Artificial Vice? Artificial Intelligence and Threats to the Self

Advances in artificial intelligence and the possibility of “mind reading” intersect with reflections on the self, first- and third-person perspectives. Computable brain models in AI raise questions of freedom and privacy, addressed in analyses of vulnerability and risks, e.g. accounts of an unfriendly superintelligence. This argument proposes that our internal vulnerability, paradoxically, can protect the self and the development of virtue against the threats posed by informational panopticons. The concept of the “bondage of the will” highlights a distinctively Christian anthropology of vulnerability, acknowledging both virtues and vices.