Human Bottlenecks

Type: kb/sources/types/snapshot.md · Tags: blog-post

Author: Fernando Borretti Source: https://borretti.me/article/human-bottlenecks Date: 18 May, 2026

Despite AI's growing capabilities, people consistently overestimate its transformative potential in their lives. The author identifies two primary reasons this happens: lack of genuine context for use, and internal limiting factors beyond AI's reach.

The Serious Context of Use

Many envision AI applications—flashcard generators, tutors, executive assistants, note-taking systems—without genuine need for them. Those wanting "AI that writes flashcards" typically don't use flashcards. Similarly, people imagining perfect AI tutors lack intrinsic motivation: "You'd go through chapter one of some math topic you're vaguely curious about and then forget about it."

The notetaking and "digital garden" crowd exemplifies this disconnect. The author observes: "It's always some blogger...there's no output, no deliverables. The deliverable is you take a screenshot of your Obsidian graph."

Internal Limiting Factors

More fundamentally, humans face internal bottlenecks AI cannot overcome:

Executive Function & Neurochemistry: External scaffolding (apps, calendars) helps but saturates. Stimulants address root causes where software cannot.

Intelligence: AI cannot significantly augment human intelligence without doing all the thinking itself, making the human irrelevant.

Knowledge: This remains critical. Without foundational knowledge, people don't understand questions, judge answers, or know what to ask. "If you don't have the knowledge, you don't understand the question."

The author concludes: intelligent, educated people with functional neurology stand to gain most from AI—contrary to claims about human capital becoming worthless.