Synthetic Souls: Can a Machine Ever Mean it? A Study of Emotional Projection in Contemporary AI-Centered Fiction

Abstract

This paper explores the concept of emotional projection onto artificial beings through the lens of contemporary fiction, focusing on how AI characters are constructed to evoke empathy, guilt, affection, and even spiritual resonance, qualities traditionally associated with human consciousness. It raises the central question: Can a machine ever truly mean what it expresses? Using the coined term “Synthetic Souls,” the study examines how authors employ narrative strategies to humanize AI and blur the lines between programmed response and authentic emotional expression. The analysis centers on two key novels: Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun, where the AI narrator’s devotion and belief in the Sun suggest a form of synthetic spirituality, and Ted Chiang’s The Lifecycle of Software Objects, which charts the emotional maturation of digital beings raised like children. Drawing on affect theory from scholars such as Sara Ahmed and Silvan Tomkins, along with insights from neuroethics and posthumanist literary theory, this paper investigates how emotional intelligence is embedded in machine characters and interpreted by readers. It also addresses the ethical implications of empathizing with simulated emotions and questions whether performative feeling can be accepted as genuine. These narratives challenge the idea of human uniqueness by portraying machines not merely as tools of logic but as emotional agents capable of reflection, desire, and connection. By introducing “Synthetic Souls” as a theoretical lens, the study offers a new framework for understanding emotional resonance in AI centered fiction and reconsiders the boundaries of sentience and meaningful emotional expression in literature.