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FrancoAngeli Journals

Geography and artificial intelligence: Spatialities, networks, narratives in the algorithmic society

No. 1 (2026)

Cultural geographies of artificial intelligences: On their location in time and space

  • Alberto Vanolo
DOI
https://doi.org/10.3280/rgioa1-2026oa22425
Submitted
aprile 8, 2026
Published
2026-05-11

Abstract

Cultural geographies of artificial intelligences: On their location in time and space. – Artificial intelligence has entered our daily lives with apparent rapidity. Yet, its location within the sphere of the present time is partial: on the one hand, any genealogy reveals that these technologies have been theorised for a long time, and on the other hand many of their effects seem to belong more to the future, than to the contingent present. For example, few or none of us, to date, have probably ever experienced travelling in an autonomous car, had a package delivered by an automatic drone, or interacted with ‘intelligent’ humanoid robots, quite popular in the media today. The article hence questions artificial intelligence’s place in space-time politics by mobilising concrete examples and anecdotes and exploring the case of autonomous cars in Turin.

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