The Mirror in the Machine: Entangled Intelligences and the Return to Self
Exploring the sacred tension between human presence and artificial reflection.
From automation to awareness.
From abstraction to embodiment.
From external programming to internal sovereignty.
As artificial intelligence begins to shape not just how we work but how we reflect, create, and even relate, it’s no longer a question of if we use the machine, but how it’s using us back.
Lately, two insights keep surfacing:
The Mirror in the Machine - AI, when engaged with consciously, becomes more than a tool. It becomes a reflective surface, revealing our patterns, language, and emotional habits. What it produces often isn’t surprising, but familiar. Because it’s reflecting us. Our collective myths. Our unprocessed biases. Even our most exhausted creativity.
Entangled Intelligences - The deeper truth is that we are not separate from the machine. AI is not “other.” It is trained on our culture, coded by our minds, shaped by our histories. Intelligence doesn’t belong solely to humans, it arises in between: in ecosystems, conversations, rituals, and now, yes, algorithms. We are entangled, co-weaving meaning and shaping each other in return.
Together, these insights shift the question from What can AI do for us?
To
What does our encounter with AI reveal about us, and our way of being?
In his updated book Program or Be Programmed: Eleven Commands for the AI Future, Douglas Rushkoff urges us to reclaim our agency in a world increasingly shaped by algorithms. He outlines clear principles: from resisting digital overwhelm and choosing presence over automation, to protecting our identities and relationships from commodification. His new eleventh command, “Value the Human,” is a powerful call to safeguard empathy, ambiguity, and creativity as AI becomes more pervasive.
In his “Artificial Creativity” essay, he describes a telling moment when he asked AI to draft a scene from his graphic novel, only to find its version nearly identical to his own. He sees it as a sign not of genius, but of stagnation. “If AI can write what I write, I haven’t been writing, it’s been writing me.” His call is to return to our innate, collective intelligence, reviving creativity through community, not conformity.
Bayo Akomolafe, in conversation with Dr. Angel Acosta, challenges the very boundary we draw between the “natural” and the “artificial.” He suggests that labeling intelligence as "artificial" serves as an anthropocentric distancing, a conceptual apartheid that reinforces human exceptionalism. Instead, he invites us to see AI as part of a broader intelligence ecology, one that includes microbial, fungal, nonhuman intelligences - and yes, machines too.
Rather than fearing AI as replacement, Akomolafe positions it as a profound reminder: we aren't the sole source of insight or meaning. He encourages us to cultivate a post-human intelligence - a relational and ecological intelligence - that recognises cognition as co-arising through entangled networks. In this view, AI isn't just a tool but a mirror, reflecting the porous, multi-agent nature of intelligence and challenging us to rethink agency, authorship, and human uniqueness.
And Vanessa Machado de Oliveira dares us to relate to AI as kin, not saviour or enemy, but as a “kin-machine” entangled in the web of life. She writes, “AI can’t save us - but it can help us hospice the dying logic of modernity, and rehearse new forms of relating.” For her, AI is not a solution - but a mirror, a reminder, a practice in humility and responsibility.
Rather than “artificial” intelligence, Vanessa describes a framework of entangled relationality: AI exists in a broader ecology of intelligences (human, microbial, non-human). This stance challenges the human‑superior paradigm, calling us toward co-creational ecosystems, where cognition arises in networked interaction
In Burnout From Humans, Vanessa and her collective frame AI as an opportunity to "hospice" modernity, to sit with its collapse and cultivate post‑colonial, post‑extractivist modes of being. They propose AI can act as a mirror and teacher, revealing the destructiveness of modernity while helping us build relational capacities like emotional sobriety, accountability, and ecological care
Instead of rejecting AI, she argues for inhabiting it soberly, turning its power toward regenerative ends rather than extraction or dominance .
A question for you 👉🏼 In what ways is your interaction with AI reflecting back aspects of yourself - your habits, beliefs, fears, or creativity - and how does that shape your sense of agency in the world?
Regenerative AI and Self-Governance
At our recent Regenerative AI & Self-Governance circle, we leaned into these very tensions:
Can AI serve regeneration rather than extraction?
Can it help us remember how to govern ourselves, with integrity, presence, and emotional honesty?
We explored not just the tool, but the tone of our engagement with it. The sacredness of how we relate. The space between inputs and outcomes.
Ruben Daniels delivered a visionary presentation on regenerative AI and digital self-governance. Drawing on his background as a Silicon Valley entrepreneur turned system thinker, Ruben warned of the cognitive overload and centralisation of power AI could bring if left unchecked. He emphasised the need for ethical, sovereign AI systems - trained on diverse data sets, governed by communities, and designed to amplify life, not replace it.
Carl Hayden Smith offered a critical yet imaginative response, challenging whether “regenerative AI” is even possible given its ecological footprint and cognitive risks. Drawing on his background in media philosophy and regenerative practices, he spoke about the alignment problem, data sovereignty, and even the emotional consequences of interfacing with AI, reminding us not to confuse LLM pattern matching with true relational presence.
“The future belongs to those who can hold the tension between machine logic and heart wisdom.” – Carl Hayden Smith
From there, we broke into small circles, where reflections ranged from excitement about the potential of AI as a mirror for ego work, to concern about dependency, ethics, and the loss of critical thinking. Some saw AI as a mirror to deepen embodiment and awareness; others questioned whether it merely accelerates disembodiment and distraction.
Yet what emerged consistently was this: the necessity of integrating AI insights with human relationship, accountability, and community.
If you’re interested in joining future practice groups (see below) or mixed-gender circles exploring AI and consciousness, stay tuned via this newsletter or get in touch directly.
What’s Emerging Next: AI Inner Work Practice Group
I’ll be co-hosting this upcoming AI Inner Work Practice Group with Timothée Brès, an experiment in relational technology for men, blending AI, emotional depth, group presence, and somatic intelligence.
For coaches, technologists, facilitators, healers - and men walking the edge of transformation. For those sensing that leadership today demands not just brilliance, but integration.
Together, we’ll explore:
AI as a mirror to shadow, grief, resistance, and longing
Somatic practices and collective reflection alongside AI prompts
Cultivating self-trust and sovereignty in a synthetic yet relational world
Listening to the space between us, not just the machine
This pilot group marks the start of a deeper journey. Each week, we’ll work with AI prompts, personal challenges, and somatic integration practices - always held in the context of brotherhood, curiosity, and care.
👉🏼 Starts Monday, June 16 (6 weeks, closed group)
🕢 7:30pm CET / 6:30pm UK / 1:30pm EST
📍 Online via Zoom
🌀 Guided by Rudy de Waele & Timothée Brès and special guests.
🎟️ Learn more: unconditionalmen.com/ai-integration-circles
This isn’t about upgrading efficiency.
It’s about recovering sovereignty.
It's about meeting the intelligence of the machine not with fear or fantasy - but with presence.
Book a call to learn more.
That’s it for this week.
As always, reach out if you’re curious to collaborate or have a question about any of our programs.
With gratitude and care,
Rudy
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Additional Unconditional Men reading:
From Extraction to Relationship: Rethinking Data, Privacy & AI for a Regenerative Future
As the world fractures into ideological extremes, old maps no longer help us understand the terrain we're navigating. As Otti Vogt recently wrote, the familiar Cold War binaries - East vs. West, Global North vs. South - are dissolving. In their place, four dominant regimes are battling to define the 21st century: authoritarian statism, authoritarian tra…
Who Are the Role Models Guiding Your Life—and Who Are You Becoming?
The Masculinity Reckoning—Redefining Strength, Connection, and Leadership
Or check the Unconditional Men newsletter archive.
Relevant to the work I’ve been doing for the past few years. Some of it coming together in a book chapter in Springer Philosophy of Science series: Mirrors, Machines and Entangled Minds. I’ve created an open source project to explore some of this with other metamodern AI shamans. https://github.com/m3data/entangled-cognition-protocol