Bernard Shaw and the Ethical Use of Artificial Intelligence: Back to Methuselah and Rejecting Human-as-Machine Per Se
摘要
This book reconstructs Bernard Shaw’s ideological context using artificial intelligence (AI), in particular Large Language Models (LLMs), to show how Shaw interacted with different schools of thought in order to work out his own unique ideology of the Superman, the Life Force, Creative Evolution, power, love, and governance. This reconstruction is significant because Shaw was in tandem with the rise of AI. His response to various types of ideologies also encapsulates the twenty-first-century admiration for and anxiety regarding AI. The reconstructions by LLMs in this book show that AI functions very much like Shaw’s conception of Creative Evolution, with the blind Life Force requiring human intellect to guide it, else it will self-destruct. This chapter will begin the reconstruction of Shaw’s ideological landscape by examining Shaw’s engagement with the human-as-machine controversy in Europe, which is also the root of the controversy surrounding AI. Many of Shaw’s ideas were formulated in response to this human-as-machine controversy. The LLMs’ analysis found that in Back to Methuselah, Shaw was providing a dramatic response to that controversy, showing the potential risks involved if humans cannot control the mechanical life-like toys they create. These are also our present concerns with the ethical use of AI.