1. In the hands of those who believe everything is permissible and their ambition knows no bounds, artificial intelligence (AI), to which they are willing to dedicate the necessary resources to create the framework for dominating society, is becoming the great redemption that points to a genuine mutation of the human condition. Right now, some are already saying that AI can have feelings and sensitivity, that is, that it can challenge human uniqueness. Is it possible to believe that AI can replace the complex and arbitrary economy of human desire? A machine, however capable of capturing and combining information, will it be able to experience love and hate, desire and fury, fascination and horror, pleasure and sadism, as is characteristic of living beings, and particularly humans, through their complex perceptual system? And what would become of this world if we reached this point, with powers capable of imposing upon us, with supposed scientific legitimacy, the way we are here? This is nothing new: there have been tragic and botched attempts at these kinds of endeavors. Without going too far back, what were the totalitarian regimes of the 20th century, with their Nazi, fascist, and communist variants?
I don't doubt the usefulness of AI. But what lies behind this onslaught? A new framework of domination controlled by very few hands, threatening to erase the human condition with all its uniqueness and precariousness through new forms of determination. Democracy developed when the space for citizenship was expanded and citizens were given a voice. Now it seems as if that voice—and desire, and will—want to be transferred to AI to create a new system of domination.
2. Let's look at our surroundings, look at others, look at nature, and not let ourselves be trapped by the machine that replaces our perceptions. In this sense, I found it eloquent. The sense of natureA book by Paolo Pecere, professor of philosophy at the University of Rome. Pecere discusses three experiences of nature: the everyday—the sensory environment in which we live, the making and unmaking of our lives; the experience canonized by science—the set of formulas governed by laws independent of us and which include us; and myth—knowledge, metaphysics, the origin of all phenomena, the Sisyphean task of making sense of it all. Naturally, these three levels translate in practice into power relations, a defining element of the human condition: no two people are alike, and in any relationship there is a difference in potential. This is how the complexity of the world is constructed, the power structures that shape it. What is always at stake is the same: the limits of each individual's freedom within the stage of the Earth.
In the current context, Paolo Pecere points out some alarming signs: the evolution of "a magnificent science," ecology, "which has become sad" because the powers it bothers and inconveniences by limiting their misdeeds present it to us as a form of oppression; and Trump's United States, which "is pulling out, since its way of life is non-negotiable," and in its delusions of omnipotence is capable of denying the most obvious realities. This leads Pecere to say that "only reason can make us truly understand what is happening, but if we do not submit, everything is inert."
3. The human condition is built from the ground up, relationship by relationship, and every form of domination is the will to confine it within a predetermined framework. We are witnessing its shift toward technological power. It may seem that, unlike other forms of domination—religious or ideological—it possesses scientific legitimacy. But the human community is made up of the complexity of unique beings, with their own economy of desire and life. The notion that AI can truly grasp this complexity is a fallacy. Or, in any case, the end of an adventure. What is the human condition if AI takes its place and, in the hands of those who control it, ends up determining human behavior? The highest stage of totalitarianism. What are we without a touch of mystery, of whimsy, of desire, of singularity? AI can be an extraordinary instrument, but it can also be a system of boundless confinement and submission. And I believe we must continue to yearn to be free. The small, concrete, singular human freedom, still so exceptional.
