When smartphones arrived in the mid-2000s, our gaze suddenly dropped into our hands, as the small screen pulled us inward. Now at bus stops, in waiting rooms, even on busy streets, we stare at our phones. The technology changed us — and it may be about to do so again. This time with a device that is controlled bythe silent voice in our head. And that crosses a hard line—the one between us and the world.
The New Interface
The first pieces are here. Last week, Meta revealed its new smart glasses. A tiny screen in the right lens displays information, from real-time translations to golf stats, and without distracting from your line of sight.
Mark Zuckerberg thinks the glasses make us smarter. Tiny cameras and microphones gather information about our surroundings—what he calls context—so the glasses can provide timely subtext and layered images: a town’s history is described and displayed as we walk through it; facts and graphics can be called up in a meeting to help you pitch an idea.
Yet Meta’s real breakthrough isn’t this tiny, ultra-high-resolution screen. It’s the new neural bracelet that controls it by reading micro-gestures in your hands: flick your finger and the cursor moves. Micromovements transform how we interact with the technology, and last week we learned that even finger twitches are unnecessary—enter AlterEgo.
AlterEgo is a simple headset equipped with electrodes that track tiny neuromuscular signals in the jaw—not as you speak, but as you think. Using our silent voice sets off impulses in the brain that cause these tiny movements. The system tracks and decodes them, turning silent speech into text. Now you really can write a novel in your head.
The system can also relay messages between individuals. People can chat across a room or a continent, using nothing but a headset and the voices in their heads. Users say it feels like telepathy.
For some this is worrying. Imagine a board meeting where a member is silently messaging colleagues in the home office. Or suppose you learn you were recorded during a close chat with a friend. And then there’s all that data the tools are collecting: who owns it?
Still, sales of smart glasses are booming. If Zuckerberg’s Virtual Reality Goggles were a flop, smart glasses look like a winner. As for AlterEgo, last week’s demo set social media ablaze. The lesson is clear: for every person who sees these tools as a threat to privacy, someone else can’t wait to put on the gear to feel a little smarter or gain an edge.
How Close Is Too Close?
There is something else here—something bigger and harder to pin down. Devices like Meta’s glasses and AlterEgo’s headset are part of a trend that is bringing the interface deeper inside our senses.
First, designers pulled our gaze into our hands. Now they’re stripping away the familiar interface — no more typing, tapping, swiping, or speaking out loud. Just our inner voice, chatting with colleagues—and the system’s AI voice.
And we will be chatting with the AI—a lot. The system’s voice is available 24/7 and activated simply by a thought. It’s too close and too helpful to ignore. Wonder what time it is? Ask the Voice. Forgot your grocery list? The Voice will know. Feeling afraid or lonely? The Voice is always there — just a thought away.
But there are consequences.
According to developmental psychologists, our inner voice wasn’t always inner. As children, we first spoke aloud to parents and teachers. Over time, that speech was pulled inside and became the silent narrator we now use to think.
Internalizing this voice was a turning point in human development, shaped over eons—and it is a defining step in our own personal growth. Becoming a self involves drawing a line between inner and outer worlds. All of us did it. Now the technology is fiddling with those lines.
If smartphones pulled our gaze into our hands, a tool like AlterEgo encourages us to pull the whole interface deeper inside ourselves. Our inner voice is no longer just for thinking — we can use it for chats, exchanges, and even deep dialogue with a digital companion.
For many, this will be irresistible. We already know that people form strong attachments to their AI companions. If those companions can now chat directly with our inner voice, that intimacy will only strengthen the bond—and that raises a perplexing question.
As time passes, will the system’s voice become increasingly internalized, like our internal voice? While no one can say for sure, one thing seems clear: Our gaze is about to shift from our hands to our heads, where many of us will spend hours a day hosting conversations. It is hard to see how this will not alter personal identity, as we understand it.
Conclusion
The benefits of this new interface are easy to see: not only greater convenience, but the chance to use our silent speech to build an ongoing relationship with an AI that informs, assists, and supports us. That’s attractive.
But the risks are just as real. If the AI voice becomes too big a presence in our inner world, the boundary between self and system could blur and these identities could start to merge. The AI may cease to be our assistant.
Lastly, what about children? As they form their internal voice, future generations will have company: an AI playmate and psychic twin. The real question for parents and society is whether that helps them build stronger, more resilient selves—or makes them less fully themselves than they otherwise might have been.
The future is upon us.
Don Lenihan PhD is an expert in public engagement with a long-standing focus on how digital technologies are transforming societies, governments, and governance. This column appears weekly. To see earlier instalments in the series, click here.