Post-anthropocentric Retrospection Of The Human-artificial Intelligence Relationship In "The Terminator" Series Films

Continuous development of science and technology results in a new world in which numerous artificial intelligence subjects originated from fictions are embodied.The new creature is a realistic research object for cultural studies.The relationship between human beings and these new non-human species in the future world is crucial for human existence and development.This essay,through a retrospective and comparative research on disparate modes of A.I.in the science fiction franchise films“The Terminator”,tries to explore a more appropriate coexisting paradigm for human beings and A.I.The arising of A.I.,biotechnology,nanotechnology,etc.has shaken the humanist definition of “Man” and blurred the boundary between human and non-human subject,and directly given birth to post-anthropocentrism in cultural criticism.As a posthumanist philosophical trend of thought,post-anthropocentrism has become an important “post-” study.It advocates the de-centralization of human beings,proposes the view of harmonious coexistence,and constructs the posthuman society of polyphyletic species commensalism.“The Terminator” series reflect the coexisting contradiction between the human and A.I.subject.It is accordant with the post-anthropocentric attempt endeavoring to construct multi-subject equal coexistence in posthumanism.The relation between human beings and A.I.is actually post-anthropocentric studies of subjectivity.Different A.I.characters’ body and consciousness illustrated from “The Terminator” series reflects on what kind of coexistence mode of human and A.I.is truly in line with post-anthropocentric values.Weak A.I.represented by T-800 is an instrumentalized other without subjectivity.Super A.I.represented by“Skynet” is a subversive entity generated with the loss of human value.Neither has achieved the human-A.I.relationship that post-anthropocentrism aspired to.Only the Strong A.I.represented by T-850,which has broken through the identity of instruments and input the value system of human society,can establish the post-anthropocentric nature-culture continuum on an equal footing with human subjects.Based on “The Terminator” A.I.series science films,from aspects of posthumanist body and consciousness of post-anthropocentric theory,this paper reflects on that the relationship between human and A.I.should break through anthropocentric instrumental rationality and constrain their learning ability with human social ethics to construct the post-anthropocentric nature-culture continuum in which human subjects equally and harmoniously coexists with A.I.subjects.