Badar Al Bri
The Arab cognitive mind has passed through several stages since the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, beginning with the spread of printing, followed by newspapers, magazines, television, and radio. By its nature, it initially responds to every new medium with suspicion, reinforcing negative perceptions that such innovations will spread social corruption and lead to political disorder. Yet, once society becomes familiar with them, those who once warned against these media often become their most enthusiastic users and promoters of their own ideas, interests, and knowledge through them.
The period from the second half of the nineteenth century until 1990 may be regarded as the first major phase of transformation in the means of knowledge production and dissemination. This phase was experienced most profoundly by the Silent Generation and Generation X. By contrast, the period from 1990 to the present (2026) has witnessed two successive transformations whose impact on the Arab world has been many times greater than that of the earlier phase. My periodization here is based not on the dates of invention or discovery, but rather on the breadth of diffusion, social influence, and horizontal interconnectedness.
The second phase began in the early 1990s with the emergence of satellite television. At first, satellite broadcasting generated intense political, social, and religious anxiety. Generation X had grown accustomed to the discourse of Arab nationalism and relatively closed identities, while satellite channels were perceived as vehicles of Western cultural invasion and foreign domination. Reality, however, took a different course. Satellite media diversified in orientation and content until the Arab world eventually came to host more than one thousand governmental and private television channels.
The rise of satellite television coincided with the emergence of the World Wide Web, electronic websites, online discussion forums, blogs, and personal and institutional websites. Together, these developments fundamentally reshaped the intellectual landscape for Generations X and Z. They dismantled the dominance of a single social narrative, broke barriers surrounding forbidden knowledge—whether political, religious, social, or security-related—and, ultimately, eroded the culture of fear. This led to an unprecedented expansion of criticism directed at governments and public institutions, as well as open discussions of religious, social, and ethical issues, often under pseudonyms. Previously prohibited newspapers and magazines became readily accessible, news no longer required official approval before publication but spread instantaneously, and public visibility was no longer exclusively determined by state institutions. Even religious, social, or cultural exclusion lost much of its effectiveness, as those marginalized for various reasons found virtual communities that shared their aspirations and ideas.
During this period, security authorities and certain governmental institutions attempted to restrict this expansion. Yet society quickly entered an even more transformative stage with the rise of social media platforms—beginning with Facebook in 2004, YouTube in 2005, Instagram in 2010, and TikTok after 2016. This development coincided with the emergence of Generation Z. Although this generation may not fully appreciate the intellectual upheaval that characterized the early years of the millennium, social media profoundly shaped its individualistic consciousness. People could now publish texts, images, and videos whenever they wished and express their opinions with unprecedented ease. Video content, discussion channels, and podcasts flourished, while the realities of human societies became increasingly visible. Alongside these developments emerged renewed emphasis on identity, values, belonging, and the preservation of cultural particularities. Collective and individual worlds alike competed for the attention of individuals, families, and societies, rendering attempts to suppress communication technologies increasingly futile, especially given the widespread availability of tools for bypassing internet restrictions.
The period extending from 1990 until the end of 2022 profoundly influenced the Arab cognitive mind. Positively, it democratized access to knowledge and greatly expanded its dissemination, while enriching intellectual diversity and facilitating direct engagement with leading scholars and thinkers. At the same time, however, it generated significant challenges, including the spread of intellectual superficiality, plagiarism, weak research standards, and the tendency to present inherited debates and outdated assumptions as unquestionable truths.
Perhaps the greatest achievement of this era was its transformation of the Arab knowledge community into a single intellectual village. One no longer needed to travel abroad to access knowledge produced in the East or the West. Scholars and intellectuals became directly accessible through their personal platforms, and participation in academic conferences was no longer dependent upon institutional sponsorship. Individuals could independently engage in virtual conferences, training programs, and interactive educational events.
This constitutes the second phase. The third phase began after 2022 with the widespread adoption of generative artificial intelligence and intelligent robotics. This algorithmic and digital transformation will undoubtedly produce profound positive and negative consequences. At the same time, it coincides with the emergence of a new generation—Generation Alpha—which increasingly distinguishes itself from its predecessors.
This third phase does not replace the previous one; rather, it extends and amplifies it. Its impact upon the cognitive mind will be far from marginal. The essential question is therefore no longer artificial intelligence itself, but rather the cognitive mind beyond artificial intelligence. The previous phase made knowledge more accessible, diverse, and easily attainable. Artificial intelligence, however, goes significantly further. It actively participates in thinking, production, planning, and identifying pathways toward intellectual leadership. In other words, artificial intelligence increasingly serves as a catalyst for creative knowledge production in writing, design, invention, and discovery.
The previous phase facilitated the transition from merely consuming knowledge to constructing it. Artificial intelligence, by contrast, enables individuals to enter directly into the stage of knowledge creation. It allows users to develop themselves intellectually and creatively across diverse fields without necessarily relying upon costly courses or time-consuming workshops.
For this reason, I believe that today’s cognitive mind should no longer think according to the logic of the previous era—that is, merely seeking openness to knowledge and interaction with it. Instead, it must shift its focus toward precision, creativity, and genuine intellectual leadership. Artificial intelligence can effortlessly generate scholarly articles, research projects, or sophisticated designs. The true challenge lies not in producing such outputs, but in employing these tools to create genuinely original works and meaningful intellectual projects. AI has dramatically shortened the path toward knowledge acquisition, diversified intellectual opportunities, and strengthened human capability. Nevertheless, the creative capacities of the human mind remain broader and deeper—provided that artificial intelligence is approached through the question of what comes after rather than through imitation, plagiarism, superficial fame, or passive reliance upon machine-generated ideas and designs.
From this perspective of “beyondness,” I believe educational, intellectual, and research institutions must fundamentally reconsider their missions. Just as humanity has moved beyond the first phase—despite still employing many of its technologies—it is now also moving beyond the second. We have entered a new era whose influence extends across individual, social, cultural, and intellectual life. This new phase must itself be studied through the lens of what comes after, enabling our cognitive minds to enter an age of creativity, innovation, and intellectual leadership across all disciplines and fields of knowledge.
Translated with the assistance of Artificial Intelligence.
