Digital Normativity: A challenge for human subjectivization and free will

TL;DR

This paper discusses how the rise of AI-driven digital normativity challenges human autonomy and free will, emphasizing the need for ethical reflection and education to maintain human subjectivity amid technological progress.

Contribution

It analyzes the normative influence of AI on human decision-making and advocates for ethical considerations and educational integration to preserve human subjectivity.

Findings

AI's normative role may threaten human autonomy

Ethical reflection is essential in AI development

Educational programs should address AI implications

Abstract

Over the past decade, artificial intelligence has demonstrated its efficiency in many different applications and a huge number of algorithms have become central and ubiquitous in our life. Their growing interest is essentially based on their capability to synthesize and process large amounts of data, and to help humans making decisions in a world of increasing complexity. Yet, the effectiveness of algorithms in bringing more and more relevant recommendations to humans may start to compete with human-alone decisions based on values other than pure efficacy. Here, we examine this tension in light of the emergence of several forms of digital normativity, and analyze how this normative role of AI may influence the ability of humans to remain subject of their life. The advent of AI technology imposes a need to achieve a balance between concrete material progress and progress of the mind to avoid any form of servitude. It has become essential that an ethical reflection accompany the current developments of intelligent algorithms beyond the sole question of their social acceptability. Such reflection should be anchored where AI technologies are being developed as well as in educational programs where their implications can be explained.