인공지능(AI) 시대의 인간 정체성 탐구 및 고전서사의 역할 -<이생규장전>과 <옹고집전>을 중심으로-

Abstract

This paper tried to examine the possibility of the role that Korean classic narrative works can play in the study of post-humanism, which has the essence of exploring the relationship between artificial intelligence (machine) and humans. Through Agamben’s concept of ‘use of the bodies’, I explore the aspect and meaning of establishing a relationship between human beings and non-human beings represented by artificial human robots and avatars in the coming age of artificial intelligence. In addition, I tried to help understanding by taking YiSaengGyuJang-Jeon(李生窺墻傳) and OngGoJip-Jeon as examples. The ancient Greek philosophers saw the ‘use of the bodies’ as ‘the use of the body of a slave’. In this way, non-human beings with bodies are historically no different from ‘slaves’ with instrumentalities that are ‘used and thrown away’. ‘Workers’ in modern industrial settings, machines in modern science, and artificial intelligence robots or avatars in the age of artificial intelligence are tools or technologies that have intimacy with the human body. Non-human beings in the form of machines or human beings have strong assisting properties (tools) as human assistants, but therefore their ‘potential’ is also strong. The ‘potentiality’ of non-human beings is important in that it ultimately leads to the ‘humanity’ issue of how close a machine (non-human beings) can be to a human and how to view the relationship between the two. The narrative setting in which the deceased Choi-Rang(崔娘) uses a fake body to maintain a relationship with the human YiSaeng(李生) in YiSaengGyuJang-Jeon is useful for understanding the relationship between avatars and humans in the virtual reality(=Meta-verse) space. Useful for these classic narrative works are meaningful in that they are the result of aestheticizing and assuming the potential that it is possible apart from the reality of the assumption that non-human beings feel emotions, and putting situations that will occur when that potential situation becomes a reality in a thought experiment. In addition, the narrative that distinguishes the real from the fake like OngGoJip-Jeon is a valuable clue to understanding ontology and human identity in the relationship between real humans and non-humans. When a human being becomes the object of ‘use’, it’s like acknowledging that humanity is another name for ‘the possibility that I can eventually be someone else’. It is necessary to dismantle the various hierarchies produced by the dual divisions of humans and non-humans, mind and body, etc., keeping in mind the other value of ‘use’ of bodies, namely ‘potentiality’. It is important to find a way to coexist not only with others who have been neglected until now, but also with various hybrid beings that will appear in the near future. When we read the classic narrative anew from the point of view of the ‘use’ of bodies, we can be provided with another perspective to explore the existence of human beings in the future society.