Editor’s Notes: Volume 6 (2023): The Promises and Perils of Artificial Intelligence

Editor’s Notes: Volume 6 (2023): The Promises and Perils of Artificial Intelligence

Science fiction authors have covered all ranges of opinions and possibilities regarding the development of artificially intelligent beings. Robots, supercomputers, cybermen, replicants, even overgrown space probes, these have been envisioned as mindless laborers, loyal sidekicks, menacing overlords, wise saviors, genocidal exterminators, sly impersonators, artificial friends, or as a new form of slave underclass. Still not many authors, to my knowledge, have envisioned as part of their dystopian visions the headaches of instructors attempting to determine if their students have used A.I. tools to cheat in their exams. Quite suddenly, the need for a reliable Turing test has become all too real.

But perhaps science fiction authors have had bigger fish to fry. It is difficult enough to determine whether the being in front of me is a human or something else—a replicant, perhaps; but if the latter is true (and the being is non-human), does this provide me with the moral sanction to “retire” it at will? As James Okapal keenly points out in “Disentangling Human Nature from Moral Status: Lessons for and from Philip K. Dick,” these are two different questions (the metaphysical and the moral) that frequently get entangled, both in PKD’s work and in connected discussions about the status of non-human beings. Carefully disentangling these meanings would be of great import, not just to PKD studies, but to metaphysical and moral discussions about non-human beings and their participation in the moral community.

Of course, the task itself of determining the metaphysical status of artificial beings built, programmed, or algorithmically self-taught to closely duplicate intelligent actions is on its way to becoming a real challenge in real life. Will the various available versions of “Turing tests” be of any use? While acknowledging various valid criticisms of the Turing test in its classical version, Marten Kaas argues in “Transcendence: Measuring Intelligence” that The Turing test continues to be valuable as a source of evidence to support the inductive inference that a machine possesses a certain kind of intelligence. But, warns Kaas, we must keep in mind Goodhart’s Law, and in devising such tests we must avoid confusing the test with the goal itself.

These articles correspond to our yearly theme, “The Promises and Perils of Artificial Intelligence.” Readers interested in this topic may want to look back at Volume 5 articles “Ex Machina: Testing Machines for Consciousness and Socio-Relational Machine Ethics,” by Harrison S. Jackson, and “The Morality of Artificial Friends in Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun,” by Jakob Stenseke, as well as Volume 4’s “’What is my purpose?’ Artificial Sentience Having an Existential Crisis in Rick and Morty,” by Alexander Maxwell.

General Articles in this volume show just how varied and rich philosophical speculation can be when inspired by works of science fiction. And few SF works have such a range, and a directness in philosophical speculation, as Olaf Stapledon’s Star Maker, a history of an entire universe, and of its creator looking for meaning. Stapledon, of enormous influence for such luminaries as Arthur Clarke, Stanislaw Lem and Brian Aldiss (who used quotations from Stapledon to introduce every section of his Galactic Empires anthologies) is a somewhat forgotten figure nowadays. It is thus a delight for us to publish Joshua Hall’s “Demiurge and Deity: The Cosmical Theology of Olaf Stapledon’s Star Maker,” a lucid and careful analysis of Stapledon’s philosophical and theological views as developed in this quite unique ages-spanning novel.

And speaking of ages-spanning novels, Junge Dou’s “The Desire for Immortality: The Posthuman Bodies in Ken Liu’s The Waves” explores a work of comparable range, as we contemplate the ages-long life journey of its protagonist through a variety of life-extending transformations, while struggling to maintain her memories and identity through shifting forms of embodiment. Incorporating also material from Liu’s Future Trilogy and Arc, the article reflects on the tensions between death and immortality, embodiment and disembodiment, and the importance of memory and social interaction in the formation of one’s identity.

These heady topics might make the reader wonder, where does science fiction end and philosophy begin? “Indeed” is the answer proposed by Andrew Fiala in “Science Fiction and the Boundaries of Philosophy: Exploring the Neutral Zone with Plato, Kant, and H.G. Wells,” an exploration of the blurriness of the boundaries between science fiction and philosophy. A bountiful reflection on the relation between these two, the article builds its argument by pulling examples of H.G. Wells doing philosophy, and Immanuel Kant doing something that could very well be called science fiction.

Thank you for reading! We hope you find the ideas in this volume intriguing, challenging and filled with wonder.

About the Author

Dr. Alfredo Mac Laughlin is Professor of Philosophy at St. Ambrose University’s Department of Philosophy. He teaches applied ethics, philosophy of knowledge, history of ancient and medieval philosophy, and a course dedicated to philosophy in science fiction. He is the producer of the SF and philosophy podcast Philosophy Universe.

---

Published: 2023-06-26