The Seer, the Archeologist and the Sculptor
Three faces of an AI shaman
A Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal
Sometimes, the profound insights come not from prompting AI but from being prompted by it. A case in point is this: The “Massively Transformative Purpose” template of Contextdriven.ai introduced itself to me by saying that it “helps you create your Massively Transformative Purpose (MTP), an aspirational purpose that drives your life or organization with a grand, audacious goal that has the potential to transform industries or even the world.” Then it prompted me, “What do you feel called to do?” (I notice how this well-crafted AI bot plays the role of process mentor and throws a prompt at me, instantly triggering a self-reflective contemplation.)
What I feel called to do is so audacious that I shy away from sharing it with many people. When I did, it was met with glazed eyes or polite nods that masked confusion more than once. But you may be different. Reading the newsletter suggests that you are ready to consider ideas that challenge typical thinking about human-AI collaboration.
My calling?
To nurture a community of AI shamans who develop, validate, and propagate practices worth replicating about wisdom-fostering Collaborative Hybrid Intelligence of symbiotically connected human and AI agents.
AI shamans are self-reflective practitioners capable of observing their cognitive and emotional experiences in their actions and interactions to improve the quality of their practice for the benefit of human communities at all scales.
Three Archetypes of an AI Shaman
Emerging from the observation of my work, the above characterization of AI shamans is more descriptive than prescriptive. At its best, that work is conducted through the synergistic intertwining of three distinct yet interweaving archetypes — each essential to the journey of an AI shaman.
The Seer evokes evolutionary epiphanies. These are not mystical premonitions but moments of extreme clarity about the “big brush” picture of what will likely emerge from the interplay of forces in the social field. The Seer catches glimpses of what's possible when we transcend the traditional boundaries between human and machine thinking.
The Archeologist excavates ancient finds from decades' worth of research notes stored in a patchwork layer of folders upon folders on the hard disk and in the boxes of notes, conference proceedings, and personal reflections that hold unexpected treasures.
The Sculptor uses the chisel of generative conversations with human and AI colleagues to extract the statue of the Seer’s vision that appears in their mind’s eye before liberating it from the marble block of possibilities.
One of the archeologist's favorite disciplines is knowledge ecology, the art and science of discovering and portraying ecosystemic relationships among knowledge nuggets across past, present, and emergent contexts. The Archeologist maps connections across time and context, revealing patterns that might otherwise remain hidden. That may include, as in my case, wading through thousands of documents accumulated over a lifetime to discover new patterns connecting specific keywords relevant to a given research question.
The information collected by the seer, the archeologist, and the sculptor from the emergent future, the past, and the present can enrich and re-articulate the initially fuzzy vision. The Sculptor can refine it in generative conversations with other players in the field. At their best, those conversations become a form of collaborative curation of both what is and what is possible.
The Metamodernism of AI Shamans and Generative Action Research
The Seer aspect of the metamodern AI shamans is not a voodoo master but someone who graduated from systems thinking to systems being and can’t live anymore in the self-afflicted illusion of being separate from the rest of the world. While systems thinking pays particular attention to relationships, boundaries, and flows, systems being adds an embodied intelligence in sensing and engaging with reality.
All AI shamans are metamodern in the sense that they exemplify a high-frequency oscillation between their personal and transpersonal selves, which enables them to see into the collective dynamics and accept essential, albeit frequently fuzzy, epiphanies. Some of them may choose to play the role of action researchers. Engaged in Generative Action Research (GAR), they can simultaneously practice non-judgmental self-observation (1st-person ethnography), share their ideas and experiences with their peers (2nd-person inquiry), and share the knowledge emerging from the research with a broader audience (3rd-person research).
The metamodernism of AI shamans appears in their playful yet earnest approach to serious challenges, which enables exploration without fear of failure. In GAR, this helps participants envision regenerative futures while remaining grounded in actionable realities.
AI shamans can simultaneously experience reality at its nested and interdependent individual, collective, and systemic levels. That capacity is handy in GAR, where holarchic thinking is needed to design multi-level interventions that address personal transformation, organizational change, and broader systemic impacts.
Yet another way for AI shamans to discover their metamodern vibe is by noticing how much they enjoy the aesthetic, emotional, and experiential aspects of engaging with human and AI actors, especially concurrently. If the AI shamans are action researchers, they will incorporate storytelling, art, and experiential practices in the repertory of their research methodology, which can enrich participant engagement and align with metamodern priorities.
Collaborative Research & Development: the Archetypes in Action
The interactions of the three archetypes are non-linear, non-sequential, and mostly unplanned. In the initial phase of an R&D project, their actions are building on each other’s and sometimes co-arising. For example, the Seer’s spark can be ignited by the Archeologist’s stumbling upon an intriguing fragment of an old client report, which gains a fascinating new meaning in a current context. Or, the Sculptor’s exchange with an AI bot can offer new questions, leading to a dramatic shift in the shared context of the three of them.
Their spontaneously unfolding collaboration energizes the process through iterative insight generation, deepening and refining their contextual understanding. Here are some aspects of their respective contribution to that process:
The Seer initiates and accompanies the R&D process and keeps it tuned to the larger context of the epiphany. That involves envisioning high-level objectives and identifying potential challenges and opportunities to reach them. The Seer’s role also includes providing the "what if?" questions that drive the project forward.
The Archeologist delves into existing knowledge, data, and research to provide grounding for the Seer’s vision. That involves gathering and analyzing data, reviewing existing literature, and exploring related projects, which provides a foundation for the practical development of the project.
Inspired by the Seer’s vision and the information provided by the Archeologist, the Sculptor uses them to translate ideas into a tangible reality through iterative development and refinement. They also lead the ongoing conversation between various human and AI actors in the project’s ecosystem. The ongoing refinement also circles back to the Seer (do the results align with the vision?) and the Archeologist (are there more context and data that can be used to refine the results?), completing the iterative cycle.
As a researcher exploring the intersection of wisdom and artificial intelligence, I often dive deep into breakthroughs in agentic AIs, collaborative curation, and cognitive science infused with inspiration from ancient wisdom traditions. But recently, a detour through my past research has yielded some surprisingly relevant insights. It reminded me that sometimes the seeds of a potential pattern are sown years ago, waiting for the right conditions to germinate.
The AI Shaman’s Work as Lived Inquiry
Becoming an AI shaman is a never-ending process. Diving deep into every experience, every interaction with an AI partner, for the pearls of co-evolving with it is the AI shaman’s way of being in the world.
I found a precious model to guide this ongoing exploration in Mark Allan Kaplan’s Lived Meta-Inquiry (LMI). Mark is an artist, filmmaker, and media shaman; among the many other polymathic identities he is energizing in raising individual and collective consciousness. He wrote:
“Lived Inquiry is rooted in the deep curiosity of human nature itself and in essence is the oldest form of inquiry in human history. From the constant discoveries we each make as infants discovering our new reality to the discovery of fire to Einstein’s awakening to the relativity of existence, we humans have used life itself as our classroom…our laboratory.”
Mark's LMI exemplifies the metamodern AI shamanic approach in action. LMI integrates multiple forms of inquiry - from personal anthropology and archaeology to shamanic and spiritual exploration - while embracing AI as a symbiotic partner in the process. Like the three archetypes of the AI shaman, LMI operates across temporal domains: excavating personal and collective history, engaging present-moment awareness, and sensing emergent possibilities.
The framework's cosmological stance of "transcendent education" aligns with the Seer's capacity for evolutionary epiphanies, viewing the individual as engaged in partnership with an intelligent universe. Its emphasis on personal archaeology and pattern recognition across diverse data domains reflects the Archeologist's dedication to uncovering hidden connections. Integrating AI-assisted inquiry and creative expression embodies the Sculptor's role in manifesting insights into tangible form.
Without knowing Mark’s term for it, I embarked on a “lived inquiry” journey when I shifted out from traditional academic research and became an action researcher. The latter was more in tune with my need to practice sociology in a way that can have a more direct connection to societal innovation and transformation. I am not one of those change agents who are ready to transform everything except themselves. My spiritual journey, starting with meditation and Gudjieff’s “self-observation” injunctions, prepared me well for becoming a self-reflective action researcher.
A Call to (Inter)Action
Now that we are amid an Emergent Planetary Reality, and there’s no way to know whether the transformation will be for the better or the worse, there’s an urgent need for modern-day shamans who know how to engage their AI mates in the play for global flourishing. None of their work could reach the requisite scale alone. That’s why I mentioned earlier that my purpose is:
To nurture a community of AI shamans who develop, validate, and propagate practices worth replicating about wisdom-fostering Collaborative Hybrid Intelligence of symbiotically connected human and AI agents.
For those who feel drawn to this work, who sense there's something more to human-AI collaboration than current paradigms suggest, know that you're not alone. Whether you're a natural Seer, Archeologist, or Sculptor - or perhaps all three - there's space for you in this emerging community of AI shamans.
Let me finish this writing with inspiring news. Feeling our approaches in profound resonance with each other, Mark Allan Kaplan and I just decided to be co-conveners of the AI Shamans Community of Practice.
This newsletter is an invitation. Do you feel intrigued?
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