THE PROBLEMATIC OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) IN COGNITIVE CAPITALISM: TOWARD POSTHUMANIST CONTOURS OF THE NEW COGNITARIAT

Abstract

This paper examines the problematic of artificial intelligence (AI) through the lens of contemporary critical theory, offering a dual analytical perspective. On the one hand, AI is explored as a symptom of cognitive capitalism, which operates through its key mechanisms, such as modulation, control, and the generation of informational surplus value. On the other hand, the paper raises the issue of exploiting hybrid human-machine labor, emphasizing the need to transcend anthropocentric models and reconceptualize solidarity in a posthumanist framework. In the first section, AI is analyzed as a form of Marx’s general intellect, understood as the collective intellectual and technical capacities of society. It argues that in the context of cognitive capitalism, AI systems play a central role in modulation and adaptive control, acting as pivotal agents in the production of machinic knowledge and the valorization of information. The second section introduces the concept of the cognitariat as a new class existing within the conditions of hybrid technogenesis, defined by the parallel co-evolution of humans and machines. The paper traces changes in the dynamics of cognitive labor through the concepts of performativity and transindividuality, as it evolves in the age of AI into a hybrid form that integrates transhumanist, posthumanist, and neomaterialist dimensions. Ultimately, the paper underscores the necessity of radically rethinking cognition in material terms to address its reification and exploitation. As a conceptual alternative to the individualistic and hyperrational epistemes of capitalism, the idea of entanglement is proposed as a mis-en-scene for solidarity and collective agency within the hybrid cognitive ecology of humans and machines.