The Last Invention?
If it were up to AI, there would be no Shohei Ohtani.
When Ohtani was about to enter his pro career in baseball, he asked every Japanese team NOT to pick him in the upcoming Nippon Professional Baseball league draft. He was going pro and instead of going the traditional route, he planned to try his luck by going directly to Major League Baseball in the states. But one team drafted him anyway – the Nippon Ham Fighters. The Ham Fighters were led by an unusual manager, Hideki Kuriyama, who ignored Ohtani’s advice and drafted him anyway. By all accounts, it should have been a wasted pick, but he asked Shohei to give him one opportunity to talk to him. Shohei, being the respectful young man that he was, agreed. In that talk, the manager told him that he saw potential in Shohei to be the first truly two-way player. Every other team would ave forced him to pick one or the other because it’s just not done any other way, and for sure he would have been drafted as a pitcher because his skills as a pitcher were more in demand. At the time, Shohei was an above average hitter, but he was already an exceptional pitcher so there was little doubt which way he would go. But the manager said if Shohei gave the team a chance he promised to develop him as a two-way player and anytime Shohei felt it was time to go he would let him try his luck in Major League Baseball. Shohei agreed. The press gave him a hard time for trying to have it both ways. Other teams were critical of him as were other players and even some of the fans. They said he was being disrespectful to the game because nobody did both. It wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. But the manager told Shohei to forget the critics and just play baseball and he did. Well, the Ham Fighters were right. Shohei did have the talent to be a two-way player. In fact, most students of the game will say he is likely the best player to have ever played the game. Only Babe Ruth did both well and even he didn’t do it at the level of Shohei Ohtani. They call him “The Unicorn” because that’s how rare his talent is. He has won FOUR MVP awards including two in both the American League and the National League. He has already won two World Series rings in his first two seasons with the Dodgers. And he became the first player in history to hit 50 home runs AND steal 50 bases. This past postseason, I just watched what was likely the greatest game any single player has ever played. He not only pitched for the Dodgers in the NLCS and won the game after striking out ten batters, but in the process hit three home runs including the longest post-season home run ever at Dodgers Stadium. This is the kind of talent you can never predict. This is the reason AI would never produce a Shohei Ohtani.
I don’t have anything against AI personally.
Like most things, AI is neither good nor bad by itself. It is technology. It can be both incredibly useful and cause great harm. The potential is still limitless and both those who predict a utopian world because of AI or the end of life as we know it have plausible and reasonable arguments. We simply don’t know. But one thing we do know is AI cannot create something truly original. It can mimic originality to the point you might honestly believe it. But it just can’t make the leap to true originality. That’s because AI draws on vast amounts of knowledge we have already accumulated and bases its response on that knowledge. But it can’t create something out of nothing. It can perfect it. It can make it better. But if all the data points in a certain direction, that is the way it will go. Hence, why Shohei would never be the greatest player on the planet. Because no one has ever done it that way before. Truly out of the box thinking is not possible for AI. It might consider it but never give it real credence because the odds are so astronomical. But sometimes it is that out of the box thinking that manifests fantasy into reality and makes the world a better place. My favorite example of this (other than Ohtani) is of course related to Disney. When Walt sought to bring animation to the big screen as a full-length feature film, “everyone” thought he was crazy. In fact, they called it “Disney’s Folly” and thought it would be the ruin of him. Instead, it launched an all-new way of storytelling that revolutionized the movie industry and the lives of people for generations to come. After opening day at Disneyland, again the critics declared it would be a colossal failure and even dubbed it “Walt’s Nightmare.”[1] Nine-hundred million visitors later those critics were proven wrong.[2]
Artificial intelligence is a reality.
How we use it and what we do with it will be our true test. Will we take the easy way out? Or will we use AI not as means of shirking our duties or cheating the system but instead to enhance what we are doing for the good of all? You might think this is a weird passage to use to reference AI but hear me out. Right before this, the people tell Samuel, “We want a king!” To be fair, Samuel’s sons were pretty despicable. The Bible even tells us they were dishonest, accepted bribes, and perverted justice. I wouldn’t trust them either. But they were forgetting that they already had a king – God. Samuel was upset about all of this so he prayed to God about it and God told him not to feel bad because it wasn’t Samuel they were rejecting. It was God himself. God told Samuel to go to the people and tell them the consequences of having a human king. And this is what Samuel shared.
10 Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking him for a king. 11 He said, “This is what the king who will reign over you will claim as his rights: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. 12 Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. 13 He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. 14 He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. 15 He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. 16 Your male and female servants and the best of your cattle[c] and donkeys he will take for his own use. 17 He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves. 18 When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, but the Lord will not answer you in that day.”
19 But the people refused to listen to Samuel. “No!” they said. “We want a king over us. 20 Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”
21 When Samuel heard all that the people said, he repeated it before the Lord. 22 The Lord answered, “Listen to them and give them a king.”
Then Samuel said to the Israelites, “Everyone go back to your own town.” 1 Samuel 8:10-22
The truth comes out.
“We want to be cool like everyone else. We want a king to tell us what to do and to do everything for us, so we don’t have to accept responsibility for our actions.” Now of course that’s not what they actually said, but in essence, it is. They want someone to just tell them what to do so they don’t have to do the hard work and figure it out for themselves. They want someone to do the work for them like fight their battles so they don’t have to accept responsibility for it, and they can go about their lives without having to consider the consequences. Samuel even tells them, “Look, this king you want? He’s going to take your best cattle. He’s going to take at least a tenth of your money. He’s going to take your land and give them as gifts to his sycophants. Then he’s going to take your sons and daughters to do with as he will. And finally, he’s going to take your freedom.” And they said, “We don’t care!” Human beings are always looking for the easy way out, even when the easy way turns out to be horrible! We love avoiding the hard work, but it’s in the hard work that the best work gets done.
Already teachers are having a hard time.
Kids are using AI to get out of doing their homework. Sure, it might mean they get a good grade. It might mean they have a better chance of getting into that top university. But when push comes to shove, they won’t have the knowledge, the skill, or the ability to truly succeed because they cheated their way through life. Life isn’t like a hotel commercial: “You’re not Dr. Stewart!” “No, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.” Kids who use AI to cheat are only truly cheating themselves because it’s not the grade that matters, it’s the learning behind it. But that’s only one way we are opting out of doing the hard work. We’re choosing to turn to AI to satisfy our needs for intimacy. That is a dangerous road because no machine can truly give you the human connection of another person or build a life with you. It can say all the things you want it to say; it can offer comfort on demand exactly as you want it, and even pretend sexual intimacy, but nothing will ever match the true beauty of a relationship that has been built together. Nothing can replace your hand being held when you’re lying in a hospital bed. Or the willingness of a partner who does something for you not because it’s been programmed to, but because they truly love you. It takes hard work to build that kind of relationship, but in the end its worth more than anything else.
I don’t know about you, but I’m worried for the future.
AI isn’t to blame. We are. Our attitude as the human race needs to improve. Instead of looking for the easy way out, we need to put in the hard work and let God’s gifts shine. God put it within each of us to contribute to the great tapestry that makes up our lives, but how will we ever discover what we can do if we’re always looking for the cheat code to life? Take the challenge. Do the hard work. Discover for yourself what God wants you to do at this time in your life. Whether you are old or young, big or small, you have gifts to offer, and your gifts could make the world a better place.
Funny note, as I’m writing this and correcting mistakes, I keep getting the prompt, “Rewrite this paragraph with Copilot” (Microsoft’s AI). Don’t worry. I didn’t use it. Not even once.
[1] Brady MacDonald, “Disneyland got off to a nightmare start in 1955, but ‘Walt’s Folly’ quickly won over fans,” Los Angeles Times, July 10, 2015, https://www.latimes.com/travel/la-tr-d-disneyland-opening-day-20150712-story.html
[2] Austin Haughton, “Disneyland Attendance Crosses 900 Million Guests,” WDWNT.com, January 12, 2026, https://wdwnt.com/2026/01/disneyland-attendance-crosses-900-million-guests/ – originally cites an article from the Orange County Register. Corroborated by an article in the Los Angeles Times but that article is behind a paywall.
Craig's Corner 