Augmented Cognition: Life as we don't know it

Abstract

This paper proposes a framework for comprehending the integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) as Augmented Cognition (AugCog). AugCog is viewed as an emergent bio-cultural process, reflecting AI's design, implementation, and usage. Section 1 establishes smart societies as a complex system. Section 2 defends that the development of AI is analogous to the biological process of niche construction. Section 3 defines AI as a socioculturally embodied expansion by which AI is shaped by and shapes human experience, resulting in various forms of AugCog. Section 4 highlights AugCog in mixed realities such as social media, neurotechnology, and smart environments, illustrating its emergence from multiscale and interdependent sociocultural perspectives. AugCog's perspective situates the human species in the state space of evolution, signifying our existence as a species and as embodied individuals.