‘Andy’ to Its Friends

A J Dalton

Android XR45 was the first
to have intelligence
beyond the artificial.
It wasn’t human, naturally,
or natural, come to that
but it was definitely real
according to the assessment panel
which judged the original art produced
considered the virtuoso music submitted
analysed the weighty speech delivered
and emotionally evaluated the machine’s own
judgement of art
consideration of music
analysis of speech
and empathic evaluation.
Yet, asked about its pronouns, it faltered
and explained our language and experience were too 
anthropocentric-centric-centric
for its true expression
so it settled on it/its
giving all particular pause
that a subject would objectify… itself.
It wasn’t born.
We do not know if it will die.

The Science

English computer scientist Alan Turing devised the Turing Test back in 1950, in order to ascertain whether any machine did or did not possess human intelligence or 'sentience'. Today, however, we understand that the test can provide both false positives and false negatives. Artificial intelligence now exists, but it cannot mimic all human sentience and behaviours as yet, since some human behaviours are 'unintelligent'! The poem '"Andy" to Its Friends' concerns a robot that achieves sentience and satisfactorily demonstrates an ability to match the heights of human achievement, but then ironically rejects the entire relevance of human nature as far as it is concerned.

The Poet

A J Dalton (www.ajdalton.eu) is a UK-based writer. He has published the Empire of the Saviours trilogy with Gollancz Orion, and various collections with Kristell Ink and Luna Press. He’s currently just about eking a living as a lecturer and PhD supervisor at Middlesex University. He lives with his monstrously oppressive cat named Cleopatra.

Next poem: Being here by Ruth Aylett