Element contents
Shakespeare and Nonhuman Intelligence
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 April 2024
Summary
The Infinite Monkey Theorem is an idea frequently encountered in mass market science books, discourse on Intelligent Design, and debates on the merits of writing produced by chatbots. According to the Theorem, an infinite number of typing monkeys will eventually generate the works of Shakespeare. Shakespeare and Nonhuman Intelligence is a metaphysical analysis of the Bard's function in the Theorem in various contexts over the past century. Beginning with early-twentieth century astrophysics and ending with twenty-first century AI, it traces the emergence of Shakespeare as the embattled figure of writing in the age of machine learning, bioinformatics, and other alleged crimes against the human organism. In an argument that pays close attention to computer programs that instantiate the Theorem, including one by biologist Richard Dawkins, and to references in publications on Intelligent Design, it contends that Shakespeare performs as an interface between the human and our Others: animal, god, machine.
Information
- Type
- Element
- Information
- Online ISBN: 9781009202633Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication: 02 May 2024
References
Agamben, G. (2004). The Open: Man and Animal. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Alumbaugh, J. (2018). CRISPR Diversifies: Cut, Paste, and Now – Evolve, www.porkbusiness.com/news/hog-production/crispr-diversifies-cut-paste-and-now-evolve.Google Scholar
Anderson, J. (2011). A Million Monkeys and Shakespeare. Significance, 8(4), 190–2.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Astrobiologist Cautions Against Jumping the Gun in Spotting ET (2021), https://mindmatters.ai/2021/02/astrobiologist-cautions-against-jumping-the-gun-in-spotting-et/.Google Scholar
Babbage, C. (1837). The Ninth Bridgewater Treatise, https://victorianweb.org/science/science_texts/bridgewater/b5.htm.Google Scholar
Bender, E. M., Gebru, T., McMillon-Major, A., & Shmitchell, S. (2021). On the Dangers of Stochastic Parrots: Can Language Models Be Too Big?. FAccT ‘21: Proceedings of the 2021 ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency, 610–623.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennett, W. R. (1976). Scientific and Engineering Problem-Solving with the Computer. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Bennett, W. R. (1977). How Artificial Is Intelligence?. American Scientist, 65(6), 694–702.Google Scholar
Bohlin, R. (n.d.). The Language of DNA, www.exploregod.com/articles/the-language-of-dna.Google Scholar
Bridle, J. (2022). Ways of Being: Animals, Plants, Machines: The Search for Planetary Intelligence. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.Google Scholar
Bruckner, L. & Brayton, D. (2016). Introduction: Warbling Invaders. In Bruckner, L. and Brayton, D., eds., Ecocritical Shakespeare. London: Routledge, pp. 1–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Canfield, K. (2005). Searching for Signs of Shakespeare, www.pw.org/content/searching_signs_shakespeare.Google Scholar
Clausing, S. (1993). An Infinite Order Solution to the Eddington Problem or Getting Monkeys to Type Shakespeare. Computers and the Humanities, 27(4), 249–259.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coppedge, D. (2021). Design of Snowflakes Explained, https://crev.info/2021/01/design-snowflakes/.Google Scholar
Cover, T. M. & Thomas, J. A. (1991). Elements of Information Theory. New York: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar
Davis, P. & Kenyon, D. H. (1996). Of Pandas and People, 2nd ed., Dallas, TX: Haughton.Google Scholar
Dawkins, R. (1986/2015). The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe without Design. New York: W.W. Norton.Google Scholar
Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. (1987). A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Dembski, W. (2004). The Design Revolution: Answering the Toughest Questions about Intelligent Design. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.Google Scholar
Dembski, W. & Wells, J. (2008). The Design of Life: Discovering Signs of Intelligence in Biological Systems. Dallas, TX: The Foundation for Thought and Ethics.Google Scholar
Derrida, J. (1978). The Theater of Cruelty and the Closure of Representation. In Bass, Alan, trans., Writing and Difference. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, pp. 232–250.Google Scholar
Desmet, C, Loper, N. & Casey, J. (2017). Introduction. In Desmet, C., Loper, N., & Casey, J., eds., Shakespeare/Not Shakespeare. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–23.Google Scholar
Dijkstra, E. (1975/1982). How Do We Tell Truths That Might Hurt? https://dl.acm.org/doi/pdf/10.1145/947923.947924.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dowd, Maureen. (2023). A.I.: Actually Insipid Until It’s Actively Insidious, www.nytimes.com/2023/01/28/opinion/chatgpt-ai-technology.html.Google Scholar
Doyle, R. (1997). On Beyond Living: Rhetorical Transformations of the Life Sciences. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Eddington, A. (1928). The Nature of the Physical World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Eliot, L. (2023). Generative AI ChatGPT Versus Those Infinite Typing Monkeys, No Contest Says AI Ethics and AI Law, www.forbes.com/sites/lanceeliot/2023/03/05/generative-ai-chatgpt-versus-those-infinite-typing-monkeys-no-contest-says-ai-ethics-and-ai-law/?sh=455735301979.Google Scholar
Elmo, Gum, Heather, Holly, Mistletoe, & Rowan, . (2002). Notes towards the Complete Works of Shakespeare. London: Kahve-Society.Google Scholar
Estill, L. (2017). Shakespeare and Disciplinarity. In Fazel, V. & Geddes, L., eds., The Shakespeare User: Critical and Creative Appropriations in a Networked Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 167–186.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Farrington, W. (2023). GPT or Not GPT, That Is the Question: Bard Blunder Doesn’t Bode Well for Google’s ChatGPT Killer, www.proactiveinvestors.com/companies/news/1005678/gpt-or-not-gpt-that-is-the-question-bard-blunder-doesn-t-bode-well-for-google-s-chatgpt-killer-1005678.html.Google Scholar
Fazel, V. & Geddes, L. (2017). Introduction: The Shakespeare User. In Fazel, V. & Geddes, L., eds., The Shakespeare User: Critical and Creative Appropriations in a Networked Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Feerick, J. & Nardizzi, V. (2012). Introduction: Swervings: On Human Indistinction. In Feerick, J. & Nardizzi, V., eds., The Indistinct Human in Renaissance Literature. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flusser, V. (2011). Does Writing Have a Future? Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flusser, V. (2011). Into the Universe of Technical Images. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franchi, S. (2005). Chess, Games, and Flies. Essays in Philosophy, 6(1), 85–114. https://commons.pacificu.edu/work/sc/fa49ac42-5486-4cac-8751-2113e1479cdf.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galey, A. (2010). Networks of Deep Impression: Shakespeare and the History of Information. Shakespeare Quarterly, 61(3), 289–312.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galey, A. (2012). The Tablets of the Law: Reading Hamlet with Scriptural Technologies. In Galey, A. & DeCook, T., eds., Shakespeare, the Bible, and the Form of the Book: Contested Scriptures. New York: Routledge, pp. 77–95.Google Scholar
Galey, A. (2014). The Shakespearean Archive: Experiments in New Media from the Renaissance to Postmodernity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gere, C. (2012). Community Without Community in Digital Culture. London: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldman, S. (2023). ChatGPT Detection Tool Says Macbeth Was Generated by AI. What Happens Now? https://venturebeat.com/ai/chatgpt-detection-tool-thinks-macbeth-was-generated-by-ai-what-happens-now/.Google Scholar
Grusin, R. (2015). Introduction. In Grusin, R., ed., The Nonhuman Turn. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, pp. vii–xxix.Google Scholar
Hardison, R. (1985) Upon the Shoulders of Giants: The Making of the Industrial West. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.Google Scholar
Hattenbach, B. & Glucoft, J. (2015). Patents in an Era of Infinite Monkeys and Artificial Intelligence. Stanford Technology Law Review, 19(32), 32–51.Google Scholar
Hayles, N. K. (2014). Cognition Everywhere: The Rise of the Cognitive Nonconscious and the Costs of Consciousness. New Literary History, 45(2), 199–220.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Helsing, D. (2020). James Jeans and The Mysterious Universe. Physics Today, 73(11), 37–42. https://physicstoday.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/PT.3.4615.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Herrick, C. (2011). The A-Z of Programming Languages: Shakespeare, Computerworld, www.computerworld.com.au/article/391510/a-z_programming_languages_shakespeare/.Google Scholar
Hiatt, B. (2023). ChatGPT: Educators Hold Emergency Meetings as AI Disrupts Schools and Universities Across Australia, https://thewest.com.au/technology/chatgpt-educators-scramble-as-ai-disrupts-schools-and-universities-across-australia-c-9565061.Google Scholar
Holderness, G. (2005). Dressing Old Words New: Shakespeare, Science, and Appropriation. Borrowers and Lenders: The Journal of Shakespeare and Appropriation, 1(2), https://borrowers-ojs-azsu.tdl.org/borrowers/article/view/79.Google Scholar
Holloway, E. (2022). Dawkins’ Dubious Double Weasel and the Combinatorial Cataclysm, https://mindmatters.ai/2022/03/dawkins-dubious-double-weasel-and-the-combinatorial-cataclysm/.Google Scholar
Hughes, A. (2023). ChatGPT: Everything You Need to know About OpenAI’s GPT-4 Tool, www.sciencefocus.com/future-technology/gpt-3/.Google Scholar
Hunting, P. (2021). Make a Monkey Out of Darwin: How to Use the Unlimited Power of the Paradigm Shift, https://medium.com/@paulhuntingauthor/your-daily-bard-1-7547f94f68a5.Google Scholar
Jarrett, K. & Naji, J. (2016). What Would Media Studies Do? Social Media Shakespeare as a Technosocial Process. Borrowers and Lenders: The Journal of Shakespeare and Appropriation, 10(1), https://borrowers-ojs-azsu.tdl.org/borrowers/article/view/284/565.Google Scholar
Johnson, E. M. (2017). Opening Shakespeare from the Margins. In Fazel, V. & Geddes, L., eds., The Shakespeare User: Critical and Creative Appropriations in a Networked Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 187–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jucan, I. (2023). Malicious Deceivers: Thinking Machines and Performative Objects. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kay, L. (2000). Who Wrote the Book of Life?: A History of the Genetic Code. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keen, A. (2007). The Cult of the Amateur: How Today’s Internet is Killing Our Culture. New York: Doubleday.Google Scholar
Kenny, T. (1864). The Life and Genius of Shakespeare. London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green.Google Scholar
Kierkegaard, S. (1997). The Difference between a Genius and an Apostle. In Hong, H. & Hong, E., eds., Without Authority: Kierkegaard’s Writings, XVIII. Princeton: Princeton University Press, pp. 91–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lanier, D. (2014). Shakespearean Rhizomatics: Adaptation, Ethics, Value. In Huang, A. & Rivlin, E., eds., Shakespeare and the Ethics of Appropriation. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 21–40.Google Scholar
Leed, J. (1966). Computers for the Humanities? A Record of the Conference Sponsored by Yale University on a Grant from IBM, January, 22–23, 1965. Computers and the Humanities 1(1), 12–14.Google Scholar
Levine, G. (2006). Darwin Loves You: Natural Selection and the Re-enchantment of the World. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Lunden, I. (2017). Disrupt SF Hackathon 2017: To Chat or Not To Chat? Shakespeare Has the Answer to Your Question, techcrunch.com/2017/09/17/to-chat-or-not-to-chat-shakespeare-has-the-answer-to-your-question/?guccounter=1.Google Scholar
Manning, P. & Gershon, I. (2013). Animating Interaction. Hau: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, 3(3), 107–137.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manouach, I. & Engelhardt, A. (2022). Preface. In Manouach, I. & Engelhardt, A., eds., Chimeras: Inventory of Synthetic Cognition. Onassis Foundation, pp. 9–13.Google Scholar
Marche, S. (2021). The Algorithm That Could Take Us Inside Shakespeare’s Mind, www.nytimes.com/2021/11/24/books/review/shakespeare-cohere-natural-language-processing.html.Google Scholar
Matei, A. (2017). Want to Chat with Shakespeare? AI Bots Will Soon Allow Us to Talk to the Dead, https://qz.com/915795/death-technology-will-soon-introduce-augmented-eternity-ai-bots-into-the-classroom.Google Scholar
McCracken, H. (2014). Fifty Years of BASIC, the Programming Language That Made Computers Personal, https://time.com/69316/basic/.Google Scholar
Meyer, S. C. (2001). Evidence for Design in Physics and Biology: From the Origin of the Universe to the Origin of Life. In Behe, M., Dembski, W., & Meyer, S. C., Science and Evidence for Design in the Universe. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, pp. 53–111, www.discovery.org/m/2003/09/Stephen-C-Meyer-Evidence-for-Design-in-Physics-and-Biology.pdf.Google Scholar
Minsky, M. & Papert, S. (2017). Perceptrons: An Introduction to Computational Geometry. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Montfort, N., Baudoin, P., Bell, J. et al. (2014). 10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)): GOTO 10. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Murphy, A. (2003). Shakespeare in Print: A History and Chronology of Shakespeare Publishing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Natale, S. & Pasulka, D. W. (2020). Introduction. In Natale, S. & Pasulka, D. W., ed., Believing in Bits: Digital Media and the Supernatural. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 1–15.Google Scholar
Olson, E. (2023). Google Shares Drop $100 Billion after Its New AI Chatbot Makes a Mistake, www.npr.org/2023/02/09/1155650909/google-chatbot–error-bard-shares.Google Scholar
Ortlund, G. (n.d.). The Christian View of Science and Faith, www.exploregod.com/articles/the-christian-view-of-science-and-faith.Google Scholar
Pettman, D. (2011). Human Error: Species-Being and Media Machines. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Pichai, S. (2023). An Important Next Step on Our AI Journey, https://blog.google/technology/ai/bard-google-ai-search-updates/.Google Scholar
Radcliffe, S. (2016). Oxford Essential Quotations, 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Radditz, W. J. (1921). Shakespeare Wrote Shakespeare. Cleveland, Ohio: The Stratford Press Co.Google Scholar
Rensberger, B. (1979). Computer Says Monkeys Couldn’t Write ‘Hamlet’ At Least Not So Far, www.nytimes.com/1979/03/06/archives/computer-says-monkeys-couldnt-write-hamlet-at-least-not-so-far.html.Google Scholar
Sagan, C. (1977). The Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence. New York: Ballantine Books.Google Scholar
Sakar, S. (2007). Doubting Darwin?: Creationist Designs on Evolution. Malden, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Scharf, C. (2021). The Ascent of Information: How Data Rules the World. New York: Riverhead Books.Google Scholar
Schelling, F. (1927). Shakespeare and “Demi-Science.” In Schelling, F., ed., Shakespeare and “Demi-Science”: Papers on Elizabethan Topics. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 1–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scialom, M. (2023). Cambridge AI Social Probes ChatGPT and “The Illusion of Intelligence” It Offers, www.cambridgeindependent.co.uk/business/cambridge-ai-social-probes-chatgpt-and-the-illusion-of-inte-9303869/.Google Scholar
Scott, E. C. & Matzke, N. (2007). Biological Design in Science Classrooms. PNAS, 104(1), 1869–8676, www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10.1073/pnas.0701505104.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sejnowski, T. (2023). Large Language Models and the Reverse Turing Test. Neural Computation, 35(3), 309–342, https://direct.mit.edu/neco/article/35/3/309/114731/Large-Language-Models-and-the-Reverse-Turing-Test.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Shakespeare, W. (n.d.). Hamlet. B. Mowat, P. Werstine, M. Poston, & R. Niles, eds., Folger Shakespeare Library, www.folger.edu/explore/shakespeares-works/hamlet/read/#line-SD%201.5.116.1.Google Scholar
Shermer, M. (2004). To Be or Not to Be a Weasel: Hamlet, Intelligent Design, and How Evolution Works. Skeptic, 9(4), 16–20.Google Scholar
Silvio, T. (2010). Animation: The New Performance? Journal of Linguistic Anthropology, 20(2), 422–438.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
“Shakespeare” (1868). In The Southern Presbyterian Review Vol. XIX, Columbia, SC: The Office of the Review, pp. 19-28.Google Scholar
Stanley, M. (2005). Explorer of Stars and Souls: Arthur Stanley Eddington, https://physicsworld.com/a/explorer-of-stars-and-souls-arthur-stanley-eddington/.Google Scholar
Stansfield, W. (2004). Hamlet Revisited: How Evolution Really Works. Skeptic, 10(4), 16–18.Google Scholar
Sundar, S. (2023). If You Still Aren’t Sure What ChatGPT Is, This Is Your Guide to the Viral Chatbot that Everyone Is Talking About, www.businessinsider.com/everything-you-need-to-know-about-chat-gpt-2023-1.Google Scholar
Taylor, G. (1989). Reinventing Shakespeare: A Cultural History from the Restoration to the Present. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Trifonov, E. N. & Brendel, V. (1986). Gnomic: A Dictionary of Genetic Codes. Rehovot, Israel: Balaban Publishers.Google Scholar
Vincent, J. (2016). Twitter Taught Microsoft’s AI Chatbot to be a Racist Asshole in Less Than a Day, www.theverge.com/2016/3/24/11297050/tay-microsoft-chatbot-racist.Google Scholar
Weil, E. (2023). You Are Not a Parrot: And a Chatbot Is Not a Human. And a Linguist Named Emily M. Bender is Very Worried What Will Happen When We Forget This, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/ai-artificial-intelligence-chatbots-emily-m-bender.html.Google Scholar
Wiker, B. & Witt, J. (2006). A Meaningful World: How the Arts and Sciences Reveal the Genius of Nature. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.Google Scholar
Witt, J. (2007). The Origin of Intelligent Design: A Brief History of the Scientific Theory of Intelligent Design, www.discovery.org/a/3207/.Google Scholar
Worthen, W. B. (2020). Shakespeare, Technicity, Theatre. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yirka, B. (2011). Programmer Has Fun with Monkeys Typing Shakespeare Theory, https://phys.org/news/2011-09-programmer-fun-monkeys-shakespeare-theory.html.Google Scholar
Yu, L. (2023). ChatGPT: Just the Infinite Monkey Theorem with a Modern Twist? https://medium.com/@As_Yu_like_it/chatgpt-just-the-infinite-monkey-theorem-with-a-modern-twist-ab41bf485475.Google Scholar
Zylinska, J. (2020). AI Art: Machine Visions and Warped Dreams. London: Open Humanities Press.Google Scholar
Accessibility standard: Unknown
Why this information is here
This section outlines the accessibility features of this content - including support for screen readers, full keyboard navigation and high-contrast display options. This may not be relevant for you.Accessibility Information
Accessibility compliance for the HTML of this element is currently unknown
and may be updated in the future.