The Existential Substitution Trap: Artificial Intelligence, Human Agency, and the Technological Reconfiguration of the Human

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This working paper advances a philosophical and empirical inquiry into how artificial intelligence progressively transforms human agency. Moving beyond catastrophic extinction scenarios, the paper develops the concept of existential obsolescence a condition where human agency, judgment, and normative responsibility are structurally displaced across sociotechnical systems despite biological persistence. By distinguishing four levels of substitution (functional, epistemic, normative, and existential), the essay articulates the Agency–Accountability Gap and details mechanisms such as teleological inversion, epistemic asymmetry, and competence erosion. Confronting posthumanist objections and analyzing the political economy of automation, it proposes institutional safeguards specifically the non-delegable core while addressing their political fragility under market pressures. Ultimately, the paper reframes the core ethics of AI: not whether machines will surpass human capabilities, but whether human value can endure the loss of human uniqueness