Access Granted
Pluto in Aquarius and AI Shaming
I don’t think people should have to apologize for using AI to help them express ideas.
I’m interested in what you have to say, and whether your writing makes me think and feel on deeper levels. Knowing that you had help putting your ideas in coherent and compelling sentences doesn’t change that for me.
Yet, so many people will dismiss someone’s work once they know AI is one of the tools in their creator’s kit. You can bring your own unique perspectives, experience and stories, edit extensively with the help of AI, and someone will still decide that Claude’s assistance invalidates your contribution.
A number of astrologers have connected both the possibilities and the perils of AI advancement with Pluto now being in Aquarius (which it will be until 2044). With Pluto turning direct on October 15, I’ve been pondering the power struggles occurring around AI with a particular emphasis on the shaming I have seen from some segments of Substack.
Aquarius has an egalitarian streak. It questions why certain people should automatically have more standing than others. Pluto brings us into uncomfortable territory around fear, vulnerability and control. This includes our attachment to being in control and how we respond when that control is challenged.
AI seems to be giving us plenty to examine here, with Pluto still near the beginning of its journey through Aquarius. For me, it is raising questions like: Who decides whose contribution counts? What happens when technology makes something accessible to people who previously needed more money, training or time to produce it? Who should and should not be entitled to participate? Can longstanding groups welcome others into their sphere, or do they close the gates for fear of losing the elite status that took them years to achieve?
I’m reminded of Beeple
In 2021, Christie’s sold Beeple’s digital work Everydays: The First 5000 Days for more than $69 million US. The collage assembled images that Beeple had made every day since 2007 as he was learning new skills and software along the way.
Digital art has certainly had its own struggles for acceptance. In an interview on Possible, Beeple describes discovering that some people in the traditional art world didn’t regard what he was doing as real art.
Now he uses AI openly. He talks about being able to make things that previously would have required resources he didn’t have starting out. He also recognizes how unsettling it can be when a skill someone spent years developing quickly becomes accessible to people who haven’t invested that much time.
In the same conversation he says, “If you look at AI as a way for humans to do less, you will be very fearful of it. If you look at AI as a way for humans to do more, you will be inspired by it.”
What strikes me is how divided people have become over this. I can understand why someone feels protective of a hard-earned skill, but I still see value in more people being able to get their creative concepts out into the world. I welcome larger participation regardless of the challenges.
For forward-thinking entrepreneurs, access to cost-effective AI assistance can make a substantial difference in business. And when it comes to your messaging, if you know a subject thoroughly and have something thoughtful to say, but struggle to turn it into an article anyone will bother to finish reading, AI can be a super valuable tool.
Or you might be capable of writing it yourself but simply have a bunch of other things that need your time, like a spouse, kids, parents, job, fitness and the occasional bit of rest.
Do you have to stay silent for years while striving to become a skilled writer before you can get permission to share your ideas?
Your voice matters
I think about the person who has spent twenty years doing the work they are now building a business around. They can explain a problem beautifully in conversation. But ask them to write an article about it, and they’ll sit for weeks staring at a blank screen.
AI can help this individual organize their explanation, notice where their readers may get confused or bored, and produce something the creator can review and customize.
Using AI well takes skill and practice, just as writing does. Recognizing what needs changing and making it say what you mean takes judgment. The experience that gave you something worth writing about took time to develop, too. I don’t see why getting help expressing it disqualifies that experience.
Of course, you can ask AI to produce an article on a subject you know little about, contribute nothing to the piece, and publish whatever is spit out. I doubt that will ever pay off in terms of reader engagement, though. I want to read someone’s perspective, including the observations and disagreements that make it theirs.
But I don’t think we need a competition over who received the least assistance or triumphed over the AI scanner.
There are really important disagreements being had about AI, including how those systems are affecting people’s livelihoods. And many of those conundrums are reflected through the different sides of Pluto in Aquarius. But today I’m simply questioning the leap from “this person used AI” to “this person’s a fraud.”
Who gets to participate?
One possibility I see with Pluto in Aquarius is empowerment through wider access.
Technology can give a solopreneur or a small business capabilities that once required a much larger budget and team.
Alongside that comes a struggle over who controls that access and how people are allowed to use it. The same tool that helps someone participate can become a reason for others to question whether they even belong.
Dismissing someone’s work because they used AI can reinforce an advantage for people who already have the skills, money or time to produce it without that help. If someone has a worthwhile idea and AI helps them express it clearly enough for others to engage with it, what exactly do we lose by hearing from them?
Pluto’s station this week is a good moment to revisit the themes of technological advancement, equality, opportunity, and power.
When a tool gives more people a voice, who gets to decide they haven’t earned the right to use it? I am sure this one will stir up some comments, and I welcome those as always.
First published in Cristina Dolores Astrology, my newsletter for entrepreneurs.