Paper short abstract:

Based on work of Solomon and Baio (2020) and Oxman (2022), I want to propose a symbiotic material intelligence approach to artificial intelligence beyond the cyborg on how we can move forward with embodiment and non-human intelligences as design materials for future AI projects and systems.

Paper long abstract:

While early enlightenment ideals of “nature” as shown in Decartes’ dualism splits intelligence from the material body, work such as de La Mettrie’s L’homme Machine insisted on the unitary nature of life as algorithm arising from material-based processes of life. Although MIT researchers have researched creating robots and other automatons based on digital senses since the early 1990s, it is only recently that some artists such as shown in the work of Solomon and Baio (2020) and Oxman (2022) have shown how algorithm and nature can coincide in new possibilities. In this paper, I will survey earlier approaches from the MIT Media Lab and other earlier projects to look at assumptions made based on human understanding of insect intelligence and examine current works in art and AI to see what non-human growth and existence works with human-designed algorithmic intelligence. In doing so, I want to propose a symbiotic material intelligence approach to artificial intelligence beyond the cyborg on how we can move forward with embodiment and non-human intelligences as design materials for future AI projects and systems.