A sociology without humans: Artificial intelligence as a threat to humanity, and sociology’s response

Abstract

The growing deployment of ‘artificial intelligence’ (AI) systems across society, and massive investments currently being made to develop systems capable of greater and greater agency, necessitates sociological reflection. Specifically, what do current shifts in automation mean for how we theorize social relations, and how should sociologists position themselves normatively? While the development of agential machines might be seen to validate ‘posthuman’ critiques and ontologies, such as those seen in actor-network theory and ‘new materialist’ thought, they have also necessitated a humanist response. This is because the sociotechnical transformations of AI are accompanied by discourses that devalue what it means to be human, and have consequences that increasingly marginalize human agency, corrupt human knowledge, threaten human interests, and are experienced as dehumanizing. Reflecting on posthumanist and humanist strains in social theory, this article considers aspects of both that can be valuable in coming to terms with the social shifts of automation and new interactive technologies, but ultimately argues for a humanist stance to counteract AI’s anti-human tendencies.