Will AI Take Over The World?

Ai-Da will open her solo exhibition LEAPING INTO THE METAVERSE at the Venice Biennale this year curated by Aidan Meller. Philosophers amongst you will be familiar with the work of Rene Descartes – a mathematician, epistemologist, and rationalist – much of his work laid the ground for modern philosophy and in particular the strand that has grown out of Hobbes and Locke that informs a lot of the 17th century and the formation of states and societies thereafter. There is one eerie and unsettling aspect of his life that is gaining greater attention. Descartes had a relationship with a servant (Helen van der Strom), and their relationship produced a young daughter Francine, to whom Descartes was very attached. Tragically, Francine died of scarlet fever, aged five, and so distraught was Descartes that he had a robot or automata (clockwork, lifelike doll) built in her likeness.