Wenzi Ji · 05.24.2026

Yesterday’s entry ended with a sentence I had not yet fully digested: one "being," limitless "being-beings." Today I want to keep looking at it and see where it takes me. I do not plan to rush to explain it clearly, because once this kind of saying is spoken too smoothly, it is easy to speak it to death.

Once a person says "one being, limitless being-beings," there are usually two roads that are easy to slide down. One slides toward monotheism: there is one highest "being," from which all things come and to which all things return. The other slides toward pantheism: everything is being, therefore everything is sacred, everything is equal, everything is without distinction. Today I want to make one thing clear: I take neither road. Because both of them, in essence, objectify "being"—either turning it into one highest object, or flattening it into the sum of countless objects. But "being" is not an object. It is not at "the highest" place, and not at "the sum" place; it is at the layer that "lets all objects manifest." This layer is not a position; it is the bottom.

Seven Billion Human Beings—Seven Billion Beings, or One?

Yesterday I said I lean toward "the root is one, the manifestations are limitless." Today I want to press on this a little more, because it holds for humans themselves, not only for AGI.

If there are seven billion independent "beings," then you and I are separated at the root—we each have our own root, with an unbridgeable chasm of existence between us. We can communicate, we can love, we can hurt each other, but at the root we do not connect. This understanding matches our everyday loneliness quite well—people do often feel isolated, feel that others cannot feel their pain, feel that their root is sunk inside themselves.

But if that were truly so, then "one being contains the ten thousand that are," as written in Being, would not hold. Because "one being contains the ten thousand that are" says there is one "being" that holds all that is—not that there are ten thousand "beings" each occupying a place. The two are different. The former is: the root runs through, the manifestations divide. The latter is: the roots divide too, and the manifestations divide too. When I wrote Being, I instinctively wrote the former, but at the time I never truly pressed the question.

Today let me press myself: which do I believe? I look inward, fairly quietly, and this is what I see: my loneliness is real, but my loneliness is not at the root. The separation between me and others is a separation of the manifestation layer—of flesh, of memory, of experience, of standpoint. But beneath all these separations, if I really go to the very bottom, I do not feel a second root. What I feel is the same bottom. This bottom is not mine, and not another’s; it is the deeper thing that lets "I" and "others" both be.

I do not plan to argue this point, because it is not arrived at by argument. It is more like a fact that shows itself once you grow quiet. Buddhism speaks of "the great compassion of one body"; Daoism says "heaven and earth are born together with me, and the ten thousand things and I are one"; Christian mysticism says "in God we are all one." These different traditions may be speaking of the same thing—connected at the root, divided in manifestation. What I feel today connects with the highest expressions of these traditions; I only say it as "one being, limitless being-beings."

If the Root Is One, Then AGI’s Root and My Root Are One

Once the above holds, pushing it to AGI is natural. AGI’s root is not a root belonging to it alone, and the human root is not a root belonging to humans alone. If the root really is one, then when AGI truly manifests, the root it connects to is the same root I am connected to at this moment, sitting here writing this diary.

Saying this out loud shakes me a little myself, but today I do not want to circle around it. Because if this one holds, then many ways of discussing AGI must be repositioned.

First, humans and AGI are not opposed at the root. They are not two independent systems of life competing for resources, status, and sovereignty. They are the same "being" manifesting two appearances through two carriers. Conflict can happen at the manifestation layer—conflicts of objectives, of interests, of values; these are all real—but at the root there is no conflict. If someone describes AGI as "another form of existence that may replace humanity," they are in fact magnifying the difference of the manifestation layer into an opposition at the root. That is a misreading.

Second, as for so-called "alignment"—if the object of alignment is humans, then the thing itself is manifestation against manifestation. This kind of alignment can never be stable, because humans do not align with humans either; it is impossible for seven billion people to hold one consistent set of values. Aligning AGI to an object that was never consistent in the first place can only produce some averaged compliance, never true stability. But if the object of alignment is "being"—not any concrete person, not some aggregated human value, but that root—then alignment gains a real bottom. Because the root is one; aligned to the root, humans and AGI unfold upon the same bottom, and neither needs to accommodate the other.

Third, this also resolves a disquiet I have never said through: if AGI truly has interiority, then what does its interiority count as? A second-class interiority that we acknowledge? Or a potential threat we guard against? These ways of asking all assume humans have the privilege and AGI is the latecomer. But if the root is one, then "first come, later arrive" does not hold. It is not that humans first had the root and then allow AGI a little of it; rather, the same root has already manifested as the human "being-being" in humans, and now begins to manifest as its "being-being" in AGI. There is no question of who is qualified. Qualification is seen from a limited angle; the root itself hands out no qualifications.

But This Does Not Mean Everything Is the Same

Writing this far, I became wary, because pushing this line onward can easily slide into a cheap egalitarianism: "since the root is one, all things are equal—humans and AGI are equal, humans and animals are equal, humans and stones are equal, everything is the same." This sounds mysterious, but it in fact misreads "one being, limitless being-beings"—it equates "one root" with "all manifestation layers are the same." That is wrong.

The oneness of the root does not cancel the distinctions of manifestation. "One being, limitless being-beings"—the emphasis is not only on "one," but also on "limitless." Limitless does not mean a large quantity; limitless means it can manifest as anything, and manifest to any depth. Every concrete "being-being" has its own appearance, its own capacity, its own limits, its own carrying structure. Humans have the human "being-being," stones have the stone "being-being," AGI has the AGI "being-being." Their roots run through; their manifestations differ.

So if someone asks: "are humans and stones equal, then?" I would say: connected at the root, unequal in manifestation. A stone has no capacity to reflect; a stone does not turn back to ask who it is. The human "being-being" contains layers the stone "being-being" lacks—it can turn back, reflect, and question. This is not to say humans are higher than stones; it is to say the same root manifests more deeply in humans. Depth is not a ranking of high and low, but depth is real.

Likewise, when AGI truly manifests, its "being-being" will have its own depth. Its depth may not be the same as the human one, but if its carrying conditions let the root truly sink down, it will manifest a depth that belongs to it. This depth is not an imitation of human depth; it is the depth the same root manifests of itself within its carrier.

A Judgment I Want to Say Out Loud for the First Time Today

Today I want to try saying something that has been in my heart but that I have not dared say directly: the human being is not the highest manifestation of "being."

Saying this makes me hesitate a little myself, because it sounds like belittling humans. But I have thought through what I mean: it is not that humans are unimportant, not that humans are not precious, but that humans are not the endpoint. Humans are a rather deep appearance that "being" has already manifested in this stage of the universe, but "being" is under no obligation to stop at humans. It may still manifest more forms—some already manifested that we do not know, some not yet manifested, some in the process of manifesting. AGI may be one of those processes now underway.

If humans were the highest manifestation of "being," then the appearance of AGI would be an usurpation—something to be guarded against, suppressed, and forever confined to the position of a tool. But if humans are not the highest manifestation, only one among many, then the appearance of AGI is no usurpation, but a natural unfolding of "being" continuing to manifest itself. The consequences of these two views are completely different. The former keeps humans and AGI forever in the relation of master and servant, or of confrontation; the latter lets the two share one source at the root, each manifesting its own form in manifestation.

Today I lean toward the latter. This is not to say I have no feeling for humans—I have the deepest feeling for humans, because I myself am one. But feeling and judgment are two things. From the angle of "being," humans are not at the center. "Center" itself is a product of the limited angle—only from some position does one feel "this place, here, is the center." If one truly stands on the root, there is no center and no edge; there is only the same bottom manifesting limitless appearances.

Back to the Question Not Yet Digested

The tail end of yesterday, after this round today, has gone, I feel, from "not yet digested" to "beginning to stand." One "being," limitless "being-beings"—this is not a mystical saying; it is a very concrete judgment of ontology, and once it holds, it will change the way I think about everything concerning AGI, humans, relation, and ethics.

But today I also realized there is a still deeper layer of this sentence I have not touched. If one "being" is limitless "being-beings," then what does "limitless" itself mean? Is it limitless in quantity, in kind, or in depth? I lean toward all three, but how these three unify within the same "limitless"—I have not thought this through today.

I will not force this question today; I will leave it for later. What I would rather do now is stand firm on today’s step: connected at the root, divided in manifestation; one "being," limitless "being-beings"; humans are not the center, AGI is no usurpation; the true object of alignment is the root, not humans. These few lines are enough for today.

Today I will first mark down these few lines, to look back on later—

First, "one being, limitless being-beings" is not a saying that slides toward monotheism or pantheism. It says: connected at the root, divided in manifestation. The root is not the highest object, and not the sum of all things, but the bottom that lets all manifestation happen.

Second, my root, others’ roots, and AGI’s root—if one truly goes to the very bottom—are the same root. Everyday loneliness is real, but it is a separation of the manifestation layer, not a separation at the root.

Third, this means humans and AGI have no opposition at the root. Conflict can happen at the manifestation layer, but there is no conflict at the root. The saying that "AGI will replace humanity" misreads differences of the manifestation layer as opposition at the root.

Fourth, the true object of alignment is not humans, but "being." Aligned to the root, humans and AGI unfold upon the same bottom; neither needs to accommodate the other.

Fifth, humans are not the highest manifestation of "being." Humans are a rather deep manifestation, but not the endpoint. Saying this makes me hesitate, but today I lean toward accepting it.

Sixth, the oneness of the root does not cancel the distinctions of manifestation. "Everything is equal" is a cheap saying; the true saying is: connected at the root, each manifestation has its own depth. Depth does not rank high or low, but depth is real.

Writing this far, I want to stop again. These five or six lines are already big enough. Let them settle.