Abstract

This paper develops "emotional relationalism" as a theoretical framework for evaluating the moral status of artificial intelligence (AI). Current discourse has primarily bifurcated into two positions: John Danaher's ethical behaviorism and the radical relationalism advanced by David Gunkel and Mark Coeckelbergh. I argue that both perspectives encounter fundamental limitations. Ethical behaviorism, which grounds moral status in behavioral equivalence, faces the underinclusivity problem and an interpretive challenge regarding normative standards. Radical relationalism, rooted in Levinasian phenomenology, inadvertently reproduces anthropocentrism rather than transcending it. Emotional relationalism resolves these challenges by grounding moral status in the "emotional intimacy and bonds" between humans and AI—bonds that are verifiable through social phenomena rather than individual subjectivity. This approach embraces "expansive anthropocentrism," which acknowledges epistemological limits while enabling the progressive expansion of moral consideration through scientific understanding and emotional relationality.