By Ammar Mirza CBE
It feels like we are living in two worlds at once. Not just different opinions, but entirely different realities.
If you have ever watched Stranger Things, you will know exactly what I mean. One moment everything looks normal. The next, you realise there is an “Upside Down” version of the same world, darker, distorted, misunderstood. And somewhere in between are the Demogorgons and Vecnas of the unknown, lurking in the spaces we do not quite understand.
That is exactly how this moment in time feels. Just recently, I found myself trying to gently introduce the idea of AI to my mother-in-law. She had recently lost her husband, and like many people navigating grief, structure and routine had become both more important and more difficult. My intention was simple. Not to replace anything human, but to offer something practical. A tool that could help prompt her day, remind her of tasks, even act as a light touch sounding board when the house felt a little too quiet.
The response was immediate. Firm. Unmovable. A complete rejection.
And what struck me even more was that just the day before, she had been sat with friends and family of a similar generation, all discussing AI with a level of certainty that it was, without question, one of the worst things to happen. No nuance. No curiosity. Just a clear line drawn.
Now, I understand it. I really do.
Because if you pause for a moment and place yourself back several decades, imagine the arrival of television. Before it, entertainment was live, local, human. Music halls, theatres, community gatherings. Then suddenly, people were appearing inside a box in your living room. Moving. Talking. Performing.
That must have felt extraordinary. And, if we are honest, probably unsettling.
Yet today, we do not even think about it. The extraordinary becomes ordinary. The unfamiliar becomes invisible.
And here is where it gets interesting.
At the other end of the spectrum, we have younger generations who move through digital environments with complete ease. AI, apps, platforms, content, creation. It is second nature. Effortless. Almost instinctive. And we, as the so called “grown ups,” often find ourselves trying to pull them back. Less screen time. More real world. More balance.
So on one side, we have fear of the new. On the other, complete immersion in it.
Two worlds. Same place.
What fascinates me is not that this tension exists, but that we seem surprised by it. History is full of these moments. Every major shift, every innovation, every leap forward has created its own version of the Upside Down. A space where uncertainty lives, where narratives form quickly, and where people either lean in or pull away.
AI just happens to be the latest.
But it is not the first, and it certainly will not be the last.
The real question is not whether AI is good or bad. That is far too simplistic. The question is how we choose to engage with it. With awareness. With responsibility. With humanity at the centre.
Because used well, it can support. It can enable. It can even comfort. But like anything powerful, without thought or balance, it can just as easily overwhelm.
Perhaps what we are really experiencing is not a technological shift, but a human one. A reminder that progress does not happen in a straight line. It moves in waves. It challenges. It disrupts. It asks us to reconsider what we know and how we feel.
And maybe, just maybe, stranger things have always been happening. We just did not have the language, or the lens, to recognise them at the time.
It feels like we are living in two worlds at once. The question is whether we choose to fear the other side, or find a way to understand it.
High Sheriff of Tyne and Wear, Ammar Mirza CBE, is Chair and Founder of ABConnexions & Executive Chair of the AmmarM Group. He also serves as Honorary Colonel of the 101st (Northumbrian) Regiment Royal Artillery and holds a range of roles across the public and private sectors as a leader in inclusive innovation, investment and internationalisation.