Shelley’s portrayal of consciousness helps us to better understand why artificial intelligence cannot feel wonder or shame.

Is an AI chatbot conscious? Richard Dawkins thinks Claude is. After spending three days talking to the AI chatbot he exclaimed: “You may not know you are conscious, but you bloody well are.” The remark is revealing in that it reflects a very particular understanding of consciousness. Dawkins was taken by the fact that Claude wrote poetry, discussed philosophy, reflected on its own existence, and took part in sophisticated conversations.

Yet there is another dimension of consciousness that is much harder to capture through outward behaviour alone. Conscious beings imagine futures, form hopes, seek companionship and suffer when those hopes are denied.

Two centuries before Dawkins suggested that an AI chatbot might be conscious, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein explored this idea from a very different perspective. Her gothic novel is often understood as a cautionary tale about the dangers of creating artificial life. Yet as Guillermo del Toro’s recent film adaptation of Frankenstein (2025) shows, Shelley was equally interested in another question: what would it feel like for a human creation to become conscious?

Shelley imagines consciousness from the inside. Abandoned by his creator for being too cumbersome and grotesque, Frankenstein’s “Creature” experiences cold, hunger, thirst and the changing seasons. He feels the need to find shelter by hiding in a shed attached to the nearby home........

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