The Imaginary of Artificial Intelligence

Im@go. A Journal of the Social Imaginary
Call for papers n.23 (June 2024)
The Imaginary of Artificial Intelligence
Editor: Maria Giovanna Musso
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Artificial Intelligence, in addition to being the intangible infrastructure that has been supporting, regulating, orienting and sometimes replacing human choices in various spheres for years now, has quickly become a mass phenomenon that involves public debate and concerns every area of social life (from industry to education, art, medicine, sport, war, politics, etc.). Even more than other disruptive technologies that preceded it (such as writing, electricity, the computer), AI is a powerful accelerator of social change in pervasive and radical terms. Thanks to the universal and rapid diffusion of its applications and effects, the circulation and ‘naturalisation’ of the imaginary contents that inspire it – and from which it releases its power – AI contributes, in fact, to establishing a new relationship between the human and the Other, to reconfiguring the relationship between nature and artifice, between phenomenon and representation, between simulacrum and ‘reality’, while reshaping the traditional notions of intelligence, creativity, truth, agency, life, etc. The 23rd issue of Im@go is dedicated to the premises and consequences of the use of AI on the level of imaginary and the role it plays in this epochal transition, a role which, as we know, harbours extraordinary promises of transformation and human empowerment, but also substantial risks, many of which are not entirely foreseeable and some of which have already been foreshadowed by some scientists and experts in the field. As it is impossible to explore all the implications of the subject, this monographic issue of Im@go will host analyses concerning the transformations IA engenders in every dimension of social life (economic, labour, scientific, artistic, legal, ethical, etc considered from the theoretical-epistemological perspective that privileges the role of the imaginary in the institution of social reality (Castoriadis), including technical production. This Call is based on the theoretical assumption that the relationship between technique and the imaginary, far from being accidental or incidental, is to be considered crucial, given the co-essentiality and the mutual feeding of the terms involved. Technique and the imaginary are, in fact, involved in a generative and co-evolutionary dynamic that operates in a double direction. On the one hand, it goes from myth and beliefs (including religious ones) to the invention-creation of artefacts (scientific, technological, artistic, etc.); and, in the opposite direction, it goes from scientific and technological artefacts to the production of new imaginaries, so establishing the conditions that make possible the creation of mental and epistemological frameworks better suited to accommodate the new brainframe.

Deadline: Abstracts submission: by 15 March 2024
Notification of acceptance of abstracts: by 20 March 2024
Submission of articles in final form: by 15 May 2024
Final revision (based on the outcome of the peer-review): by 15 June 2024
Publication of the issue: July 2024