For 300,000 years Homo Sapiens have dominated Earth not because we are stronger in our muscles or faster, but because we are smarter. Higher intelligence allowed us to invent fire, writing, democracy, and computers.
In the 21st century, for the first time in history, we are building AI machines that may soon become smarter than us.
Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence – A Journey into the Future is a deeply accessible yet rigorously philosophical exploration of what happens when intelligence ceases to be an exclusively human privilege. Written in vivid, almost literary prose, the book combines ancient Greek thought (e.g. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle) with contemporary philosophy of technology (e.g. Heidegger, Bostrom, Floridi) and cutting-edge debates on AGI, Superintelligence, brain-computer interfaces, autonomous weapons, post-humanism and their social and political impact into the future.
Far from apocalyptic prophecies or techno-optimistic manifestos, it offers original ontological and ethical analyses of the triple revolution (AI + Web + Biotech) that is already profoundly reshaping the present and future of society, science, warfare, creativity, politics, democracy. The central question is as simple as it is terrifying: can we control something smarter than ourselves?
Accessible to the general reader yet valuable for scholars and students, the book calls for urgent philosophical education and political preparedness – deriving from the field of Political Philosophy. Because the most decisive choices about our future shall not be made only by engineers in California or Shenzhen, but by all of us.
A timeless introduction to the Philosophy of AI, not just a book about current AI gadgets, but a sober philosophical foresight for the decades to come, at a moment humanity needs philosophical inquiry on technology the most.
“Best Non-Fiction Book of 2023” by the readers of the established Greek newspaper “Athens Voice”.
DIOPTRA, 2023, 424 P.
