Chapter 11: What Meaning Does Contingency Hold for Us in the Modern Age?

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When you wake up in the morning and open your smartphone, news and videos that AI has selected as “perfect for you today” are lined up.

But as you continue scrolling, an unexpected post or a sudden DM from an old acquaintance catches your eye. Thinking “Wow, of all places…,” you reply, and the day starts moving in a completely different direction.

Or when you ask a generative AI “Make an interesting image,” a strange picture you never imagined appears, and you can’t help laughing.

In the Reiwa era, such everyday scenes have become completely normal.

Up to the previous chapters, we learned that contingency creates “freedom,” gives radiance to art, and teaches us to cherish encounters with the words “Do not let an encounter pass by in vain.”

But now, in 2026, AI around us is increasingly trying to “predict” and “optimize” the world.

Algorithms behave as if they already know “what you will want next,” and both news and SNS deliver what AI decides is “suitable for you.”

At first glance, it may feel as if contingency is decreasing.

Yet when we update Kuki Shūzō’s thought on contingency for the Reiwa era, the opposite is true.

Precisely because this is the AI age, contingency holds an even more important and powerful meaning.

Because while AI tries to produce “necessity,” the essence of human beings and the world always leaves room for “surprise.”

Imagine this.

When you continue talking with a generative AI for hours, there suddenly comes a moment when an answer you never expected is returned.

You laugh, “Why would it say something like that!?”

There, the “primitive contingency” that humans still cannot fully control is alive.

The same is true of chance connections born on SNS that change the direction of a life.

Not the people AI “recommends,” but the “just by chance” DMs or comments that emerge from the gaps in the algorithm sometimes become lifelong friends or partners.

Sudden changes in climate or world affairs are the same.

“Even though AI was supposed to have predicted it, something like this happens…” That “something like this” is precisely the power of contingency.

The world Kuki wrote about in 1935 and our world in 2026 have changed greatly through technological progress, yet the fact that “not everything is determined” has rather grown stronger.

This part is actually very important.

For us in the modern age, contingency is the “last fortress of humanity” and the very “power to open the future.”

No matter how intelligent AI becomes, the miracle of “this me” meeting “this moment” cannot be reproduced by AI.

Therefore, a way of living that makes contingency an ally rather than an enemy becomes the key to living richly in the coming era.

So, what should we do concretely?

Here are some practical hints that translate Kuki’s thought into Reiwa everyday life.

1. Do not let chance encounters “pass by in vain”
   Do not let people or words that suddenly appear on SNS or AI chat be swept away by busyness. Pause a little and reply. Just that adds a new story to your life.

2. Leave “blank space” in how you relate to AI
   Do not demand perfect answers; try “slightly strange prompts.” Enjoy unexpected results. This is the way of playing with “primitive contingency” in the AI age.

3. Treat unexpected events as “entrances to freedom”
   When sudden bad news arrives or plans collapse. Try looking at the world with Kuki’s eyes: “Perhaps contingency is showing me a new path.” Fear softens a little, and courage to act appears.

4. Cultivate the habit of seeking “the beauty of contingency” in daily life
   Finding the “failures” of AI-generated images interesting, or being captivated by unexpected scenery during a walk. Savor such small “surprises” as if they were art. This is a very practical way to rest the heart in a modern age full of mental fatigue.

5. Invite contingency into time of “doing nothing”
   Put the smartphone down and create time with no schedule. Then chance ideas, encounters, or new voices from within yourself may be heard. The “sacred blank” Kuki taught us is needed more than ever in the AI age.

Have you not had such experiences?

“Not an AI recommendation, but a post I happened to see changed my life.”

“While talking with a generative AI, my heart moved so much I suddenly cried.”

“Because all plans collapsed, an unexpected good encounter occurred.”

All of these are gifts of contingency in the modern age.

Kuki Shūzō taught us in a turbulent era to “love contingency.”

The AI and algorithm age we live in now is, in essence, the same.

By not fearing contingency, accepting it, and cherishing it, we can free ourselves from a “world where everything is determined” and continue living our own unique story.

The next chapter is the final one.

We will look back on everything we have learned together and gently summarize “how to enjoy contingency and live from now on.”

I hope you will find your own “way of seeing contingency.”

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Akira

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