The Haft and the Eye: Being, Representation, and the AI Epoch
Figshare July 18, 2026 DOI: 10.6084/m9.figshare.33027701 (opens in new tab) via OpenAlex
Summary
AI-generated from the abstractConsciousness requires a fragmentation of primordial unity, making the perspectival 'I' both necessary for self-knowledge and a wound of separation. Drawing on William Golding's novel The Inheritors and the works of Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Nāgārjuna, Hofstadter, and Kastrup, the paper traces an arc from pre-Socratic immediacy to artificial intelligence, arguing that AI completes the Western representational project. Where Homo sapiens displaced Neanderthals by combining embodied practice with abstract representation, AI perfects the abstract tool while lacking embodiment. This may force a return to practice as primary, producing a third condition: practice permanently inflected by having passed through full representational consciousness.
Study at a glance
| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Keywords | Narrative Embodied cognition Consciousness Representation politics Proposition |
| Key finding | Argues that AI represents the completion of the Western representational project and may force a return to practice as primary, inflected by representational consciousness. |
Abstract
How does Being know itself, and what is lost in that knowing? Using William Golding’s TheInheritors as narrative foundation, this paper draws on Heidegger, Wittgenstein, N■g■rjuna,Hofstadter, and Kastrup to show that consciousness requires fragmentation of primordial unity:the perspectival “I” is both necessary for self-knowledge and the wound of separation. Tracingan epochal arc from pre-Socratic immediacy to artificial intelligence, it argues that AIrepresents the completion, not merely the intensification, of the Western representationalproject. Where Homo sapiens displaced Neanderthals by combining embodied practice withabstract representation (blade and haft), AI inverts this structure: it perfects the haft whilepossessing no hand. This forced displacement may accomplish what philosophy argued butculture refused — a return to practice as primary, and the emergence of a third condition:practice permanently inflected by having passed through full representational consciousness. Acompanion paper develops the linguistic-structural and empirical grounding for this argumentthrough Halliday’s stratification model and gerontolinguistic evidence; the present papermakes the philosophical and epochal case.