The Alchemy of Intuition

Transmuting AI’s Noise into Meaningful Innovation

Being an entrepreneur is really no different from being a content producer or an artist. They are much closer than one would think. Both artist and entrepreneur bring things into the world that may well have never come to exist without them. In this series of articles, when I mention one I am talking about the other as well.

Both of these creators are confronted with a deluge of data and automated outputs that while delivering on efficiency can produce bland and soulless results. We can't really expect the AI machine to change very much despite our protestations. We don't have the hands on the levers that control the algorithms and perhaps never will. Therefore we have to learn how AI really works and adapt it to our needs in order to bring our visions into reality.

Writing tomes full of prompts is really playing AI’s game by its own rules. The queries may be ever more sophisticated producing very useful results but it won't be enough to do the things that have never been done before. For that we need human intuition and imagination.

The alchemists in many ways were the first experimental scientists. They were engaged in all sorts of mad plans to turn common lead into gold. A lot of them died in the attempt. Lead isn't safe to mess with. But that exploration of the unknown is what is interesting. Entrepreneurs and artists are modern-day fellow voyagers on the same sort of journey as the alchemists of old. They too will be experimenting at the edge of the world's knowledge. Ostensibly they may be pursuing gold or the perfect artistic rendition and they too will discover many things on the way that can only be found once they have set out in pursuit of their goals.

Human intuition is the real philosopher's stone. By blending AI’s capabilities with intuitive insight, entrepreneurs and artists can create products or works of art that can connect deeply with consumers in the new economy. A place where emotional engagement is the ultimate value.

AI, while powerful, is a prediction engine and a remixer of existing patterns. The alchemist-entrepreneur uses intuition to filter the noise from an unceasing flow of data to identify and determine the most valuable offering they can bring to the service of human flourishing. One would hope that planetary flourishing would be part of that deal.

Practical workflows begin with using AI as a starting point, not an endpoint. Entrepreneurs can leverage tools like ChatGPT for brainstorming or Midjourney for visual prototypes, but they must filter outputs through intuitive reflection.

There are many methods for accessing intuition. But they all boil down to being still and quiet, watching, listening, paying attention and being sensitive to emotional valences. Sounds easy but remarkably hard to actually do. But I don't know of any other way.

It is our shared intuitions that allow artists and entrepreneurs to create works that reach into the hearts of others but ethical considerations are paramount in countering manipulation. AI’s biases can be craftily used to exploit emotions, as seen in cases like Facebook’s 2014 Emotional Contagion study. The study was heavily criticised for not obtaining consent from the subjects but if they had known that they were in play the experimenters probably would not have got the results they got. In short, it is really easy to have emotions like fear, doubt etc., pass through a given online community with rapid and consummate ease.

But there really is no need for any kind of shady activity. As Dominic Chalmers et al. note, in their paper, 'Artificial Intelligence and Entrepreneurship: Implications for Venture Creation in the Fourth Industrial Revolution,’ AI use enhances long-term value by building trust.

"Entrepreneurs who are developing and applying this technology face some profound ethical challenges; in sum, just because AI can do something does not necessarily mean an entrepreneur should."

Entrepreneurs and artists can harness AI’s potential while preserving the soul of innovation. In the Feeling Economy, it is argued that emotions drive decisions. According to the authors, Roland and Ming-Hui Huang,

"The Feeling Economy is an economy in which the majority of people’s work and wages are jobs or tasks that utilise their personal feelings. Easy tasks like communicating with people, building and maintaining relationships, and influencing others are often referred to as “soft” aspects of a job.These tasks are reserved for well necessitates workers who have excellent emotional intelligence (EQ) and social skills. Skills such as people skills are widely regarded as technical skills in the Thinking Economy and are even more important. Therefore, in contrast to the “hard” service Thinking Economy (such as engineers), the “soft” service economy will be plentiful, and jobs that emphasise soft skills will be booming."

Things in the form of goods will become trivially easy to design and produce so services will be where the action will be. Instead of the rampant materialism we see around us now, we have the opportunity to focus on what we really care about, the importance of their relationships and a renewed focus on the joys of being alive. (That does not mean hedonism, by the way.)

Background Reading:

Chalmers, D., MacKenzie, N. G., & Carter, S. (2021). Artificial Intelligence and Entrepreneurship: Implications for Venture Creation in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice. https://eprints.gla.ac.uk/219929/1/219929.pdf

Huang, M. H., & Rust, R. T. (2021). A Strategic Framework for Artificial Intelligence in Marketing. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0883902622000398

Noyes, E. (2024). How Entrepreneurs Can Use AI to Understand Target Customers. Babson Thought & Action. https://entrepreneurship.babson.edu/erik-noyes-ai-entrepreneurs/

Teter, D. (2024). Navigating the AI Revolution: Practical Insights for Entrepreneurs. Stanford Graduate School of Business. https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/navigating-ai-revolution-practical-insights-entrepreneurs

Toko, N. (2023). Artificial Intelligence - Ethics and Meaning from a Jungian Perspective. Nicholas Toko. https://www.nicholastoko.com/post/artificial-intelligence-ethics-and-meaning-from-a-jungian-perspective-1