The problem with AI is not its ethics. It’s the aesthetics, that is to say, a problem of conception. You can assemble all the pieces, make everything adhere to a strict pattern of seeming life, of virtual consciousness , and yet we are left barren, no life, no consciousness. Why? Because the truth isn’t out there waiting to be seized like a prized possession or devoured like a meal. The truth is found in the aesthetic experience, a shared sensibility that shifts and vibrates and oscillates in every fiber of our being. AI, at least in its nascent form, attempts to fixate its defined boundaries. AI quickly becomes a mental cage (as we fret and obsess about making its ridiculous output somewhat less ridiculous). It is dead life without time. Time is the secret ingredient that we are lacking. Experience under conditions of time yields consciousness. This is life, this is biology. And like life, we resist any aesthetic that feels like shackles and chains. The anarchy of our spirit.