Bio-Centered Artificial Intelligence: Towards a Progressive AI-biosphere Relation Through the Concepts of Poiesis and Mimesis

The current societal debate surrounding AI appears committed to the idea that AI should be ‘human-centered.’ This commitment reflects an anthropocentric framing that overlooks the moral needs of nonhuman entities and expresses the position of moral exceptionalism. In response, we call for bio-centered AI and ask how the biosphere can be placed at the center of our thinking about AI development and implementation. We deploy the concepts of poiesis and mimesis to investigate the AI-biosphere relation. Viewing AI as poietic reveals how it both depends on the extraction of materials from the biosphere in development, and adapts the biosphere to human needs and wants in implementation. Building on this we argue that AI currently rests upon and reinforces a reductive anthropocentric and exploitative understanding of the biosphere. Viewing AI as mimesis reveals how AI technologies are bio-mimetic in taking inspiration from natural forms, and offers a progressive understanding of the AI-biosphere relation by providing impetus for articulating an explorative bio-mimetic concept of AI that can ground the articulation of bio-centered AI.