And here is where the dialectic comes in. Yet there is a constant danger of dependence, exacerbated by the fact that AI can now do tasks such as driving, for example, previously imagined to be exclusive to humans. (Indeed, “robot” comes from the Czech word for “serf”, a tenant who pays rent on farmland through servitude or labor.) So in that respect, we humans are masters, and AI is our close-to-ideal slave. Like all tools, whether as computer algorithms alone or as algorithms embedded in robots, AI was invented by humans to make work easier, allowing us to save time, and make life more pleasant by freeing it from drudgery.ĪI accomplishes this not only by assisting in routinary tasks, but also in augmenting and enhancing human agency through precise medical imaging diagnostics, for instance. Despite the inequality, there is mutual, reciprocal need between them.ĪI represents the latest episode in the grand scheme of technological advancements. Although to affirm the self, one needs to deny the other, at the same time the other turns out to be necessary even just to forge the notion of self. Superior self-awareness could only come through recognition of and from the other self-reflection could only be achieved through the mediation of the other as mirror. As they go through different stages in their relationship, they come to realise how they inescapably depend on each other. The “Master-Slave Dialectic” is a conceptual construct, an idealised story of how two unequal individuals meet, experiencing a deep conflict or even life-threatening struggle in their joint quest for higher level self-consciousness. It could also serve as a lens through which to examine the trajectories of human-AI engagement.

It has been used to explain a wide range of processes from how the human species evolved from lower life-forms (“hominisation”) to the psychological development of children, from the transformation of societies through industrialisation to the history of nations as they progress into sovereign states.

The “Master-Slave Dialectic” in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit is perhaps among the most commented passages in his work.

Master an dcommander