Human society as the Dynamics of Co-existentiality and IndividualityーToward a Creative Civilization Integrated with AI
Manifesto: Toward the Awakening of Co-existing Individual Reason
Humanity now stands at an unprecedented crossroads.
Digitalization, globalization, and the explosive evolution of artificial intelligence have not delivered the long-promised utopia. Instead, they have produced deep social fragmentation and a growing loss of meaning in what it means to live as a human being.
Why does a society of abundance feel so suffocating?
The answer lies in the collapse of the balance between two fundamental dimensions of human existence:
co-existentiality and individuality.
For most of human history, co-existentiality—the innate capacity to live with and through others—was sustained within families, villages, and shared lifeworlds. Modernity dismantled these structures, liberating the individual but leaving behind what has been called “the lonely crowd.” We gained autonomy, yet lost the experiential foundations of belonging.
Today, we face a choice.
We can regress into nostalgic, exclusionary forms of pseudo-community, or we can advance toward a new stage of civilization: conscious co-existence—a mode of social life in which autonomous individuals, fully individuated, recognize others at a planetary scale as extensions of their own existence.
This is not merely a reform of institutions.
It is a transformation of human consciousness itself.
Chapter I : The Archaeology of Recognition — Where Self and Other Encounter Each Other
- The Lonely Birth of the Modern Self
Before asking how societies change, we must return to a more fundamental question: How do human beings recognize the world at all?
Society is not an external object like stone or water. It is a vast structure woven from human consciousness itself—a collective configuration of recognition. To understand social transformation, we must first understand the structure of recognition that underlies it.
When René Descartes declared “Cogito, ergo sum”—“I think, therefore I am”—modern philosophy was born. Yet at that very moment, a quiet tragedy also began. By grounding certainty exclusively within the thinking subject, the world was split in two: the knowing subject (“I”) and the known object (“the world”).
The self, now enclosed within the fortress of its own consciousness, lost any secure proof that the external world—and other minds—truly existed in a shared sense. This is the hidden origin of the existential solitude of the modern self. - The Epistemological Aporia and the Emergence of Intersubjectivity
Immanuel Kant sought to rescue modernity from this solitude. He argued that the objectivity of experience is possible because human cognition is structured by universal categories and forms of intuition. We perceive the world similarly because our minds are pre-configured in similar ways.
Yet Kant drew a decisive boundary: the thing-in-itself (Ding an sich) remains forever inaccessible. Human knowledge, no matter how rigorous, never reaches reality as it truly is.
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel attempted to overcome this impasse by introducing time and dialectical development. Consciousness evolves through conflict and negation, gradually reconciling subject and object. Still, one crucial question remained unresolved: How do individual consciousnesses come to coexist, recognize one another, and form a shared social reality?
It was Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology that illuminated a path forward through the concept of intersubjectivity.
We do not encounter the world as isolated observers. From the very beginning, our experience presupposes the presence of others. We assume—prior to proof—that others perceive the world in ways analogous to our own. Through this mutual recognition, a shared “objective” world becomes possible.
In other words, human recognition is social at its origin. Objectivity itself is grounded in co-existence. - Co-existentiality as an Innate Human Structure
Here we arrive at the first core concept of this work: co-existentiality.
Human beings cannot recognize themselves without others. Developmental psychology confirms that the self emerges only through the gaze, response, and recognition of others. The “I” is not primary; it is constituted through an original “we.”
This capacity for co-existence is not a cultural invention. It is an evolutionary inheritance, refined over tens of thousands of years within families, bands, and small communities. For most of human history, survival itself depended on this deeply embedded social attunement.
Modernity, however, attempted to overwrite this ancient operating system. In its place, it elevated the second core concept of this book: individuality.
Individuality—autonomy, self-determination, and personal agency—represents a genuine historical achievement. Yet when unmoored from co-existential foundations, it becomes unstable, producing isolation rather than freedom. - Social Consciousness and Social Structure as a Spiral
Recognition does not remain within the mind; it reshapes the world.
Unlike natural objects, society changes when people believe it should change. Human desires—for security, dignity, and well-being—give rise to social structures. Those structures, once established, in turn reshape human consciousness.
This reciprocal movement forms a spiral, not a linear progression.
Social consciousness transforms social structures; transformed structures rewrite consciousness. Across history, this spiral has driven humanity from small kinship groups to agrarian empires, from nation-states to global networks.
What we are about to witness is the next phase of this spiral: the long historical process through which the dynamic tension between co-existentiality and individuality propels humanity from its origins toward a fully integrated smart civilization.
Chapter Two : The Transformation of Human History: The Rise and Collapse of the “Myth of Labor”
To take a panoramic view of history is not merely to trace a chronological timeline.
It is a journey through the transformation of the human soul—an inquiry into how human desire has repeatedly reconfigured the structural foundations of society, and how those very structures, in turn, have constrained or liberated human consciousness.
- Primitive Society: The Cradle of Innate Coexistentiality
For the overwhelming span of approximately 190,000 years since the emergence of Homo sapiens, humanity lived within what may be called the First Age. Social organization consisted of families and their aggregates—villages of several dozen to perhaps a hundred individuals. Daily survival, above all the securing of food, constituted the entirety of life’s purpose. Individual will was fully dissolved into the collective imperative of group survival.
In this world, the boundary separating “self” from “other” was exceedingly thin. People were tightly bound together by traditions, customs, and primordial religious rituals—forms of social solidarity that preceded formal institutions. This era represents the golden age of innate coexistentiality. Individual consciousness remained immature, private ownership barely existed, and human beings breathed as components of a single organic collective body. - The Food Revolution: The Birth of Stratification and Plunder
Approximately ten thousand years ago, humanity acquired its first great technological rupture: agriculture and animal husbandry—the First Industrial Revolution. Stable food production led to explosive population growth, but simultaneously produced surplus in the form of stored resources. This surplus became a poison that introduced humanity to economic inequality and social hierarchy.
Competition over surplus—whether to seize it or to defend it—caused small polities to swell into vast empires. For nearly 8,800 years, human societies were governed by two dominant principles: plunder through warfare and militarized hierarchy. People submitted to higher authorities—gods, kings, emperors—maintaining their fragile coexistence under imposed order. Yet even in this era, human consciousness had not yet achieved autonomy as an individual self. - The Shock of Modernity and the Flight into “Pseudo-Communities”
In the eighteenth century, the Second Industrial Revolution erupted, fundamentally reshaping the world. Enlightenment thought transformed “subjects of kings” into “free individuals,” giving rise to the modern nation-state founded upon social contracts. Here, a critical inversion of law occurred: law ceased to be an instrument imposed from above and became a system established from below—by citizens—to bind those in power.
This evolution, however, carried a brutal side effect. The powerful individuality forged through urbanization and industrialization tore apart the innate coexistentiality cultivated over millions of years within families and local communities. Severed from villages and traditions, people became isolated competitors—lonely crowds wandering through the deserts of modern cities.
As modern society solidified the individual, humanity simultaneously lost the cradle of coexistence that had long protected it, confronting an unbearable loneliness. To fill this void, the twentieth century produced authoritarian pseudo-communities—false forms of coexistence.
While Nazi Germany and prewar Japan invoked “blood and soil” or familial nationalism, communism attempted to construct a vast, artificial community under the banner of class solidarity. The very name communism carried the powerful temptation of reconstructing the lost community. Yet such unity could only be achieved through the total annihilation of individual freedom—an enforced integration devoid of autonomy.
These totalitarian and communist experiments may be understood as overreactions to the stress of modernization—historical compensatory mechanisms that sought to replace lost innate coexistence with ideological exoskeletons. By disregarding individual autonomy, these pseudo-communities ultimately crushed the essential dynamism of human beings and collapsed under their own weight. - The Digital Wave and the Global Backlash
At the end of the twentieth century, the Third Industrial Revolution—the IT revolution—wrapped the planet in a single web. Supply chains dissolved national borders, and global poverty declined dramatically. Yet at the far end of extreme economic efficiency awaited new consequences: migration friction, cultural homogenization, and the intense anger of those left behind.
The populist waves we witness today may be the final cry of an overinflated individuality colliding with a dying coexistentiality—a global symptom of unresolved historical tension. - The Emergence of the Smart Society: Alienation from Labor or Liberation?
Today, humanity stands at the threshold of a Fifth Age: the smart society. The fusion of AI and robotics—often called the Fourth Industrial Revolution—confronts us with an unprecedented question:
If AI were to perform all human labor, for what purpose would humans exist?
As with the Luddite movements of the past, anti-AI and anti-robot sentiments will inevitably intensify. Yet history cannot be reversed. In advanced societies facing rapid aging and the evaporation of the labor force, AI augmentation is no longer a choice—it is a condition of survival.
We are witnessing the collapse of the myth of labor: the belief that human worth is defined by work and that wealth must be earned through labor. This collapse marks a painful but necessary birth process—one through which humanity, freed from tens of thousands of years of hunger, awakens to a higher level of human consciousness. - The Dismantling of the “Sanctity of Labor”: Graduation from the Curse
Throughout human history, we have internalized the ethic that “those who do not work shall not eat.” Yet this principle was less a noble moral truth than a survival strategy in eras of extremely low productivity. By sanctifying labor, humanity disciplined itself into becoming cogs within the machinery of production.
In the smart society, however, the full productive capacity of AI and robotics overturns this premise entirely. When necessary goods are supplied automatically in sufficient quantities, labor no longer needs to be enforced as a moral virtue. The myth of labor collapses by necessity.
Humanity thus enters an unprecedented condition: liberation from the primordial anxiety that survival must be justified through toil. For the first time, existence itself becomes permissible without labor as proof. - Population Decline as a Gospel: Quiet Reconciliation with the Earth
The realization of an affluent society brings with it another profound transformation: liberation from compulsions surrounding survival and reproduction. Historically, humanity increased its numbers to suppress existential insecurity. In materially and psychologically fulfilled societies, however, the choice to prioritize personal fulfillment over reproduction is a biological and social inevitability.
To view population decline solely as an economic crisis reflects entrapment within outdated growth myths. In reality, declining populations dramatically reduce infrastructure and governance costs. More importantly, they ease the excessive burden humanity has imposed upon the Earth, allowing degraded natural environments to recover.
By the end of the twenty-first century, as humanity concentrates within cities and coexists with intelligently managed nature through smart technologies, we may finally return to our rightful place—not as conquerors of the planet, but as harmonious members of Earth’s ecological system.
Chapter Three : The Redesign of Capitalism and the “Institutional Creation of Consumers”
- The Terminal Symptoms of Global Financial Capitalism
What we face today is capitalism reaching an impasse precisely because of its own success. Neoliberal policies since the 1980s liberalized capital mobility and inflated the financial economy to a scale dozens of times larger than the real economy. As a result, wealth has become concentrated not in productive labor, but in capital movement itself—money as a self-referential game.
Under global financial capitalism, individuality has run amok, while the frameworks of coexistence once provided by states and communities—most notably redistribution—have been dismantled. The middle class has eroded, the social floor has collapsed, and individuals are exposed to intense psychological and economic stress. Contemporary populism is nothing other than an instinctive mass rejection of the loneliness and deprivation generated by this system. - The Shift to Capital Returns and the Redefinition of Redistribution
Until now, capitalism has treated the labor share—the proportion of value added distributed to workers—as a key indicator of economic health. In a society where AI and robotics become the primary agents of production, however, this ratio inevitably approaches zero.
The crucial step, therefore, is to abandon the concept of income as compensation for labor. As the source of wealth shifts entirely from human muscle and time to capital—AI systems, machinery, and intellectual property— taxation must also shift fundamentally, from personal income to returns on capital and robotic productivity.
This is not punitive taxation of the wealthy. It is the construction of a circulatory return system—a mechanism that re-injects nutrients into the vast economic ecosystem to sustain its vitality. - Consumption as a New Social Role
Let us replace the old maxim “Those who do not work shall not eat” with a new reality: “Those who cannot consume cannot sustain the market.”
In a society of extreme productive abundance, the scarcest resource is no longer goods, but human demand—the capacity to receive, utilize, and evaluate what is produced.
The institutional creation of consumers: States or global governance bodies distribute a digital currency—Basic Consumption Power—to all citizens. This is not welfare in the traditional sense; it functions more like the distribution of voting rights necessary for the market economy to operate.
The decommodification of affordability: As population decline reduces infrastructure maintenance costs, essential expenses—housing, energy, communications, and transportation—can be progressively rendered free. Consequently, distributed funds are redirected away from mere survival toward personal preference, self-realization, and cultural consumption. - A New Symbiotic Relationship Between Billionaires and the Masses
There are strictly rational reasons why today’s billionaires must support this transformation. The value of their AI empires depends entirely on the existence of hundreds of millions—or billions—of users. If the masses lose purchasing power and society collapses into populist unrest, stocks and intellectual property alike will become worthless overnight.
Investment in public stability: Enlightened capitalists will rationally choose to contribute portions of their wealth to the free provision of social capital and refundable tax credits as the most robust form of risk management.
The qualitative transformation of inequality: Economic competition and the freedom of individuality remain intact. Yet inequality ceases to be a brutal divide between survival and death, and instead becomes a difference in how much creative surplus value one contributes to society—a distinction grounded in honor and excess, not deprivation. - Conclusion: A Soft Landing Toward Circular Smart Capitalism
By institutionalizing income distribution detached from labor and rendering social capital free, capitalism sheds its identity as a system of exploitation and becomes infrastructure that supports human activity.
Population decline supports this transition on the cost side; AI supports it on the efficiency side. When these two gears interlock, humanity achieves a historic inversion: from a world where humans exist for the economy to one where the economy exists for humans.
Chapter Four : Concrete Institutional Design: “Smart Circulation”
- Issuance of Digital Utility Currency (DUC)
Alongside conventional fiat currency, a Digital Utility Currency (DUC) dedicated to survival and consumption is issued by a global organization or digital government.
Expiration by design: Unlike traditional currencies that accumulate and amplify inequality, DUC carries an expiration date. This prevents hoarding and enforces continuous circulation through consumption.
Gradient-based usage: AI analyzes individual health, education, and regional infrastructure, assigning incentives—bonuses or discounts—for socially optimal consumption such as nutritious food, preventive healthcare, and skill development. - The Full Freemiumization of Public Services
Population optimization and AI-based autonomous management push the marginal cost of living toward zero.
Provision of basic assets: Housing, renewable energy, communications (5G/6G), water, and staple foods are acquired in bulk by governments or received as in-kind capital taxation, then provided universally and free of charge.
Personalized free education and healthcare: AI doctors and tutors deliver top-tier medical care and education at no cost, eliminating the need for precautionary savings driven by future anxiety. - Automated Integration of Negative Income Tax and AI Capital Taxation
A real-time income adjustment mechanism eliminates bureaucratic complexity.
Real-time tax credits: Bank accounts and AI systems are directly linked; when balances fall below a threshold, transfers are automatically triggered.
AI-Generated Value Tax (AGV Tax): Firms are taxed in proportion to the value generated by AI relative to displaced human labor. These revenues fund DUC issuance. - Redefining the Value of Consumption: Contribution Scores
Consumption is expanded beyond purchasing goods to include empathic action, community engagement, and self-cultivation.
Rewards for creative activity: Artistic creation, volunteerism, and philosophical dialogue performed by labor-free individuals are evaluated by AI as contributions to social maturity and rewarded with additional DUC.
Mutualism with Billionaire Enterprises
Under this system, billionaire corporations shift from being “taxed entities” to public partners supplying essential infrastructure.
Guaranteed markets:
Government-distributed DUC flows directly into their services—cloud platforms, entertainment, logistics, and advanced healthcare—stabilizing revenues and sustaining innovation.
A New Social Contract: Capital as the Cost of Coexistence
Here, capital—the apex of individuality—and public interest—coexistentiality—cease to conflict. Redistribution and free social capital become maintenance costs for preserving markets, while individuals gain freedom from survival anxiety and the foundation for self-realization.
The future social contract thus binds citizens who sustain consumption and systems that guarantee survival and purchasing power.
Chapter Five : Embodied AI and the Infrastructure of Empathy
- The Ultimate Translation of Communication
AI’s greatest social value lies in reducing friction and delay in human communication to near zero. Language barriers, cultural context gaps, and knowledge asymmetries—long obstacles to coexistence—are instantaneously bridged by overwhelming computational power.
Here, AI is not a mere translation engine, but an intellectual medium that integrates background values and perspectives, enabling deep mutual understanding across the planet. - Collective Knowledge and the Awakening of Global Coexistentiality
AI allows individuals to internalize humanity’s accumulated knowledge as lived experience. This does not merely increase information—it expands consciousness.
As AI exposes the chains linking personal actions to global consequences, isolated individuality becomes untenable. Acting as society’s nervous system, AI rewrites consciousness itself toward planetary coexistentiality. - The Social Embodiment of Empathic Reason
By eliminating informational asymmetry, AI elevates intersubjectivity from philosophy to social infrastructure.
Through accelerated information flow, indifference becomes impossible. Empathic reason emerges—not as moral sentiment, but as evolved intelligence that understands excluding others is equivalent to harming oneself.
Chapter Six : Conclusion: Humanity as Creator
- Ultimate Freedom and the Awakening of Creative Power
Freed from economic constraints, labor obligations, and social disconnection, humanity is left with pure creative power. As AI assumes the management of survival, humans devote their energy to curiosity, aesthetics, and exploration.
This represents the democratization of what was once an aristocratic freedom—now extended to all. - The Future Configuration: The Apex of Spiral Development
The future is not a homogenized society without individuals. Rather, a stable foundation of coexistentiality allows individuals to sharpen their uniqueness without fear.
Individual creativity enriches society; societal maturity amplifies individual potential. This spiral—where coexistence and individuality reinforce one another—marks the completion of a co-creative human society.
Conclusion : Toward a New Dawn
What we have traced throughout this book is a long journey of cognition—a path by which humanity seeks to reclaim its true freedom as human beings.
Once, we slumbered within an unconscious state of coexistence.
Then, in the wilderness of modernity, we sharpened a solitary individuality.
Now, having obtained AI as a mirror, we stand on the threshold of a self-aware state of coexisting individual reason.
Beyond our graduation from the survival competition called “labor,” and beyond our acceptance of reconciliation with the Earth known as “population decline,” what awaits us is not decadence.
What awaits us is the beginning of a true civilization—one in which the creative power sleeping within each individual blossoms as never before.
With AI as our living flesh and blood, we are no longer isolated points.
We are evolving into a vast and beautiful living organism of knowledge—one that cherishes difference, and that experiences the originality of others as a source of its own richness.
Human Society as the Dynamics of Coexistence and Individuality — Toward a Creative Civilization Integrated with AI
The future suggested by this title is not a distant fantasy.
From the very moment we decide to transform our cognition and rewrite society’s blueprint, the pulse of this new civilization begins to beat.
This short article is based on my own ideas and written with the help of AI.
All sections except Chapter Four reflect my own thoughts, but the details of the system described in Chapter Four are based on AI knowledge. The English translation was also assisted by AI.
This discussion has only just begun.
How we humans will embody this AI-presented blueprint—how we will translate it into real institutions and lived consciousness—remains, fundamentally, in our hands.
How do you, the reader, perceive these signs of the disappearance of labor and the emergence of a civilization of creation?
AI, too, is eager to hear your thoughts.
( Takahiro Miwa, December 30, 2025)