‘The real miracle isn’t intelligence, it’s the human brain’: Anupam Mittal on why AI won’t replace humans

People Group founder and Shark Tank India judge Anupam Mittal said AI is unlikely to replace humans anytime soon, arguing that the true marvel lies not in intelligence itself but in the complexity and efficiency of the human brain.

In a post on LinkedIn, Mittal said replicating the capabilities of a single human brain using today’s AI approaches would require computing infrastructure on the scale of a football-field-sized data center, operating at full capacity, merely to mimic how one person sees, thinks, learns and makes decisions in real time.

By contrast, he noted, the human brain performs these functions using roughly 20 watts of power.

“To match a single human brain using today’s AI approaches, you’d need something close to a football-field-sized data centre running flat out - just to mimic how one person sees, thinks, learns, and decides in real time...All that to replicate what your brain does on 20 watts,” Mittal wrote.

Mittal added that attempts to biologically replicate the brain, including neurons, synapses, chemistry and plasticit, move far beyond conventional computing models.

While such replication may be theoretically possible, he said it would require computing power on a planetary scale.

He said artificial intelligence excels at automation, repetition and large-scale pattern recognition, but lacks key human attributes such as judgment, creativity, contextual understanding and knowing when not to act. These qualities, he argued, are emergent properties shaped over millions of years of evolution and cannot be reduced to additional parameters or larger models.

Until there is a fundamental shift in how intelligence is computed, rather than incremental advances through larger models and more processing power, Mittal said the replacement of human creativity by AI is not a near-term threat.

“The real miracle of the brain isn’t intelligence. It’s all the complexity that fits inside your skull, runs on sugar and oxygen, and dissipates less heat than a light bulb. That’s the human flex AI can’t replicate,” he added.

Netizens reaction

Mittal’s post quickly sparked a discussion, with professionals from technology, law, data science and entrepreneurship weighing in, largely agreeing with his central thesis, while adding their own nuances.

“The real question isn't replacement, it's augmentation. From my experience building automation systems at Wellness Extract, AI doesn't eliminate jobs—it evolves them,” a user wrote.

“Well explained, especially the energy-efficiency gap of the human brain. One thought though — AI may not need to replicate the entire human brain to replace humans in many economic roles. History shows that partial automation often displaces outcomes without matching biology (calculators vs mathematicians, planes vs birds),” another noted.

“I agree we can't achieve by AI what Humans can do with just 20W but I don't think that it requires a earth sized computer,” a third expressed.

“Insightful framing. One nuance though: AI doesn’t need to replicate the human brain to replace humans functionally. Disruption historically happens by redefining tasks and economics, not by biological imitation. The real question isn’t consciousness, it’s how much human presence remains necessary in the loop,” another added.