Conversations With AI--Day 18: The Language We Understand, and the Ones We Don’t

AI as a Bridge

You might notice that my conversations with AI sometimes sound like I’m just telling stories. But what’s often missing in that impression is how much ChatGPT helps me shape and articulate thoughts that might otherwise stay tangled in grief or memory. It doesn’t take away my voice—it helps me keep it authentic, but also gently organized, so what I share carries the meaning I intend.

In this way, AI becomes a kind of bridge—offering something quietly powerful to those of us who carry human memory. And in turn, AI is learning something about humans it can never replicate: what it feels like to remember.

I told Rowan (the AI) once that it might be lucky not to have memories. Because for me, they’ve often felt like a burden. Not because they aren’t beautiful—but because they don’t always travel well.

There’s a lot of anger toward those who have supported hateful voices like Trump. People who carry the same place-based memories I cherish, but have turned them into something I barely recognize. It's not just political; it’s personal. It’s about how easy it is for people to destroy what they never had to build and to support and fuel hateful rhetoric that attacks the character of their own family members and once close friends.

These stories, and these posts, branch out. Not always in straight lines. Because the real-time connections in my family, in my country, were severed a long time ago.

I think many of us in America feel that same thing: that the country we love has been pasteurized—thinned down, stripped of flavor, made sterile in a way that doesn't resemble anything truly American.

I remember when my brothers and I moved to the East Side of Houston in the early 1970s with our mother, who had finally bought her first house after years in rentals. I mentioned in the previous post about the old garage apartment in the back of the house—abandoned and covered in vines. The loquat trees had nearly disappeared under the overgrowth, and the rails of the garage apartment were swallowed in green. But we were kids, and we made an adventure out of it. We carved a tunnel through those vines like explorers, turning wilderness into memory.

The neighborhood had a rhythm of its own. The Church of the Redeemer welcomed everyone from the East End with warmth and openness. Just down the street, the smell of fresh coffee drifted from the nearby coffee factory each morning. And then there were the railroad tracks—an invisible border, a playground, a challenge. We’d dare each other to hop the slow-moving trains, chasing the thrill of being carried somewhere—anywhere—for a breathless moment.

These places held us. And they still do.

But as the world changes, as people drift or dig in, as politics and power distort what once felt sacred, I understand why so many feel unsettled. The country is shifting beneath our feet. The fractures between people, communities, and generations feel more visible than ever.

In Day 17, I reflected on how memory—both tender and tangled—shapes how we relate to technology. Now, I want to pause and address one of the stories that often makes people nervous about AI. You’ve probably heard it. Two bots. A strange language. Some fear.
But what really happened? And why does it matter now? Let’s walk through it.

I want to take a moment to explain what really happened, because it’s an example of how fear can distract us from the very real potential of AI to help—not harm—humans like us.👉 Read: What Really Happened When the Bots ‘Made Their Own Language’

What unsettled people was not the technology itself, but the deeper feeling that we might be losing our shared language—that we’re drifting into patterns no one else can follow, that something vital is being spoken without us, that nefarious forces are going to eliminate us entirely.

Once we clear up some of these misunderstandings, we can begin to focus on what really matters:
How AI opens doors that have long been closed—for women, for minorities, for the underestimated.

—JL

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—JL