The article argues that sending AI agents to attend meetings on your behalf may save time but comes with hidden cognitive and social costs backed by neuroscience. Research suggests that being physically or mentally present in meetings helps build trust, social bonds, and shared understanding through subtle cues like tone, facial expressions, and real-time interaction, which AI proxies cannot fully capture. Offloading participation to an AI can weaken relationships, reduce accountability, and impair memory and learning because the brain retains information better when people actively engage. While AI agents may be useful for note-taking or routine updates, relying on them too heavily risks eroding the human connections and cognitive benefits that meetings, at their best, are meant to create.
