They Are Not Wise But Only Appear Wise

Philippe Beaudoin · October 5, 2026

“They are not wise, but only appear wise.”

These words have been written many times about AI, but they are actually from… Plato, citing Socrates, recalling the Egyptian myth around the invention of writing:

“For this invention will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it, because they will not practice their memory. Their trust in writing, produced by external characters which are no part of themselves, will discourage the use of their own memory within them. You have invented an elixir not of memory, but of reminding; and you offer your pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom, for they will read many things without instruction and will therefore seem to know many things, when they are for the most part ignorant and hard to get along with, since they are not wise, but only appear wise.”

I stumbled on that today, following a fascinating conversation with a UBC philosopher. History has rhymed for thousands of years. But what I find the most striking, here, is the idea of “the tool” versus “the self”. After you’ve read the book, is it a part of you? If you can recall parts and use that to look up a passage, is it a part of you? If you have never read it but know about it so use Google to look it up, is it a part of you? If you do the same with AI?

There’s no good answer. There’s only the answer we collectively align on. But notice one thing all of these answers have in common: there needs to be a stimulus that starts from you. A moment where, in your mind, you react with “I’m going to look this up”. If we lose that part — that sensitivity — then we’ve lost our reason for being.

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