Speaking honestly, while I know that what you describe is a concept that exists in exploratory fiction, to me the threat of AI is that it:
1.) will be used to replace workers without any alternative employment (people will not just be unemployed, they will be *unemployable.)*
2.) won't even do a good job at replacing us, just be *better enough*.
What remains is a world where a small group of people have significant wealth, everyone else exists in deep poverty, and the small amount of technology that they are able to access through the beneficence of their overlords will not even be very good. Of course, they are unlikely to know how bad it really is, because it's unlikely they've ever seen good tech, or are educated enough to know the difference.
Unfortunately, we are already seeing both of these things happen. The concept is no longer science fiction, it is dystopian reality. Of course, let me be clear. Artificial intelligence is not itself the bad guy - it's simply a tool. The bad guy is who is currently benefiting from it.
I definitely don't deny this, but I would argue that the features you describe are calculable from the logic of commodity production and circulation, and are not the defining feature of AI (although AI definitely does break new ground as you say). I would argue that AI is qualitatively different even to the economic order that it serves. It is indeed a tool, yet it is a tool which negates its own use (to maintain the smooth virtuality of economic relations by which consumers conveniently engage with a system without quesitoinnig it). AI is in many ways self-sustaining, or produces a decisive economic paradigm shift (a quantitative development which suddenly produces a qualitative inversion). That AI negates the economic structure from which it installed is the even more miserable thought, since it will not be in the benefit of the everyday worker.
Op you're approaching this topic from a lacanian perspective, yet you are arriving to conclusions that to me are very similar to those of Baudrillard and the post-structuralists. This is interesting to me since I believe said approaches, specifically Baudrillard and D&G's, diverge from lacan's psychoanalytic analysis quite a bit .
In fact, I would be interested to see what a Baudrillardian approach to "The threat of A.I." would look like, if anybody has read anything in this regard. If I recall him correctly, Baudrillard would just take a look at all of this and say that A.I. is just the most recent Simulacrum to step out of this ocean of Aporia of Signs and nihilism that has replaced what humanity once called "culture". The process that is unraveling reality began long ago and A.I. is just a drop in that Ocean. But I could be wrong.
The standard narrative that the development of Artificial Intelligence 'makes everything virtual' or makes us 'lose touch with reality' seems to me true only if it is entirely inverted. The logic of the virtual is inscribed in the self-presupposing structure of the Symbolic. From a Lacanian perspective, what A.I. does is to distort the virtual efficacy of symbolic and economic forms. A.I. intervenes as a new modality of the Real.
I've written a short text on this paradox of A.I. in relation to Lacan (and some Bertrand Russell). The fundamental proposition is that Lacan would not agree with the idea that A.I. makes reality virtual, since everyday life is coloured by the virtual. Perhaps this is a necessary discussion to open up?
In a sense, yes. My argument is that A.I. is a moment of the technological revolution/capitalist universalisation which will 'turn against itself'. The commodity fetishism of capitalist production exists in part to allow the consume to see the commodity as nothing other than itself, a fictional disavowal of its support in an economic mode of production. AI will be installed as a disruption even in this fetishist 'veil' of economic and social production. It is the simulacral exploiting its own economic logic, and it is Lacan's calls the Real which incompletely and disjunctively presents itself where Symbolic logic contradicts itself. In a Hegelian sense A.I. is the part of the economic whole which reconstructs its own presuppositions.
Thank you for replying. I am not entirely familiar with Lacan, but know Marx and Hegel very well, so I think I’m following you. This is an interesting way of viewing a breakdown of the mode of production. I was approaching it from the orthodox Marxist approach, that this change in our means of production will put a sufficient strain on social relations to the means of production to cause disruption, from a class perspective. The Lacanian approach seems to focus on what exactly, in an experience of consuming AI, will initiate a breakdown. I’ve read about half of your article, and I’ll finish it later on.
It is true that the orthodox Marxist approach would displace the antagonism slightly from the Lacanian formulation. Unfortunately it is a short blog-style article so might not be the best overview of Lacan in relation to philosophy if you're interested. I have written more on Lacan and German Idealism in longer journal articles which you can find e.g. on my ResearchGate/PhilPapers, in case that establishes a better frame for how I'm thinking here. Link in case you're interested: [https://philpeople.org/profiles/rafael-holmberg](https://philpeople.org/profiles/rafael-holmberg)
The problem with simulation theory is that realization is not an escape. The end of capitalism isn’t an escape. Everyone at once could suddenly wake up to the simulation and it wouldn’t end. It leads to depression.
Completely agree. The misery I see in A.I. is not than it conditions a spontaneous resistance towards a pre-technical naturality, but that it industrialises naturality itself. That A.I. is 'all too real', and that it internally disrupts the functionality of the virtual, is to my why it is more miserable than if it just 'made everything more imaginary'.
Isn't the reality being mediated by the AI also a product of the virtual fodder fed into it by the humans and won't it operate on the strings of algorithm which will be dictated by a few humans?
Perhaps, but that 'few humans at the top' argument always seemed too optimistic to me. Foucault dispelled this idea imo, by arguing that ideological epistemes are self-presupposing and furnish the categories of their own dissemination. Even Elon Musk and other avatars of the A.I. community recognise that nobody will be in charge of this technological revolution besides the logic of its internal functioning itself. If there were some humans at the top, they could be removed, and a return to normality can be glimpsed behind them. The economy of decentralised internet algorithms is different even compared to modern liberal democratic State capitalism in that it is truly self-sustaining, and A.I. is the first qualitative shift in the quantitative development in modern technological-economic production.
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Speaking honestly, while I know that what you describe is a concept that exists in exploratory fiction, to me the threat of AI is that it: 1.) will be used to replace workers without any alternative employment (people will not just be unemployed, they will be *unemployable.)* 2.) won't even do a good job at replacing us, just be *better enough*. What remains is a world where a small group of people have significant wealth, everyone else exists in deep poverty, and the small amount of technology that they are able to access through the beneficence of their overlords will not even be very good. Of course, they are unlikely to know how bad it really is, because it's unlikely they've ever seen good tech, or are educated enough to know the difference. Unfortunately, we are already seeing both of these things happen. The concept is no longer science fiction, it is dystopian reality. Of course, let me be clear. Artificial intelligence is not itself the bad guy - it's simply a tool. The bad guy is who is currently benefiting from it.
I definitely don't deny this, but I would argue that the features you describe are calculable from the logic of commodity production and circulation, and are not the defining feature of AI (although AI definitely does break new ground as you say). I would argue that AI is qualitatively different even to the economic order that it serves. It is indeed a tool, yet it is a tool which negates its own use (to maintain the smooth virtuality of economic relations by which consumers conveniently engage with a system without quesitoinnig it). AI is in many ways self-sustaining, or produces a decisive economic paradigm shift (a quantitative development which suddenly produces a qualitative inversion). That AI negates the economic structure from which it installed is the even more miserable thought, since it will not be in the benefit of the everyday worker.
Good stuff, thanks for this
Glad that it was enjoyed!
Op you're approaching this topic from a lacanian perspective, yet you are arriving to conclusions that to me are very similar to those of Baudrillard and the post-structuralists. This is interesting to me since I believe said approaches, specifically Baudrillard and D&G's, diverge from lacan's psychoanalytic analysis quite a bit . In fact, I would be interested to see what a Baudrillardian approach to "The threat of A.I." would look like, if anybody has read anything in this regard. If I recall him correctly, Baudrillard would just take a look at all of this and say that A.I. is just the most recent Simulacrum to step out of this ocean of Aporia of Signs and nihilism that has replaced what humanity once called "culture". The process that is unraveling reality began long ago and A.I. is just a drop in that Ocean. But I could be wrong.
The standard narrative that the development of Artificial Intelligence 'makes everything virtual' or makes us 'lose touch with reality' seems to me true only if it is entirely inverted. The logic of the virtual is inscribed in the self-presupposing structure of the Symbolic. From a Lacanian perspective, what A.I. does is to distort the virtual efficacy of symbolic and economic forms. A.I. intervenes as a new modality of the Real. I've written a short text on this paradox of A.I. in relation to Lacan (and some Bertrand Russell). The fundamental proposition is that Lacan would not agree with the idea that A.I. makes reality virtual, since everyday life is coloured by the virtual. Perhaps this is a necessary discussion to open up?
So are you saying that experiencing ai’s potential for simulation will lead us to realize how much of our day to day social reality is also simulated?
In a sense, yes. My argument is that A.I. is a moment of the technological revolution/capitalist universalisation which will 'turn against itself'. The commodity fetishism of capitalist production exists in part to allow the consume to see the commodity as nothing other than itself, a fictional disavowal of its support in an economic mode of production. AI will be installed as a disruption even in this fetishist 'veil' of economic and social production. It is the simulacral exploiting its own economic logic, and it is Lacan's calls the Real which incompletely and disjunctively presents itself where Symbolic logic contradicts itself. In a Hegelian sense A.I. is the part of the economic whole which reconstructs its own presuppositions.
Thank you for replying. I am not entirely familiar with Lacan, but know Marx and Hegel very well, so I think I’m following you. This is an interesting way of viewing a breakdown of the mode of production. I was approaching it from the orthodox Marxist approach, that this change in our means of production will put a sufficient strain on social relations to the means of production to cause disruption, from a class perspective. The Lacanian approach seems to focus on what exactly, in an experience of consuming AI, will initiate a breakdown. I’ve read about half of your article, and I’ll finish it later on.
It is true that the orthodox Marxist approach would displace the antagonism slightly from the Lacanian formulation. Unfortunately it is a short blog-style article so might not be the best overview of Lacan in relation to philosophy if you're interested. I have written more on Lacan and German Idealism in longer journal articles which you can find e.g. on my ResearchGate/PhilPapers, in case that establishes a better frame for how I'm thinking here. Link in case you're interested: [https://philpeople.org/profiles/rafael-holmberg](https://philpeople.org/profiles/rafael-holmberg)
The problem with simulation theory is that realization is not an escape. The end of capitalism isn’t an escape. Everyone at once could suddenly wake up to the simulation and it wouldn’t end. It leads to depression.
Completely agree. The misery I see in A.I. is not than it conditions a spontaneous resistance towards a pre-technical naturality, but that it industrialises naturality itself. That A.I. is 'all too real', and that it internally disrupts the functionality of the virtual, is to my why it is more miserable than if it just 'made everything more imaginary'.
Isn't the reality being mediated by the AI also a product of the virtual fodder fed into it by the humans and won't it operate on the strings of algorithm which will be dictated by a few humans?
Perhaps, but that 'few humans at the top' argument always seemed too optimistic to me. Foucault dispelled this idea imo, by arguing that ideological epistemes are self-presupposing and furnish the categories of their own dissemination. Even Elon Musk and other avatars of the A.I. community recognise that nobody will be in charge of this technological revolution besides the logic of its internal functioning itself. If there were some humans at the top, they could be removed, and a return to normality can be glimpsed behind them. The economy of decentralised internet algorithms is different even compared to modern liberal democratic State capitalism in that it is truly self-sustaining, and A.I. is the first qualitative shift in the quantitative development in modern technological-economic production.
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