ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND POSTHUMAN FUTURES IN JEANETTE WINTERSON'S "FRANKISSSTEIN

Abstract

The central thesis of this paper is that Jeanette Winterson's novel Frankissstein: A Love Story uses the character of Victor Stein — an AI researcher who seeks to free consciousness from the limitations of the human body — to examine the cultural and historical implications of artificial intelligence, including mind uploading and technological immortality. Winterson's rewriting of Mary Shelley's original places those discussions within the larger cultural context of the dangers of unregulated scientific ambitions. In addition, we will examine how she interrogates many of the underlying assumptions of transhumanist conceptions of human enhancement. We base our analysis on two theoretical models — N. K. Hayles' concept of embodiment, and F. Ferrando's philosophical model of posthumanism. Through the figure of Victor Stein, Winterson portrays a world where AI could potentially preserve aspects of human consciousness; however, as his struggles demonstrate, the tension between preserving or freeing one's mind from one's physical body are inherent to his approach. Similarly, through Ry Shelley's experiences with gender transition — both physically and in terms of her sense of self — Winterson highlights the material and social components of self-identity that cannot be simply reduced to information-based representations of the self. We argue that Winterson does not explicitly advocate either for or against technological advancements. Rather, by using AI as a means of interrogating what constitutes human existence in a posthuman society, Winterson suggests that the central question raised by artificial intelligence is not whether machines can become human, but whether human identity can survive technological transcendence.