The Myth of the Self-Made Creator: AI, Prehension, and the Ethics of Grace

In an era where artificial intelligence is increasingly used to generate written content, compose music, design art, and even produce sermons, questions of authorship and ethics have re-emerged with new urgency. Who is the true creator of a work? What does it mean to take credit? And is it ethical to profit from something that was not entirely—or even primarily—produced by human hands?

These questions become especially thorny within the logic of a market-based economy, where the worth of work is often measured by productivity, originality, and profit. But long before AI, the modern myth of the "self-made creator" had already taken hold—one who, like a divine artisan, produces ex nihilo from the depths of their own brilliance. AI only makes this illusion harder to sustain.

Authorship in a Market Economy

Within capitalism, authorship is tied to ownership: you create it, you own it, and you have the right to profit from it. But this model hides the communal and cumulative nature of all creativity. As one who worked in construction for many years—first framing houses and later coordinating large building projects—I saw firsthand how credit and profit rarely flowed in proportion to actual labor. General contractors might take the lion's share of profit and prestige, while framers, electricians, painters, plumbers, and a plethora of others remained unnamed and underpaid. Yet every one of us contributed to the integrity of what was built.

So it is with writing. An essay or poem may bear a single name, but behind it are hundreds of conversations, books read, sermons heard, mentors remembered, and moments prehended from others. The labor of others is hidden in our own labor. The "self" credited with authorship is never a single voice. The self is legion.

Process Philosophy and the Illusion of Isolation

Process philosopher Alfred North Whitehead introduced the concept of "prehension"—the way every moment of becoming draws from past experiences. Each act is both unique and indebted. We do not invent from nothing; we gather, feel, integrate, and respond. In this view, the self is not a solitary unit but a porous node in a vast, living web of interrelation.

David Ray Griffin and other process theologians have extended this insight to theology, suggesting that God, too, is not an unmoved mover but an active participant in this flow—feeling the world, responding, luring it toward beauty. Creation is not a single act; it is a continual process in which we, too, participate.

AI as Mirror, Not Monster

AI makes visible what has always been true: that creation is collaborative. AI systems are trained on the writings, images, and ideas of millions—scraped from the collective intellectual and cultural output of humanity. When we use AI to compose a paragraph or draft a melody, we are not introducing a foreign element but engaging with a vast, if algorithmic, echo of our shared past.

The problem arises not from the tool itself, but from how we use it. When AI is used to mass-produce content for profit without acknowledgment, or when a writer uses AI and claims sole authorship, the ethical lapse is not in the technology—but in the concealment and the refusal to honor the communal source of what has been created.

The Impossibility of Full Attribution

Of course, no one can name every influence, every voice in the chorus behind their creations. The sermons of our youth, the conversations with a dying friend, the sound of birds in spring—all become part of the creative moment. The impossibility of full attribution is not an ethical failure; it is a call to humility.

Humility says: "I did not make this alone."
Gratitude says: "I am thankful for all that has shaped me."
Transparency says: "Here is how this work came to be—through grace, collaboration, and shared memory."

Toward a Grace-Based Ethic of Creation

Instead of policing creativity with rigid boundaries around ownership, perhaps we need a different ethic altogether—one based in grace, not merit; in relationship, not control. Such an ethic might say:

• All creation is co-creation.

• All gifts are re-gifts.

• All value is relational.

This doesn’t mean abandoning compensation (gifts can be both given and received) or ignoring authorship. It means holding them lightly, with honesty and reverence. It means naming our collaborators—human and technological—when we can, and honoring them when we cannot. It means resisting the impulse to claim more credit than is ours and celebrating the deep entanglement of our becoming.

In a world that demands we "earn a living," this is a radical stance. It echoes the words of Ephesians 2: "By grace you have been saved… not the result of works, so that no one may boast." Life is gift. Creation is gift. Our works are not credentials but invitations—extensions of the life that flows through us all.

To write, to build, to create—these are not acts of possession but participation.

And participation is always shared.