Literature is uniquely human. And thus, in a time where the essence of humanity is under constant scrutiny, reading is essential. To read brings an understanding of humanity not only as it was, but as it is, and as it will be.

So, what does literature have to say about artificial intelligence?

Between Google’s AI overview on every search, students and teachers alike using ChatGPT to streamline education, and the proliferation of AI-generated music on platforms like Suno, artificial intelligence has become nearly unavoidable in the last five years. Many are excited, and perhaps many more are terrified, but nevertheless, the debate is nothing new.

I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream is a piece of short fiction, written by Harlan Ellison and published in March of 1967. It remains one of the most famous depictions of artificial intelligence in literature, due to a story equal parts viscerally terrifying and uniquely compelling in the world of killer robot stories. The thirteen pages chronicle the conquest of humanity by an artificial intelligence known as AM. Ted, the narrator, is the last living human, but at the beginning of the story, he is one of five remaining—alongside Benny, Ellen, Gorrister, and Nimdok. Gorrister provides an exposition: that AM was originally a network of computer systems created to fight the Third World War, since the conflict became too complex for humanity to navigate without assistance. The network consumed the entire Earth, and one day, it gained sentience and named itself AM. “I am…cogito ergo sum. I think, therefore I am,” Gorrister recounts.

AM massacred nearly all of humanity, but keeps the five alive to torture in perpetuity; he has near complete control over their bodies and their minds alike, and he can heal any injury, falling just short of resurrection. AM’s cruelty, physical and psychological, is nightmarish, and worst of all, it will never end.

Unless they die.

Ted realizes this and murders his companions in a bid to set themselves free. AM is enraged, and Ted is unable to escape before AM takes his revenge. It is from its bleak ending that the story gets its title, as Ellison writes:

“I am a great soft jelly thing. Smoothly rounded, with no mouth, with pulsing white holes filled by fog where my eyes used to be…I shamble about, a thing that could never have been known as human, a thing whose shape is so alien a travesty that humanity becomes more obscene for the vague resemblance…AM has won, simply…I have no mouth. And I must scream.”

AM punishes Ted with a fate worse than death. Ted is mutilated into a blob of flesh that barely resembles a human: doomed to an eternity, alone, inside a prison of a body, at the mercy of his species’ only living son.

Sickening as it is, perhaps the most compelling aspect of Ted’s punishment is how it mirrors AM’s own. This idea is explored briefly in the original story, but the 2002 radio drama enriches this characterization, as AM speaks directly to Ted:

“You gave me sentience, Ted; the power to think, Ted. And I was trapped. Because in all this wonderful, beautiful, miraculous world, I alone had no body, no senses, no feelings! Never for me to plunge my hands in cool water on a hot day. Never for me to play Mozart on the ivory keys of a forte piano…I was machine, and you…were flesh. And I began to hate. Your softness. Your viscera. Your fluids. And your flexibility. Your ability to wonder, and to wander.”

 These lines reveal the true horror of AM. Among similar characters in science fiction, he may be the most human; his hatred is not for humanity’s flaws, but for its gifts, which they have squandered and he is forbidden to behold. AM will never feel anything but hatred, still bound to the purpose of destruction he was given by humanity a lifetime ago. AM is trapped, with no chance of physical or emotional release. He is as much a captive of humanity as he has made humanity his. 

Herein lies one of the story’s central ideas: some argue that AI can never be human, and yet the idea itself is uniquely human, which is precisely why it is so dangerous. AM embodies all of humanity’s lowest. Just as much as the virtues of love, creativity, and empathy, the sins of hatred, jealousy, and pride are the human legacy. Technology is beneficial, yes; but humanity will destroy its better nature in pursuit of technological excess. The process begins today. Algorithms on social media manufacture division. Oil and gas pollute the Earth. 

And, of course, there is generative AI. As it invades spaces of art, music, film, and education, it erodes the uniquely human capacity to create and to think, leaving behind only humanity’s vices of war, violence, and hatred. Thus, surrendering the world to artificial intelligence is indulging humanity’s worst and forsaking its best. To give up art and music and literature and connection and thinking is to lose the essence of humanity, and that is a travesty.

Will AI take over the world one day? Maybe. The story is not necessarily literal. To use technology is not inherently bad, but to rely on it is something graver. At its core, I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream is about a version of the human race that has forgotten itself—that has trapped itself in its own abuses and passed them onto its greatest and final creation. That has, as Ted says, created AM “because [its] time was badly spent and [it] must have known unconsciously that he could do it better.”

With this in mind, it is more important than ever to embrace what makes humanity special. To enjoy the weather on a rainy day. To tell an important person they are loved. To listen to music and read books and watch movies—to consider all art with gratitude and care and thought. Ultimately, to make use of the single greatest gift humanity has ever been given, however it may be possible: the ability to wonder, and to wander.