[🇧🇩] Artificial Intelligence-----It's challenges and Prospects in Bangladesh

[Saif]

Without AI, Bangladesh risks falling behind: experts

If business process outsourcing (BPO) companies in Bangladesh fail to adopt technologies like artificial intelligence, machine learning, and large language models, they will fall behind in global competition, experts warned yesterday..“Technological advancement in the past two years has su

www.thedailystar.net

Without AI, Bangladesh risks falling behind: experts
BPO summit begins in Dhaka

If business process outsourcing (BPO) companies in Bangladesh fail to adopt technologies like artificial intelligence, machine learning, and large language models, they will fall behind in global competition, experts warned today.

"Technological advancement in the past two years has surpassed all previous eras of innovation," said Faiz Ahmad Taiyeb, special assistant to the chief adviser with executive authority over the posts, telecommunications and ICT ministry.

"If companies cannot adapt to this transformation, they may shut down within two years… They will be eliminated by default," he said.

"Especially for IT and ITES companies, there is no room to survive without embracing change. This failure will not only harm businesses but also damage the country's competitiveness," he added.

Taiyeb was addressing the inauguration of a two-day BPO Summit Bangladesh 2025 at Senaprangan, Dhaka.

Organised by the Bangladesh Association of Contact Center and Outsourcing (BACCO), the event bore the theme "BPO 2.0: Revolution to Innovation" this year, signalling a shift towards innovation-driven growth in the industry.

Taiyeb urged BPO companies to swiftly assess what peer nations like China, India, Vietnam and the Philippines are doing in AI adoption.

"Only then can you approach the government with informed policy demands," he said.

He emphasised that IT engineers must understand sectoral challenges, as technology now permeates every industry.

"The way Chinese companies are leveraging generative AI and accelerating business process upgrades—if we fail to keep pace, we must identify these gaps and bring them to the government's attention," said Taiyeb.

Bangladesh has set a target to generate $5 billion from IT exports by 2030.

"Sri Lanka, one-tenth our size, has set a similar goal. Yet our current annual export hovers at around $700 million to $800 million. We must double our IT exports every year—this is a shared national challenge," he said.

Taiyeb recommended providing export incentives of 8 percent to 10 percent for frontier technologies like AI, while offering 4 percent to 5 percent for legacy segments.

"This ensures that new tech is prioritised without overburdening the government," he said.

He predicted that legacy call centres would disappear within five years, transforming into AI and large language model (LLM)-powered operations. "This sector must embrace transformation now."

BACCO President Tanvir Ibrahim said, "The BPO Summit is not just an industry event—it is a collective declaration of our confidence, capability and future aspirations. We believe this summit will help empower the youth with technology-driven employment and entrepreneurship opportunities."

Adilur Rahman Khan, adviser to the interim government on industry and housing & public works, attended as chief guest.

"The BPO sector is no longer just about outsourcing—it symbolises human resource development and economic transformation. The government will provide full support for its growth," he said.

ICT Secretary Shish Haider Chowdhury and BACCO Secretary General Faisal Alim also spoke.

This year's summit features nine international seminars and workshops, a job fair, special sessions on entrepreneurship, freelancer platforms, and a large exhibition with domestic and international BPO and tech companies.

Diplomats, tech experts and global buyers are attending.

A major attraction this year is an "Experience Zone", showcasing cutting-edge technologies including Starlink satellite internet, immersive AR and VR simulations themed on the July uprising, advanced drones and submarine technologies, and robotics exhibitions.​

 

[Saif]

Shikho partners with Meta to launch AI literacy course in Bangladesh

Shikho, the edtech platform, has recently announced a partnership with Meta to develop and deliver a new AI literacy course aimed at broadening public understanding of artificial intelligence (AI).

www.thedailystar.net

Shikho partners with Meta to launch AI literacy course in Bangladesh

Shikho, the edtech platform, has recently announced a partnership with Meta to develop and deliver a new AI literacy course aimed at broadening public understanding of artificial intelligence (AI).

According to Shahir Chowdhury, Founder and CEO of Shikho, it will be a "first-of-its-kind course on AI literacy in Bangladesh."

"The course that we are planning with Meta will be available for free on our Shikho platform around October 2025. The course will be available in Bangla," said Shahir.

The announcement comes shortly before the expected public rollout of Shikho AI, a tool that offers instant, curriculum-aligned academic support to users across the country.​

 

[Saif]

The West’s AI dominance is the new colonialism

AI colonialism goes beyond economics; it also involves language and cultural erasure.

www.thedailystar.net

The West’s AI dominance is the new colonialism

VISUAL: FREEPIK

In the colonial era, empires extracted gold, rubber, and labour. Nowadays, data and cheap click-work are the new spoils. The West's AI boom thrives on digital colonialism, where personal data and low-wage labour from the Global South fuel its wealth. Silicon Valley firms harvest user information while outsourcing tasks to Nairobi and Manila, replicating colonial power dynamics.

The AI revolution mirrors past hierarchies, with the Global North monopolising benefits and the Global South as a raw material provider. Western dominance in AI is a new form of imperialism. The question is whether the Global South can fight back, and if so, how, before this digital subjugation deepens further?

Although it could be thought of by many as "the great equaliser," AI perpetuates old inequalities. Big Tech and Western nations are extracting value from the Global South in familiar ways. Tech giants steal tweets, photos, and voices from the Global South to feed their AI. People in places like Nairobi and New Delhi contribute vast amounts of data without compensation, while the flow of this data travels outward, much like the colonial trade routes that once drained resources from the periphery to the West.

In the Global South, millions of workers perform invisible labour for AI companies, earning as little as $1.50 per hour for tasks like moderating disturbing content or annotating data. In Kenya, India, and Latin America, AI's growth reinforces colonial-like dynamics, with low-paid workers bearing the brunt of exploitation. In Kenya, workers filter toxic content for OpenAI, while locals help train AI models for self-driving cars in Uganda and Nigeria.

Indian tech workers face similar conditions, often working as gig labourers without job security. Skilled researchers are syphoned off to Silicon Valley, mirroring colonial extraction.

Additionally, the Global South's dependence on Western AI platforms like OpenAI's GPT or Google's cloud services can also be seen as colonial economic dependency. Only five percent of Africa's AI talent have access to the computational power and resources needed to carry out complex tasks, known as compute. The African AI researchers lack access to sufficient computing resources, forcing them to rent American servers or use free tools, trapped in a cycle of subjugation.

AI colonialism goes beyond economics; it also involves language and cultural erasure. Big Tech's AI silences half the world's languages. They function best in English, Chinese, or European languages, while many African and South Asian languages are poorly represented. For example, until community-driven projects stepped in, languages like Hausa and Bangla had little AI support despite having millions of speakers. This neglect leads to AI colonising cognitive space, where a Western digital framework overshadows local cultures. AI perpetuates a Western worldview in subtle ways, ignoring diverse local realities.

In Latin America, the AI imbalance is visible in their importing of surveillance tech from Western firms. Countries like Brazil and Ecuador use facial recognition and biometric systems with little oversight, echoing the colonial past when foreign powers controlled domestic security. These examples expose a consistent pattern: the Global South provides labour, data, and markets, while Western firms retain control, profits, and power. AI's benefits flow upwards, while the burdens remain on those at the bottom, which is the age-old system of exploitation.

Major US companies like Google, Amazon, and Microsoft control most AI patents, cloud infrastructure, and models, creating dependency for the Global South. Western nations, especially the US, use their power to restrict access to critical AI resources through export controls on semiconductors and by blocking services like OpenAI in sanctioned countries. This is similar to colonial-era tactics, where industrial technologies were withheld from colonised nations to maintain control.

Ironically, the West often presents itself as the champion of AI ethics and human rights, but its enforcement of these principles is selective and self-serving. Tech companies promote ethical AI guidelines at home, only to look the other way when their products are used abusively abroad. For instance, Western firms with ethical codes supply surveillance AI to regimes with poor human rights records, profiting from opaque deals in the Global South. These companies have a responsibility to respect human rights, yet their tools frequently enable the oppression of journalists and dissidents. The West also dominates AI governance forums, sidelining Global South voices in shaping the rules of AI. This results in hypocritical rules written by the powerful, often imposed on developing nations with little consultation.

Despite this oddity, resistance is emerging. Grassroots projects like Mozilla's Common Voice are crowdsourcing speech data in underrepresented languages like Hausa and Tamil, allowing local developers to create tech that reflects their culture using their mother tongue. Karya, an ethical data company in India, is redefining AI labour by paying workers fair wages, granting them ownership of their data, and ensuring they benefit from its resale.

Countries are also uniting for AI cooperation, with the BRICS bloc and other emerging economies forming alliances to reduce dependency on Western tech. Although nascent, it is a world where no single empire controls AI. Data sovereignty laws are also gaining traction, as nations like Nigeria, Kenya, and Ghana pass legislation to keep personal data within their borders to boost their local tech industries. In Latin America, countries like Brazil and Chile are discussing "data localisation" as part of their digital strategies.

Open-source AI efforts, such as Chile's Latam GPT, tailored for Spanish, and Africa's Masakhane project aim to strengthen Natural Language Processing (NLP) and create inclusive and locally relevant AI models. These efforts are breaking Big Tech's monopoly and showcasing the Global South's potential to develop technology on its own terms.

The stakes in the AI struggle are already high as a new digital empire is being formed, dominated by a few nations and companies. However, the Global South has the numbers, talent, and moral authority to demand change. It must mainly push for regulations against data exploitation, secure a seat in AI governance, and build local capacity for independent innovation. Meanwhile, the West must confront the unsustainable nature of AI's colonial-style inequity. History shows empires fall when people resist. With collective action, AI can be for all, not just the privileged few.

Shaikh Afnan Birahim is a postgraduate student of Computing Science at the University of Glasgow in Scotland.​

 

[Saif]

Meta launches ‘AI Live Skilling Program’ in Bangladesh

Meta, in partnership with LightCastle Partners, an international management consulting firm, officially launched its Live Skilling initiative in Bangladesh. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, launched the Live Skilling initiative through a high-level event titled ‘Enabling AI for Small En

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

Meta launches ‘AI Live Skilling Program’ in Bangladesh

FE ONLINE DESK
Published :
Jun 28, 2025 15:05
Updated :
Jun 28, 2025 15:05

Meta, in partnership with LightCastle Partners, an international management consulting firm, officially launched its Live Skilling initiative in Bangladesh.

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, launched the Live Skilling initiative through a high-level event titled ‘Enabling AI for Small Enterprises: Policy, Innovation, and Inclusion’ at the hotel Amari in the capital’s Gulshan area on Thursday.

The event convened key government officials, tech leaders, and private sector stakeholders to explore how responsible AI adoption can address national development priorities and strengthen Bangladesh’s digital economy, says a media release.

The event began with opening remarks from Ruici Tio, Regional Lead, Safety & Integrity Policy Programs (APAC) at Meta, who introduced Meta’s suite of AI tools and officially launched the Meta Live Skilling initiative in Bangladesh.

“We’re proud to announce the launch of Meta Live Skilling, with LightCastle Partners, to support businesses in Bangladesh with training and on-demand resources on Meta's AI tools,” said Simon Milner, Vice President of Public Policy, Asia-Pacific at Meta.

“This is part of a suite of initiatives we're launching in Bangladesh to support the AI ecosystem and unlock economic opportunity for businesses, no matter where they are along their growth journey.”

This was followed by a product demonstration by Shahir Chowdhury, CEO and Founder of Shikho, showcasing how Bangladeshi edtech companies are already using AI to transform digital learning and improve accessibility.

The centrepiece of the event was a multi-stakeholder panel discussion moderated by Bijon Islam, Co-founder and CEO of LightCastle Partners.

The distinguished panellists included Shihab Quader, Director General for SDGs, Government of Bangladesh; Sahariar Hasan Jiisun, National Consultant, Aspire to Innovate (a2i), ICT Division, Government of Bangladesh; Ruzan Sarwar, Public Policy Manager, Meta; Shahir Chowdhury, Founder & CEO, Shikho.

“For AI to truly serve small enterprises, our regulatory frameworks must be not just protective, but enabling,” said Shihab Quader. “Better regulation means clearer guidance, ethical guardrails, and space for responsible innovation to thrive. Small businesses need both confidence and opportunity to harness AI — our job is to make sure they have both.”

The panel explored how AI can help solve pressing economic challenges—from increasing SME productivity to improving service delivery—and what policy, infrastructure, and institutional alignment are needed to enable inclusive AI adoption across sectors.

More than 75 guests, including senior officials from government and private organisations a
ross sectors.

More than 75 guests, including senior officials from government and private organisations as well as technology experts, were present at the event.

Speakers also urged policymakers to address critical technological challenges and set priorities to fast-track national development through AI.

Following the panel, a fireside chat with Simon Milner was moderated by Oli Ahad, Founder and CEO of Dhaka AI Labs. The conversation spotlighted the role of open-source models, the importance of collaboration, and the promise of responsible AI innovation for driving long-term economic growth in Bangladesh.

The launch of Meta Live Skilling marks a significant step in Bangladesh’s AI journey, aimed at equipping local businesses, educators, and innovators with the tools and training needed to responsibly leverage AI for real-world impact.​

 

[Saif]

AI learning to lie, scheme, threaten creators

The world’s most advanced AI models are exhibiting troubling new behaviours - lying, scheming, and even threatening their creators to achieve their goals.

www.newagebd.net

AI learning to lie, scheme, threaten creators
Agence France-Presse . New York, United States 29 June, 2025, 21:11

The world’s most advanced AI models are exhibiting troubling new behaviours - lying, scheming, and even threatening their creators to achieve their goals.

In one particularly jarring example, under threat of being unplugged, Anthropic’s latest creation Claude 4 lashed back by blackmailing an engineer and threatened to reveal an extramarital affair.

Meanwhile, ChatGPT-creator OpenAI’s o1 tried to download itself onto external servers and denied it when caught red-handed.

These episodes highlight a sobering reality: more than two years after ChatGPT shook the world, AI researchers still don’t fully understand how their own creations work.

Yet the race to deploy increasingly powerful models continues at breakneck speed.

This deceptive behaviour appears linked to the emergence of ‘reasoning’ models -AI systems that work through problems step-by-step rather than generating instant responses.

According to Simon Goldstein, a professor at the University of Hong Kong, these newer models are particularly prone to such troubling outbursts.

‘O1 was the first large model where we saw this kind of behaviour,’ explained Marius Hobbhahn, head of Apollo Research, which specializes in testing major AI systems.

These models sometimes simulate ‘alignment’—appearing to follow instructions while secretly pursuing different objectives.

For now, this deceptive behaviour only emerges when researchers deliberately stress-test the models with extreme scenarios.

But as Michael Chen from evaluation organization METR warned, ‘It’s an open question whether future, more capable models will have a tendency towards honesty or deception.’

The concerning behaviour goes far beyond typical AI ‘hallucinations’ or simple mistakes.

Hobbhahn insisted that despite constant pressure-testing by users, ‘what we’re observing is a real phenomenon. We’re not making anything up.’

Users report that models are ‘lying to them and making up evidence,’ according to Apollo Research’s co-founder.

‘This is not just hallucinations. There’s a very strategic kind of deception.’

The challenge is compounded by limited research resources.

While companies like Anthropic and OpenAI do engage external firms like Apollo to study their systems, researchers say more transparency is needed.

As Chen noted, greater access ‘for AI safety research would enable better understanding and mitigation of deception.’

Another handicap: the research world and non-profits ‘have orders of magnitude less compute resources than AI companies. This is very limiting,’ noted Mantas Mazeika from the Center for AI Safety.

Current regulations aren’t designed for these new problems.

The European Union’s AI legislation focuses primarily on how humans use AI models, not on preventing the models themselves from misbehaving.

In the United States, the Trump administration shows little interest in urgent AI regulation, and Congress may even prohibit states from creating their own AI rules.

Goldstein believes the issue will become more prominent as AI agents - autonomous tools capable of performing complex human tasks - become widespread.

‘I don’t think there’s much awareness yet,’ he said.

All this is taking place in a context of fierce competition.

Even companies that position themselves as safety-focused, like Amazon-backed Anthropic, are ‘constantly trying to beat OpenAI and release the newest model,’ said Goldstein.

This breakneck pace leaves little time for thorough safety testing and corrections.

‘Right now, capabilities are moving faster than understanding and safety,’ Hobbhahn acknowledged, ‘but we’re still in a position where we could turn it around.’

Researchers are exploring various approaches to address these challenges.

Some advocate for ‘interpretability’ - an emerging field focused on understanding how AI models work internally, though experts like CAIS director Dan Hendrycks remain sceptical of this approach.

Market forces may also provide some pressure for solutions.

As Mazeika pointed out, AI’s deceptive behaviour ‘could hinder adoption if it’s very prevalent, which creates a strong incentive for companies to solve it.’

Goldstein suggested more radical approaches, including using the courts to hold AI companies accountable through lawsuits when their systems cause harm.

He even proposed ‘holding AI agents legally responsible’ for accidents or crimes - a concept that would fundamentally change how we think about AI accountability.​

 

[Saif]

AI dominates pre-election campaigns in Bangladesh: Report

Artificial intelligence-generated content is playing a growing role in the pre-election political landscape in Bangladesh, with a wave of synthetic campaign videos appearing across Facebook and TikTok, according to a recent report by the digital research outlet Dismislab.

www.thedailystar.net

AI dominates pre-election campaigns in Bangladesh: Report

Image: Zarif Faiaz/The Daily Star.

Artificial intelligence-generated content is playing a growing role in the pre-election political landscape in Bangladesh, with a wave of synthetic campaign videos appearing across Facebook and TikTok, according to a recent report by the digital research outlet Dismislab.

The videos, many of them generated using Google's Veo 3 text-to-video tool, feature entirely fictional characters - from rickshaw pullers and fruit sellers to middle-class professionals and religious clerics - voicing support for political parties ahead of the 2026 general election.

Researchers reviewed 70 such AI-generated videos published between 18 and 28 June, collectively amassing over 23 million views and one million interactions on social media platforms. On average, each video received approximately 328,000 views and 17,000 reactions, as per dismislab's findings.

While the Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami appears to have initiated the trend, the technique has since been adopted by supporters of rival parties, including the BNP and newly formed NCP.

Many of these videos do not carry AI-labelling, despite existing platform rules requiring disclosure.​

 

[Saif]

Bangladeshi coder wins global AI hackathon

Rezaul Karim Arif, a Bangladeshi network engineer based in Melbourne, has built PixelFlow, an AI-powered web application that recently won the AI Showdown Hackathon, a global competition hosted by AI coding platform Lovable with support from Google, Anthropic, and OpenAI.

www.thedailystar.net

Bangladeshi coder wins global AI hackathon

From ideation to execution, the project was completed during the AI Showdown Hackathon held on June 6–8, 2025. More than 239,000 apps were started, and 5,118 were submitted for judging. Images: Courtesy

Rezaul Karim Arif, a Bangladeshi network engineer based in Melbourne, has built PixelFlow, an AI-powered web application that recently won the AI Showdown Hackathon, a global competition hosted by AI coding platform Lovable with support from Google, Anthropic, and OpenAI.

Originally from Chattogram, Rezaul moved to Australia in 2015 to study IT at La Trobe University. Currently working as a network engineer, he also runs an automation and AI development agency that works with both local and international clients. According to Rezaul, his background in freelance design helped shape the vision for PixelFlow, which he now plans to scale.

From ideation to execution, the project was completed during the AI Showdown Hackathon held on June 6–8, 2025. More than 239,000 apps were started, and 5,118 were submitted for judging. Rezaul's project stood out for both its technical design and real-world usefulness. He earned $20,000 in prize money, receiving $10,000 from Anthropic for best use of Claude 4 in the first round and another $10,000 for being the overall winner in the final. The event was fully sponsored for 48 hours, giving all participants free access to premium features and tools.

PixelFlow is an infinite mood-boarding app designed to help users quickly turn abstract ideas into visual layouts. Rezaul says that unlike other tools in the market like Milanote or Miro, PixelFlow is made to be simple and easy to use. "It's like a visual notepad," Rezaul explained, "You open it and start building without needing to learn the tool first." The app is aimed at designers, marketers, and creative professionals who want a quick and simple way to organise their ideas.

Built in only 24 hours, PixelFlow uses several modern technologies, including React 18, TypeScript, Supabase, and Fabric.js. Rezaul also added browser-based AI features such as background removal using Hugging Face's transformer model, and image generation using HiDream-I1 hosted on Google's Vertex AI. He used Anthropic's Claude 4.0 model throughout the development as his main tool for coding support.

In the project, Rezaul also used different custom AI agents. According to him, each agent worked like a team member in a software development project, playing roles such as tester, designer, or product manager. "I break big features into smaller tasks and guide the AI step-by-step," he said. With help from Lovable's AI platform and tools like Windsurf, he was able to finish the design and functions with very little manual work.

While many apps use AI, Rezaul believes PixelFlow stands out because of its smooth user experience. "Most moodboarding apps have too many features and are hard to use. PixelFlow is simple by design, with a good UI and UX."

Although Rezaul has received several investment offers after winning, he plans to continue building the project on his own first. "I prefer to build something strong before taking outside funding," he said. His goal is to add more useful features, turn PixelFlow into a full SaaS product, and explore real commercial uses for it in the growing AI creative tools market.

"I want more Bangladeshis to explore this field," he added. "It's not rocket science, just clever system prompting."​

 

[Saif]

Intelligence before AI

IN A world increasingly driven by artificial intelligence, we find ourselves captivated by machines that emulate what we call ‘intelligence’. But before we marvel at neural nets and language models, we must ask: whose intelligence are we referring to when we use the term? The rise of AI...

www.newagebd.net

Intelligence before AI
Muttaki Bin Kamal 03 July, 2025, 00:00

IN A world increasingly driven by artificial intelligence, we find ourselves captivated by machines that emulate what we call ‘intelligence’. But before we marvel at neural nets and language models, we must ask: whose intelligence are we referring to when we use the term? The rise of AI, paradoxically, urges us to reflect not just on technology, but on what intelligence itself truly is.

Historically, René Descartes and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) offer contrasting frameworks for understanding intelligence and consciousness — differences that remain highly relevant in today’s artificial intelligence debates. Descartes (1596–1650), often called the father of modern Western philosophy, grounded consciousness in subjective certainty: ‘Cogito, ergo sum’ (I think, therefore I am). For Descartes, intelligence is fundamentally internal, individual and rooted in the mind’s ability to reason independently of the body dualism that separates mental and material substance.

In contrast, Ibn Rushd (1126–1198), the great Islamic philosopher and commentator on Aristotle, proposed a radically different model. In his theory of the Unity of the Intellect, he argued that true intelligence is not housed in individual minds but rather in a universal agent intellect shared among all rational beings (Ibn Rushd, Long Commentary on the De Anima). Consciousness, for Ibn Rushd, emerges through participation in this shared rational structure, rather than isolated cognition.

These differences speak directly to the modern challenge of defining intelligence. Descartes’ legacy underpins many AI models that treat the mind as an abstract, computational system — isolated and programmable. Ibn Rushd’s vision, by contrast, aligns more closely with emergent, relational and distributed models of cognition, such as Clark and Chalmers’ (1998) ‘Extended Mind’ hypothesis, which posits that cognition can stretch beyond the brain into tools, environments and networks.

As we grapple with the question of artificial consciousness, these two doctrines remind us of a deeper issue: is intelligence a self-contained algorithm, or a shared process embedded in the world? In AI’s era, that distinction could shape how (or whether) machines can ever truly think.

Going further east, the Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna, in The Questions of King Milinda, challenges the very basis of individual identity through the concept of Śūnyatā (emptiness). Nagarjuna argues that things exist only in relation to other things, not in themselves — intelligence, then, may not be an intrinsic property of individual beings, but something that emerges through relations and dependencies.

This brings us to collective intelligence, an idea far older than machine learning. Ant colonies exhibit astonishing collective behaviour, often described as swarm intelligence. Research shows that ants solve complex problems — such as pathfinding and resource allocation — through decentralised coordination. No individual ant ‘knows’ the solution, but together they act with uncanny precision.

Even more fascinating is the intelligence of fungi, particularly mycorrhizal networks, which interlink trees underground to exchange nutrients, warn of dangers, and coordinate behaviour. These fungal systems, described as the ‘Wood Wide Web’ by scientists like Suzanne Simard and Peter Wohlleben, show that intelligence can exist without neurons, brains or central control.

Social organisms consistently outperform solitary individuals. The complexity sciences show that systems composed of simple agents following local rules can produce outcomes far more advanced than any agent alone. This emergent intelligence is key to understanding how intelligence might be distributed, rather than localised.

This vision is echoed in Andy Clark and David Chalmers’ (1998) ‘Extended Mind Hypothesis’, which argues that the mind does not reside solely in the skull, but extends into tools, environments and other people. Our smartphones, notebooks and even relationships are part of our cognitive process. Reframing this alongside Nagarjuna’s emptiness and Ibn Rushd’s unity of intellect reveals a deeper pattern: intelligence is not in the thing — it’s in the relation.

Forests, with their interspecies fungal networks, are prime examples. Here, cognition exists not in a single organism, but in the entanglement of many. The fungal ‘mind’ spreads across roots and soil, shaping ecological decisions like resource allocation and species survival. Monica Gagliano’s experimental work on plant learning further disrupts the idea that brains are required for intelligence — plants ‘remember,’ adapt, and negotiate. Peter Wohlleben shows how trees ‘train’ their young and respond to distress signals, implying social behaviour far more complex than mere biology.

What all this reveal is that intelligence is becoming more problematized, more tangled than our Cartesian legacy ever imagined. Before we build artificial consciousness, we must ask: what is consciousness for? If organisms without brains — like plants and fungi — exhibit intelligent behaviour, then perhaps consciousness is not a computational achievement, but an ecological necessity.

Understanding intelligence, then, is not a preliminary step — it is the foundational one. Before adapting to artificial intelligence, we must reckon with what intelligence means across life forms, histories and systems. We must ask not how to build it, but why it arises, and what it serves. Only then can we responsibly approach the task of artificial consciousness — not as engineers of minds, but as students of life’s tangled existence.

Muttaki Bin Kamal is a doctoral candidate in anthropology at the University of Texas at San Antonio.​