Abstract

This study analyses the linguistic interaction of human beings with Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) technologies in terms of Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics. It can thus be concluded that: i) a distinction must be drawn between imitating a function and possessing a property when dealing with the ontology of GAI; ii) GAI technologies are capable of imitating certain human-like mental functions without necessarily possessing the human-like properties that underpin these functions; iii) the transformation of perception that has occurred in the postmodern period, coupled with the perception that GAI possesses human-like properties, gives rise to an ontological illusion.