Collaborating with artificial intelligence in healthcare: How collective imaginaries of AI’s future shape its reality

Abstract

This article explores the role of magical beliefs in shaping the rapid integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare. Drawing on ethnographic research across hospitals in seven countries, it argues that healthcare professionals’ perceptions of AI as an autonomous, inevitable force significantly propel ongoing development and investment, despite frequent frustrations, errors, and ethical concerns. These beliefs—centered on notions of AI's self-learning, unstoppable progression, and perceived agency—function as a form of collective imagination that sustains hope and motivation, even in the face of empirical limitations. While clinicians are aware of AI's flaws and the ethical dilemmas it raises, they continue to work around its shortcomings, driven by a conviction that a flawless AI will eventually emerge through some form of “magical” development. This perspective underscores how shared magical beliefs imbue AI with agency and inevitability, shaping future trajectories beyond material and discursive forces. Recognizing these beliefs offers new insights into the socio-cultural dynamics underpinning technological adoption in healthcare and raises questions about the influence of collective imagination on policy, regulation, and ethical frameworks. Ultimately, this analysis highlights the need to critically engage with the symbolic and cultural forces that sustain the rapid rise of AI, emphasizing that understanding these shared beliefs is crucial for shaping more realistic and ethically grounded futures of healthcare technology.