Posthumanistic Considerations for the Human-Centric Approach to European Regulation of Artificial Intelligence

Abstract

The article critiques the European Union's human-centric approach to regulating artificial intelligence, particularly in the context of the AI Act and the preparatory works of the High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence. It argues that while the human-centric approach intends to place human values at the core of AI regulation, it reproduces an anachronistic liberal humanist anthropocentrism, grounded in the human/machine dichotomy, that structurally forecloses the regulatory goals the Act itself proclaims. Deploying critical posthumanist methodology as a deconstructive project, the article reveals the conceptual limitations of this framework and proposes an ontocentric posthuman jurisprudence, drawing on Floridi's information ethics and Braidotti's critical posthumanities, as a more adequate regulatory foundation. Crucially, this shift does not require abandoning human values; rather, transcending the human/machine dichotomy is a precondition for protecting them more fully. Such a framework would extend regulatory protection to non-human actors and the environment, while remaining genuinely oriented towards the human, and being more fit for the stated goals of the regulation.