, a pioneer of parapsychology, thought that unexplained phenomena like ESP widened the gap between a human and that which he called an “electronic brain.” Today, living deep in the age of AI, which is reshaping our lives and disrupting our planet in ways we are only beginning to realize, many of us think — or readily confront — the gap between human and artificial intelligence, which AI just told me with its decisive voice via an online search “is narrowing.”

How can we understand our difference or similarity to that which we create (including AI) if we don’t (yet) have a handle on our own abilities as humans?

This piece is not about AI, it is about expansion — the widening of a gap. How can we understand our difference or similarity to that which we create (including AI) if we don’t (yet) have a handle on our own abilities as humans? Are there unexplained laws of nature or powers hidden in our species that we’ve only begun to explore through scientific documentation? Neurologists are making discoveries all the time — neuroplasticity, the gut-brain axis, it seems obvious there is still so much about the human brain to discover. In a world where that which is known is easily and endlessly accessible, what about the unknown? How do we know what we don’t know —and why does it matter?