arin 1000 week 11 - kathy cleland

8/14/2019 ARIN 1000 Week 11 - Kathy Cleland

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ARIN 1000 Week 11 - Kathy Cleland

Cyborgs


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What is a cyborg?

Cyborg = 'cybernetic organism

Term coined by Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline in1960 to describe a lab rat with an osmotic pumpprogrammed to dispense chemicals

an animal-machine hybrid entity that is partbiological/organic and part machine


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Cybernetics - Norbert Wiener

Cyberneticsstudies organization, communication andcontrol in complex systems by focusing on circular (feedback)mechanisms

Cybernetics is an interdisciplinary science that studies humanand machine systems including: electrical engineering,biology, neurophysiology, computer science, anthropology,

and psychology

Sources:http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBERN.htmlhttp://www.hyperdictionary.com


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Cybernetics - Norbert Wiener

Cybernetics aims to understand the similarities anddifferences in internal workings of organic and machineprocesses (action - feedback - response) and, by

formulating abstract concepts common to all systems, tounderstand their behaviour.

Example: thermoregulation in humans and machines

Sources:http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBERN.htmlhttp://www.hyperdictionary.com


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Cybernetics:

Humans and Machines In cybernetics, machines, organisms and many other types

of systems are said to be analogous or 'isomorphic'.

This means that they are, in principle, the same - they

function or behave in fundamentally the same way with

respect to processes and feedback.


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Cybernetic Equation:

Human = Machine Computers are often imbued with human or biological qualities.

(e.g. computers think, have memory, get viruses, etc)

Similarly, human processes are often seen analogous tocomputer processes.

e.g. we talk about humans being programmed to act or behave in a certain

way (programmed by our parents, culture, education etc)

DNA is described as being analagous to a computer program Hardware (computer) - Software - Wetware (human)


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In The Human Uses of Human Beings (1948), NorbertWiener refers to the 'cybernation' of the world and his fearthat that this would lead to a dehumanisation of human

beings (e.g. automation replacing human jobs and humansbeing treated as just a cog in the machine)

According to Wiener we must consider the social

dimensions of cybernetic systems and make sure that thesesystems are designed with human use in mind and for thebenefit of humans.


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Who are cyborgs?


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Everyday human/machine cyborgs

Human life in the 21st century involves a close

relationship with a myriad of technologies that we are

finding it increasingly difficult to live without

e.g. computers, phones, cameras, cars, television etc)

Computer systems link humans and machines in

cybernetic feedback loops

This is the broadest possible definition of the cyborg


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Bio-medical Cyborgs

Cyborg technologies used to replace lost or impaired

biological functions

Pacemakers

Artificial hips and other joints

Prosthetic limbs

Cochlear implants

Artificial skin and other organs

The elderly in society are becoming the first cyborgs


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Bio-medical Cyborgs

humans/animals born as a result of reproductive

technologies including genetic engineering

pharmacological cyborgs - drugs used to optimise or

enhance normal biological functions

eg. sports medicine

Cosmetic surgery


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Examples of Cyborgs

Cyborg technologies used to amplify and extend human

capacities

For example, the kinds of melding of machine and human

that we see in VR technologies (eg fighter pilot training)

Telepresence technologies


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The Cyborg and the Posthuman

Cyborg discourses are linked with the concept of the

posthuman.

Our cyborg technologies are giving us the capacity to

intervene in our own evolution both through technological

augmentation and genetic engineering.

The re-design of the human is leading us into the realms of

the posthuman and its associated unstable boundaries and

shifting identities.


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The cyborg crosses boundaries

The cyborg signposts the fact that the distinctions between

machine/human no longer hold. The cyborg blurs

boundaries between:

Living Non-living

Organic Inorganic

Natural Artificial

Body Machine

Human Non-human


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What do the theorists say?

Marshall McLuhan

"All media are extensions of some human faculty - physic

or physical.

McHugh (quoted in Gray reading)

"Soon perhaps, it will be impossible to tell where human

ends and machines begin."


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Donna Haraway

"We are all cyborgs."

Figuratively, we are "living through a movement from an

organic, industrial society to [society as] an ...information

system".

[i.e. humans are being re-crafted by biological andcommunications technologies.]


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futurologist Alvin Toffler:

soon, miniaturised computers "will not only beimplanted to compensate for some physical defect but

eventually will be implanted to enhance human capability.

The line between human and computer at some point will

become completely blurred.


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N. Katherine Hayles

According to Hayles we are moving from the human-machine hyphen where the human is connected to the

machine, to the human/machine splice where the human

and the machine extend into each other and there is no

clearly distinguishable boundary between them.


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Kevin Warwick

Kevin Warwick, Professor

of Cybernetics at the

University of Reading,UK, has implanted

computer chips into his

arm allowing him to

communicate with a

computer.Image Source: http://www.kevinwarwick.com/


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Stelarc

It is time the question whether a bipedal [two legged], breathing body

with binocular vision and a 1400 cc brain us an adequate biological form.

It cannot cope with the...information it has accumulated. The most

significant planetary pressure is no longer the gravitational pull but the

information thrust. Gravity has moulded the evolved body in shape and

structure and contained it on the planet. Information [technology] propels

the body beyond itself and its biosphere. Information fashions the form

and function of the post evolutionary body (quoted in Dery 161)


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Stelarc - Extra Ear

Image source:http://www.stelarc.va.com.au


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Stelarc - Prosthetic Head

Image source:http://www.stelarc.va.com.au


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Patricia Piccinini

Image from TMGP (The Mutant Genome Project)

Image source: http://www.patriciapiccinini.net/


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Patricia Piccinini

We Are Family Series - Game Boys Advanced



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Patricia Piccinini

We Are Family Series - Still Life with Stem Cells



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Patricia Piccinini

Protein Lattice, 1997



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Patricia Piccinini

We Are Family Series - The Young Family



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Film example:Robocop

Robocop, 1987, dir: Paul Verhoeven

The narrative is set in a near future Detroit.

Law enforcement has been privatised taken over by the

corporation Omni Consumer Products (OCP).

OCP is developing a new cyborg police officer called the

Robocop - part human, part machine.

The robocop cyborg is build using the body of a police

officer (Murphy) who is declared dead after being

severely injured in the line of duty.


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Robocop - central themes

Dehumanisation threatened by the advent of the cyborg

The human is viewed as a product

Murphys memory is wiped so he can be re-programmed

Murphy is owned by the corporation OCP

Reassertion of human identity despite technological

transformations Murphy re-asserts his human identity by reclaiming his

human memories and human relationships


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Terminator 2: Judgement Day

Terminator 2: Judgement Day,1991, dir. James Cameron

Theme - the humanisation of the machine

The terminator learns human values


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References

Additional Readings in Fisher Reserve Gray, C. H. (ed), (1995), Introduction, in The Cyborg Handbook, London: Routledge.

Gray, C. H. (2001) Cyborg Citizen: Politics in the Posthuman Age, New York: Routledge.

Haraway, D. Foreword, in Chris Hables Gray (ed), (1995) The Cyborg Handbook, London:

Routledge. Haraway, D. (1991) A Manifesto for Cyborgs, in Simians, Cyborgs and Women, London: FreeAssociation Books.

Murphie, A. and Potts, J. (2003) Culture and Technology, Basingstoke: Palgrave.

See Chapter 5 Cyborgs: the Body, Information and Technology.

Springer, C. (1996) Muscular Circuitry, in Electronic Eros: Bodies and Desire in thePostindustrial Age, University of Texas Press.

Telotte, J. P. (1995) Life at the Horizon: The Tremulous Public Body, and The ExposedModern Body: Terminatorand Terminator 2, in Telotte, J. P. (1995) Replications: A RoboticHistory of the Science Fiction Film, University of Illinois Press.

Tofts, D. et al (eds.) (2002) Prefiguring Cyberculture: an intellectual history, Sydney: PowerPublications; Cambridge, Mass.: MIT.

arin 1000 week 11 - kathy cleland

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