Materialist Reasonings, the Boundary Object of the Brain, and Artificial Intelligence

• In Event: (De)Stabilizing Ontologies: Continuity and Change

Abstract

The early 21st century has witnessed the formalization of three major movements that will radically change the face of education: artificial intelligence (AI), Big Data and neuroscience. The contemporaneity and confluence of such movements is significant. Curriculum studies scholarship is starting to think through the political implications of such movements’ interconnectedness, recognizing how connection changes the nature of an object and forces new conceptualizations of power. This paper offers a genealogical and sociological analysis of the trajectories that have enabled this contemporary alliance:

1) the belief in phenotype as bespeaking an interiority or hidden depth,
2) the role of the brain as boundary object for translation of power effects, and
3) the disarticulation of artificial intelligence from the mind-body-brain complex.

Author

• Bernadette Baker, University of Wisconsin - Madison