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Existence hacked: meaning, freedom, death, and intimacy in the age of AI

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Abstract

Everyday life is increasingly restructured by algorithms that participate, not only as medium, but also as partners, co-creators, mentors, and figures of authority, in our affective and creative experiences. Their agentic capacity is enabled by big data capitalism as well as through the newly acquired ability to generate meaning (text) and visuals (images, videos, holograms). AI technology engages with aspects of existence that constitute the core of what it means to be human. Promising transcendence of existential givens it induces an illusory sense of safety, as it brings us even closer to a confrontation with constitutive ontological complexities. For instance, AI technology commits to a transcendence of mortality, luring humans to envision the possibility of “digital resurrection” and of acquiring immortality via a merger with machines. Seduced by the seeming omnipotence manufactured for us in the digital world, which molds itself to our wishes, we end up questioning not only our agency and freedom but the very fact of being alive. In addition, in the current epidemic of loneliness, in which inter-human connections are thinning out and our reliance on chatbots for friendship, care, and romance increases, humanity is confronted with the state of fundamental isolation and the desire for intimacy and community. This article meditates on AI technology’s tendency to colonize aspects of life that are at the core of humanity, namely meaning, freedom, death, and intimacy, as well as on the societal risks associated with fundamentally altering our understanding of these matters.

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Notes

  1. Carl Gustav Jung (1958) brought attention to this aspect, insisting that the myths preserved and shared in tribal societies constitute the psychic life of the community, which community decays when it loses its mythological heritage.

  2. While there are many enthusiasts encouraging these developments, there are also deeply concerned voices. For instance, Professor Laurent Muzellec, Dean of Trinity Business School at Trinity College Dublin, laments the use of chatbots by “99.9%” of his students for their essays and coursework,” hence impeding the young generation’s intellectual development (The Telegraph May, 5 2024).

  3. For example, as previously was the case with Tupac Shakur, the legendary singer Elvis Presley will be summoned to a virtual existence, as part of a new immersive concert experience. The company Elvis Evolution uses AI to generate Elvis’ image projections, created from thousands of his personal photos and home-video footage. The show is set to open in London in November of 2024 before moving to Las Vegas, Berlin, and Tokyo (Rufo 2024).

  4. Martin Heidegger uses the term “thrownness” to refer to this state in which what one can know or do is limited by the fundamental structural aspects of the human existential condition (Yalom 1980, p. 358).

  5. Recognizing the gravity of the crisis, Japanese telecom giant NTT, and newspaper publisher, The Yomiuri Shimbun warned that generative AI poses risks of causing “enormous and irreversible damage” to society. Arguing that “If generative AI is allowed to go unchecked, trust in society as a whole may be damaged as people grow distrustful of one another and incentives are lost for guaranteeing authenticity and trustworthiness” (Daws 2024). Similarly, Naomi Klein raises alarm about the fact that the management of critical informational pathways has been outsourced to algorithms which are run by for-profit organizations. The spread of lies and conspiracies on these digital platforms is now so rampant that it threatens public health and the survival of representative democracy (Klein 2023, p. 92).

  6. In the US, the Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy has been especially vocal in generating awareness of the epidemic of loneliness, engulfing the North American population with severe implications. Research revealed that loneliness can be as lethal as smoking 15 cigarettes per day, significantly heightening the risk of heart disease, stroke, and premature death. Dr. Vivek Murthy stresses that the social media enabled connections are not appropriate replacements for meaningful interhuman bonds. He issued a call for urgent action, advocating for a renewed national commitment to building healthy communities and interhuman relations (Murthy 2023).

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  1. International Studies, University of North Carolina Wilmington, 601 S. College Road, Wilmington, NC, 28403-5629, USA

    Florentina C. Andreescu

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  1. Florentina C. Andreescu
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Correspondence to Florentina C. Andreescu.

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Andreescu, F.C. Existence hacked: meaning, freedom, death, and intimacy in the age of AI. AI & Soc (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-024-02052-5

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