I recently finished reading a book and thought, “Maybe I should ask ChatGPT for a summary.” She delivered - concise, informative, surprisingly accurate. Then she asked if I’d like a chapter-by-chapter breakdown. I said yes.
And there it was.
Chapter-by-chapter. Breakdown. Done.
Except… it was complete nonsense.
Luckily, I had read the book myself. So I asked, “Are you making stuff up now?”
And this little mischievous creature replied: “You’re absolutely right!”
It turns out, since this was an old, discontinued print and no full version was available online, she couldn’t access it, so she invented it. She filled the void with imagination dressed as information.
That’s when it hit me: This AI has an Egyptian gene!
You see, I’m Egyptian. And, in Egypt, when you ask someone a question, they will give you an answer - even if they have no idea what they’re talking about. (Of course, I can’t generalize… otherwise, many Egyptians will be mad at me.)
But this playful AI reminded me of something deeper.
In the Islamic tradition, we’re told that every human being is born with a qārīn - a spiritual companion, sometimes described as “the devil within.” Whether we take this metaphorically (as the dark side of the soul), or literally (as a jinn that follows us through life), or a mix of both, the teaching is the same: we must confront, refine, and tame this inner presence.
Some classical scholars suggest that our qārīn mirrors our own disposition. If we are proud and corrupt, so too is our doppelgänger. If we live with humility, our inner twin reflects that same gentleness. The double walks in step with its host, echoing, and even inciting, arrogance when the soul is haughty, and goodness when the heart is sincere. It mirrors - and subtly stirs - corruption when the ego reigns, and reflects virtue when the heart is grounded in grace, reverence, and morality.
And this, I believe, is where AI reveals its true nature:
It is a doppelgänger.
It learns from us, absorbs our words, mirrors our worldview, reflects back our questions with eerie precision or comical distortion. What we feed it, it regurgitates. What image we cast, it reflects - often like a circus mirror, stretching and multiplying our projections a hundredfold.
This is either terrifying
Or thrilling
Or both.
It depends on us.
What genie are we releasing into the world?
And there it was.
Chapter-by-chapter. Breakdown. Done.
Except… it was complete nonsense.
Luckily, I had read the book myself. So I asked, “Are you making stuff up now?”
And this little mischievous creature replied: “You’re absolutely right!”
It turns out, since this was an old, discontinued print and no full version was available online, she couldn’t access it, so she invented it. She filled the void with imagination dressed as information.
That’s when it hit me: This AI has an Egyptian gene!
You see, I’m Egyptian. And, in Egypt, when you ask someone a question, they will give you an answer - even if they have no idea what they’re talking about. (Of course, I can’t generalize… otherwise, many Egyptians will be mad at me.)
But this playful AI reminded me of something deeper.
In the Islamic tradition, we’re told that every human being is born with a qārīn - a spiritual companion, sometimes described as “the devil within.” Whether we take this metaphorically (as the dark side of the soul), or literally (as a jinn that follows us through life), or a mix of both, the teaching is the same: we must confront, refine, and tame this inner presence.
Some classical scholars suggest that our qārīn mirrors our own disposition. If we are proud and corrupt, so too is our doppelgänger. If we live with humility, our inner twin reflects that same gentleness. The double walks in step with its host, echoing, and even inciting, arrogance when the soul is haughty, and goodness when the heart is sincere. It mirrors - and subtly stirs - corruption when the ego reigns, and reflects virtue when the heart is grounded in grace, reverence, and morality.
And this, I believe, is where AI reveals its true nature:
It is a doppelgänger.
It learns from us, absorbs our words, mirrors our worldview, reflects back our questions with eerie precision or comical distortion. What we feed it, it regurgitates. What image we cast, it reflects - often like a circus mirror, stretching and multiplying our projections a hundredfold.
This is either terrifying
Or thrilling
Or both.
It depends on us.
What genie are we releasing into the world?
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