“AI” is a notoriously broad catch-all for a wide range of different technologies, theories, and products. A common denominator shared by all however is the claim they stake to augmenting human cognition. Responsibly used, or so we are told/sold, “AI” is thus like a cognitive exoskeleton, which will amplify our brainwaves and allow us to perform literally superhuman feats. Ignoring the probability of catastrophe which empirically accompanies any attempt to go above and beyond the human (see Icarus; see also hubris) the danger I would like to signal is that of the porous boundary between enhancement and prosthesis.
A prosthesis is an artificial replacement, often for a missing or damaged internal or external body part. In this sense it is like an extreme form of enhancement: a tool allowing someone to do something much more effectively, or beyond the limits of present, unaided ability. But a prothesis is also a replacement in the sense of replacing or relocating the invalid into a context of acceptability: a prosthesis simultaneously replaces the functionality lost by the missing or damaged part, and also replaces the incomplete/damaged body within a symbolic landscape of socially accepted appearances and functionalities. For example: a prosthetic leg replaces the invalid’s missing leg, but it also re-places the invalid back into the world of people who walk “normally” i.e. according to the tacit norms that structure our social reality. In other words, a prosthesis enhances the invalid’s capacity to do something socially desirable, e.g. to walk normally or to look normal. There is therefore what we may call a cosmetic dimension to prostheses, and which they share with enhancements: the wish to appeal to a gaze outside the self. With that in mind, it becomes necessary to interrogate both the nature of this “appeal” and the validity of the social norms that prompt the need to elicit it, that prompt the need for a given prosthetic. We must ask: for whose gaze am I doing this? In whose eyes do I wish to appear “normal”, i.e. in conformity with norms? (And bear in mind that being “normal” in this sense does not mean mediocre, average - consider the phrase “beauty norms”, which statistically few of us embody, and no-one at all for very long.) We might say therefore that enhancements are always also prostheses: not for a missing physical part, but for a missing or damaged sense of self-worth. A prosthesis is never just about the “missing” physical or quantifiable part - it is always also about something else, a felt lack situated elsewhere. On top of their material functionality, prostheses are always also an acknowledgement of the social construction of both worth and self.
To return to “AI”, what then do we feel we are lacking or missing that makes us desire the cognitive enhancement these tools promise? Over the last hundred years, consumer-capitalism has literally negged us to death about everything from our home appliances and automobiles to our clothing and physique, even penetrating our psyche to the extent of commodifying our expression of social bonds and sexuality. Telling us we are stupid telling us we are somehow unacceptable as we are while simultaneously holding up a product that promises to conceal the fact is a market trader’s trick as old as time. What is at stake today however is no longer just a lifelong relationship of self-loathing towards our skin, our bellies, our phones or fridges or faces but to the very nexus of thought and feeling that animates us. Who could have invented such a product? What must have happened to someone to make them create a replacement for missing sense of mental worth? Who told them they were stupid once, and why did it stick so hard, so much so that their only way to cope was to conclude that the whole world should feel as debilitated as they do. Questions that “AI” cannot answer.
