Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, and Animal Slaughter: The Embodiment of Necropolitical Dystopia

Abstract Artificial intelligence and robotics have revolutionized slaughterhouse operations, allowing collaborative robots to reduce the physical and moral stress on butchers. However, animals remain an “absent referent” in the process, and the development of artificial intelligence in this field continues the trend of moral distancing present in killing. This dystopian scenario, in which machines endlessly breed and kill animals, and in which the avoidance of moral responsibility is aided by artificial intelligence so that effectively no one has to bear the burden of blame for their deaths, is a manifestation of the triumph of necropower.