Between Puppet and Actor: Reframing Authorship in this Age of AI Agents

2025-01-25

AI Summary

The rise of AI-assisted creation challenges traditional conceptions of authorship. Method: Drawing on philosophical hermeneutics, media archaeology, and human–machine interaction theory—and informed by interactive narrative case studies and critical authorship theory—this paper develops the “puppet–actor continuum,” a novel conceptual framework for situate LLMs’ agency within creative processes, transcending the binary of AI-as-tool versus AI-as-author. Contribution/Results: It argues that LLMs possess bounded autonomy (e.g., improvisational narrative generation) yet lack authorial status; instead, they function as co-creative agents with situated agentic capacity. This framework advances new theoretical foundations for copyright attribution, delineation of creative responsibility, and ethical design of human–AI collaboration, thereby enabling adaptive evolution of conceptual systems governing authorship and creativity in AI-augmented contexts.

Technology Category

• Cognitive Modeling & Cognitive Systems: Computational Creativity
• Humans and AI: Game Design — Procedural Content Generation & Storytelling
• Philosophy and Ethics of AI: AI & Epistemology

Application Category

• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy
• Semantics and Knowledge: Data modeling to support human-machine intelligence, including LLMs agents, intelligent system behavior, explanations, and user-friendly interactions
• Economics, Online Markets and Human Computation: Cost models of using LLMs in production systems

Abstract

This chapter examines the conceptual tensions in understanding artificial intelligence (AI) agents' role in creative processes, particularly focusing on Large Language Models (LLMs). Building upon Schmidt's 1954 categorization of human-technology relationships and the classical definition of"author,"this chapter proposes to understand AI agency as existing somewhere between that of an inanimate puppet and a performing actor. While AI agents demonstrate a degree of creative autonomy, including the ability to improvise and construct complex narrative content in interactive storytelling, they cannot be considered authors in the classical sense of the term. This chapter thus suggests that AI agents exist in a dynamic state between human-controlled puppets and semi-autonomous actors. This conceptual positioning reflects how AI agents, while they can certainly contribute to creative work, remain bound to human direction. We also argue that existing conceptual frames concerning authorship should evolve and adapt to capture these new relationships.

Problem

• AI-Assisted Creation
• Authorship Identity
• Human-AI Collaboration

Innovation

• AI-Assisted Creation
• Authorship Redefinition
• Creative Process Evolution