AI and/as Racialised Political Theology

Syed Mustafa Ali

doi:10.2298/FID2403645A

Authors

Syed Mustafa Ali The Open University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.2298/FID2403645A

Keywords:

artificial intelligence, political theology, racism, critical race theory, decolonial thought

Abstract

Building on earlier work engaging with the entanglement of artificial intelligence (AI) and apocalypticism and both with whiteness (Ali 2019), in the present essay I explore AI through the lens of a political theology informed by critical race theory and decolonial thought. The essay begins by setting out the meaning of a few key concepts, viz. AI, political theology, ‘The World’, and the apocalyptic, before going on to consider their relationship, and concludes by briefly sketching an oppositional stance that I suggest is appropriate to adopt in relation to AI where the latter is understood as a manifestation of racialised political theology.

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