One Thing AI Can’t Learn

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For this, our 98th issue since NAJOM was first published 33 years ago—in another era—we invited you to explore the student-teacher relationship in a world permeated by the internet and AI. We asked: How do we learn in this new age? Does faster access to more information help us or confuse us? Are we less inclined to meet in person with teachers and colleagues? What do you see as possibilities and cautions for this new age of learning and sharing?

You answered back—with another question: “Is there anything that the internet and AI can’t do?”

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In the six years since COVID-19, Zoom has allowed us to sit in on seminars almost anywhere in the world without getting on a plane—or even dressed, for that matter. Now, AI is expanding so rapidly that our imagination is the only limit to the information we can access. Oran Kivity shares some of his favourite tools with us, including an app that calculates open points. John Jaarsveld celebrates the Chinese Text Project—the largest database of pre-modern Chinese texts in existence, just one example of information that was once completely unavailable, but is now at he fingertips of anyone who can type ctext.org.

Even the least tech-savvy among us are stumbling upon ways to convert time-consuming tasks into more time for our patients, or to deepen our knowledge in other ways. At NAJOM, almost overnight, AI has become especially useful in translating articles from Japanese to English, and vice versa. As a bilingual and multicultural journal, we still rely on the contextual knowledge of our human translators, but we can now fly where we once slogged through confusing passages, better equipped than ever to honour a writer’s original intent.

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However, as it turns out, your question—“Is there anything that the internet and AI can’t do?”—was tongue-in-cheek. While we can and do benefit from many of AI’s jaw-dropping capacities, none of our contributors to this issue have given them too much fanfare, let alone suggested that robots will soon be treating our patients. In fact, our writers have gone out of their way to present a singular, contrasting message: the more easily information becomes available, the more important embodied knowledge becomes.

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This concept—shintaichi (身体知)—is precisely what is required to practice Traditional Japanese Medicine (TJM). It is acquired at the incremental speed at which biological processes such as growth, development, and integration occur. (Takahashi Hideo points to the mirror-neuron system to help us understand why physically watching a master may influence motor learning differently than watching a screen.) This type of knowledge is often accumulated over generations, usually with the support of mentors who themselves possess extraordinary quantities of it. Ultimately, it includes wisdom.

There is no cookie-cutter path to acquiring shintaichi. The traditional master-disciple model—the gold standard according to roundtable experts Ikai, Oura, Toshikawa, and Kido—is sadly falling prey to modern social realities. Thus, it is remarkable and rare that one of our contributors, Naoki Kubota, has been able to pinpoint his place in a four-century, unbroken lineage of Ishizaka Ryu practitioners.

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More commonly today, the path to shintaichi is a blend of formal schooling, individual proclivities, opportunity, and an enduring yearning for a mentor. Bob Quinn once kept a folded prayer in his wallet to that effect. Tom Hurrle, looking back, sees himself as “a disciple of Time.” Mizutani Junji explains, “I never had a strict teacher, and rather than asking someone else for directions, I chose to find my own path.” For him, that path became NAJOM.

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Most of our contributors offer an olive branch to the convenience of technology. Many, like Mark Petruzzi and Atsuki Maeda, guide us to see that the new optimal approach will likely be a “hybrid model”—a thoughtful blending of in-person, hands-on practice and online learning, paired with the part-time presence of a master.

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We are pioneers, with almost as much to learn about learning as we do about the medicine itself.

For our next issue, NAJOM 99 (March 2027), we will literally be "Working Ourselves to the Bone," exploring case studies, tools, and techniques for treating fractures, spinal stenosis, joint trauma, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoporosis, osteopenia, and more. (The deadline is January 1, 2027, but please submit your proposals soon—do not wait for the deadline to send in your completed article).

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And importantly, July 2027 marks the publication of NAJOM’s 100th issue. We are deeply grateful to all of you who have journeyed with us to this point, many since our very first issue in July 1994. Over the next month or so, please share your ideas on how we, as a global community, can celebrate this milestone together.

In learning together,

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Cheryl Coull, editor