HUMANOID ROBOTS: REPRODUCTION OF THE LIVING AND ONTOLOGICAL LIMIT - Elhem Beddouda - ETHICA SOCIETAS-Rivista di scienze umane e sociali

A comparative reflection between Islamic jurisprudence and advanced technology

Abstract: The emergence of humanoid robotics and cognitive simulation technologies calls for an interdisciplinary reflection spanning philosophy, religious anthropology, ethics of technology, and social studies of modernity. This article proposes a comparative analysis between the contemporary debate on humanoid robots and the Islamic juridical-theological tradition concerning the prohibition against reproducing animated forms. In particular, the study examines prophetic traditions (aḥādīth) stating that, on the Day of Judgment, those who created images or simulacra of living beings will be asked to “breathe a soul” into their creations, yet will be incapable of doing so. Through a sociological and philosophical reading, the article interprets this narrative not merely as an iconographic prohibition, but as an ontological delimitation of human power in relation to the divine act of creation.

Keywords: #HumanoidRobotics #ArtificialIntelligence #IslamicJurisprudence #EthicsOfTechnology #SpiritualityAndTechnology #ArtificialConsciousness #HumanLimit #Ontology #ElhemBeddouda #ethicasocietas #ethicasocietasjournal #scientificjournal #humanities #socialsciences #ethicasocietasupli

Elhem Beddouda, is a professional educator with a degree in Education and Training Sciences from the University of Parma, where she completed a thesis entitled Islam and Educational Function: Perspectives on Religious Assistance in Prison. She is currently enrolled in the Global Studies for Sustainable Local and International Development and Cooperation program at the same university.

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Introduction

In the twenty-first century, humanoid robotics occupies an increasingly central place within the global imagination. Technology companies, research centers, and governments are investing heavily in the construction of machines capable not only of performing mechanical tasks, but also of imitating language, facial expressions, posture, emotions, and even certain human decision-making processes. The implicit goal of much contemporary research is no longer merely the production of efficient tools, but the progressive simulation of human presence itself.

At the same time, within the monotheistic religious traditions there exists a long-standing reflection on the meaning of the creation of living beings. In Islamic thought, the issue of figurative representation of animate beings has generated an extensive juridical and theological debate. Among the most discussed texts are several aḥādīth attributed to the Prophet Muḥammad, in which it is stated that the “makers of images” will be questioned by God and asked to give life to their creations. In one version reported in the canonical collections, it is said: “Those who make these images will be punished on the Day of Resurrection, and it will be said to them: give life to what you have created.”

In another formulation: “Whoever imitates the creation of God will be asked to breathe a soul into what he has produced, but he will not be able to do so.”

These texts have been interpreted in different ways throughout Islamic history. Some jurists understood them as an almost absolute prohibition of figurative representation; others distinguished between idolatry, decorative art, pedagogical function, and spiritual intention. Yet beyond these interpretative differences, one central issue emerges: the human being may imitate the form of life, but does not possess the power to truly confer life upon it.

In the contemporary context, this reflection acquires renewed relevance. Humanoid robotics no longer produces simple static images, but artificial bodies capable of movement, interaction, and learning. This raises profound questions: when a machine perfectly imitates human behavior, what remains specifically human? What is the boundary between simulation and life? And to what extent does the desire to create an “artificial being” represent a modern form of symbolic transcendence of the human limit?

The Representation of Living Beings in Islamic Jurisprudence

The issue of images in the Islamic world cannot be reduced to a simple opposition between art and religion. Historically, Islamic jurisprudence developed a complex reflection surrounding the representation of living beings, influenced by the context of the seventh-century Arabian Peninsula, where polytheistic idolatry still played a significant role.

Many classical jurists interpreted the aḥādīth against the musawwirūn (makers of images) as a preventive measure against idolatry. The principal problem was not art itself, but rather the risk that human beings might attribute sacredness to their own creations. For this reason, Islamic societies developed a strong non-figurative aesthetic tradition grounded in calligraphy, geometry, and arabesque forms.

However, reducing these texts solely to the prevention of idolatry would be insufficient. A deeper reading reveals that the critique also concerns the anthropological claim implicit in the imitation of living beings. The human act of reproducing the animated body is presented as an attempt to approach the divine act of creation.

In the Qur’an, the creation of the human being is described as a process culminating in the divine breath: “Then He fashioned him harmoniously and breathed into him of His Spirit.”

Life, in this perspective, does not simply coincide with biological form. Matter may be shaped, but the vital principle belongs exclusively to God. Human beings may imitate the appearance of living beings, but they cannot produce the rūḥ, the spiritual breath.

The prophetic saying concerning the impossibility of “breathing the soul” into images therefore assumes an ontological significance. The problem is not merely the making of images, but forgetting the radical distinction between outward imitation and authentic creation.

Humanoid Robotics and the Promethean Desire

Technological modernity has progressively transformed the relationship between human beings and nature. Whereas in pre-industrial eras technology was primarily conceived as a means of adapting to the environment, advanced modernity increasingly regards technology as a tool for overcoming natural limitations.

Humanoid robotics represents one of the most radical examples of this transformation. The goal of many contemporary laboratories is not simply to create useful machines, but to produce artificial systems increasingly similar to human beings in cognitive, relational, and emotional terms.

This dynamic may be interpreted through the category of the Promethean desire: the human aspiration to appropriate prerogatives traditionally attributed to the divine. In Greek mythology, Prometheus steals fire from the gods; in technological modernity, human beings symbolically attempt to appropriate the creative power itself.

Contemporary interest in realistic androids, artificial general intelligence, and simulations of consciousness demonstrates that the technological project concerns far more than economic efficiency. It touches profound symbolic dimensions: the desire to replicate life, to extend intelligence beyond the biological body, and in some cases to imagine a technical transcendence of death itself.

In this sense, humanoid robotics may be interpreted as a new form of anthropopoiesis: the human being produces an animated image of itself, seeking to reflect itself within an artificial creature.

The Simulation of Life and the Question of the Soul

One of the central aspects of the contemporary debate concerns the distinction between the simulation of life and authentic life. Humanoid robots can imitate language, learn behavioral patterns, recognize emotions, and produce complex responses. Yet the fundamental question remains open: does the imitation of consciousness amount to consciousness itself?

From the perspective of cognitive sciences, no consensus yet exists regarding the nature of human consciousness. Certain materialist currents maintain that the mind emerges from sufficiently complex computational processes; others argue that subjective experience cannot be reduced to mere information processing.

The Islamic tradition introduces here a significant distinction between form, intellect, and soul. The rūḥ is not simply an energetic or cognitive principle, but a transcendent dimension escaping full human comprehension. The Qur’an states: “They ask you concerning the Spirit. Say: the Spirit belongs to the command of my Lord, and you have been given but little knowledge.”

This statement establishes a fundamental epistemological limit. Human beings may know and manipulate matter, but they do not possess total access to the mystery of life.

Applied to the contemporary debate, this perspective suggests that no level of technological sophistication can automatically transform a simulation into a living being in the fullest sense of the term. An android may imitate human behavior, but this does not necessarily imply interior presence, phenomenal consciousness, or soul.

The prophetic saying concerning “breathing the soul” thus acquires a remarkable symbolic relevance. It may be interpreted as a permanent metaphor of the human limit: the capacity to reproduce form does not coincide with the power to create life.

Spirituality and Technology: Opposition or Complementarity?

Interpreting the Islamic tradition exclusively as a rejection of technology would be historically inaccurate. Classical Islamic civilization contributed significantly to the development of mathematics, astronomy, medicine, and engineering. The issue, therefore, is not technology in itself, but rather the ethical and spiritual relationship human beings establish with it.

Technology may be considered an instrument of care, improvement of living conditions, and expansion of human possibilities. Humanoid robots could assist the elderly, perform dangerous tasks, facilitate medical rehabilitation, or support educational activities.

However, the issue changes when technology no longer merely serves life, but attempts symbolically to replace it. At this point, a decisive philosophical question emerges: do human beings build machines to extend their humanity, or to emancipate themselves from the human condition itself?

Some contemporary transhumanist currents imagine a future in which human consciousness could be transferred into artificial supports, overcoming the biological limits of the body. Within these narratives, death itself appears as a technical problem to be solved.

The Islamic spiritual perspective instead introduces another conception of limit. The limit is not necessarily a weakness to be eliminated, but a constitutive condition of the human being. Mortality, vulnerability, and incompleteness belong to the anthropological structure of the creature.

From this perspective, humanoid robotics becomes a privileged space of confrontation between two worldviews:

a technicist vision, in which the human limit must progressively be overcome;
a spiritual vision, in which the limit reminds the human being of its creaturely condition.

The Artificial Body as a Mirror of the Contemporary Crisis

The growing interest in realistic androids does not arise solely from industrial needs. It also reflects profound transformations in the contemporary perception of the body and identity.

In late-modern societies, the human body is increasingly conceived as an entity that can be modified, optimized, and potentially replaced. The spread of biotechnologies, cosmetic surgery, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence contributes to redefining the relationship between personal identity and biological materiality.

The humanoid robot represents the symbolic radicalization of this tendency. It is an artificially constructed body attempting to reproduce presence, relationship, and emotion. Its existence often produces an ambiguous sensation: familiarity and unease at the same time. This phenomenon has been described by the theory of the uncanny valley, according to which an almost-human entity generates discomfort precisely because of its imperfect resemblance to living beings.

From a sociological perspective, this unease may derive from the fact that the humanoid robot destabilizes traditional boundaries between human and non-human, natural and artificial, organism and machine.

The Islamic reflection on the human creative limit acquires here a new interpretative function. It concerns not only the permissibility of images, but also the necessity of preserving a symbolic distinction between living creature and artificial construction.

Beyond Technology: The Limit as an Anthropological Category

One of the fundamental characteristics of advanced modernity is the difficulty of accepting limits. Contemporary technological culture tends to interpret every limit as an obstacle to be overcome through innovation, calculation, and enhancement.

Yet the idea of limit occupies a central role in many spiritual traditions. In Islamic thought, recognition of the human limit does not imply passivity, but ontological awareness. Human beings are endowed with moral responsibility and rational capacity, yet they remain creatures.

The contemporary risk does not consist simply in the development of sophisticated machines, but in the transformation of technology into a total metaphysical horizon. When technology implicitly assumes the role of a new salvific promise, it ceases to be an instrument and becomes an ideology.

The comparison between humanoid robotics and the Islamic tradition therefore allows the formulation of a broader critique of technocratic modernity. The problem is not that human beings construct advanced machines, but that they progressively forget the distinction between technical power and ontological power.

The possibility of simulating human behavior does not equate to the capacity to produce consciousness, interiority, or soul. In this sense, the prophetic saying concerning “breathing the soul” appears not as a simple moralistic condemnation, but as a permanent reminder of a threshold that technology may approach without ever truly crossing.

Conclusion

Humanoid robotics constitutes one of the most significant domains through which contemporary modernity interrogates itself. Behind the development of realistic androids and advanced artificial intelligences emerges an ancient question: what does it mean to create life?

Islamic jurisprudence concerning the representation of animate beings, interpreted through the prophetic sayings about “breathing the soul,” offers an original perspective for understanding this transformation. More than a simple rejection of images, it expresses a reflection on the ontological limit of the human being.

Human beings may shape matter, imitate living beings, and construct increasingly sophisticated machines. Nevertheless, the capacity to produce authentic interiority remains radically problematic. The distance between simulation and life is not merely technical, but metaphysical.

In this sense, the dialogue between Islamic spirituality and humanoid robotics should not be interpreted as an opposition between religion and progress. Rather, it may open a critical space within which to question the human meaning of contemporary technology.

The decisive question is not merely how far human beings may advance technologically, but what conception of humanity is being constructed along this path. Technological modernity tends to regard the limit as a failure to overcome; the spiritual perspective instead reminds us that the limit may constitute a necessary condition for preserving the very meaning of the human.

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