DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP?

PHILIP K. DICK, 1968

Futuristic Societies

Philip K. Dick, 1928-1982

Born in ChicagoBegan writing 1952Interest in metaphysics

and theologyQuestioning the

universeFictionalizing

philosophizer44 published novels, 121 short storiesBlade runner, Total

Recall, Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly

The Apocalypse?

What is behind our appetite for doomsday visions?Are we confronting deep-seated species-wide fear?Can’t we wait for the end of the world?

Philosophy & Culture

The Road , 2006, Cormac McCarthy. It is a post-apocalyptic tale of a journey taken by a

father and his young son over a period of several months, across a landscape blasted by an unnamed cataclysm that destroyed all civilization and, apparently, almost all life on earth.

Android?

An android is a robot or synthetic organism designed to look and act like a human.

Largely within the domain of science fiction

Frequently seen in film and television.

Android

Honda and several other corporations and private enterprises have developed impressive androids

A long way to go to make them fully human like.

c-3po

Star Wars – Luke Skywalker and c-3po

Humanity

What constitutes the quality of being human?

What role does nature play for humans?

Destruction of the world as we know it

Insanity if humansNon-comprehension of their insanity

Artifice

Artificial humansArtificial animals

Self-extermination

Empathy – group fusion / moral choices

Move to Mars!

Social Body

Michel Foucault:“the idea of a social body constituted by the universality of wills” is a great fantasy

the “phenomenon of the social body is the effect not of a consensus but of the materiality of power operating on the very bodies of individuals.”

Earth has created a hierarchy of power

Hope?

The “Specials”Empathy – social structureRational hope? Religious hope?

NatureKipple

Rick Deckard, Bounty Hunter

Married to IranNo children, but an artificial sheepIdentity linked to destroyed natureCreation of a subject-identity ~ possession of

power over an animal (nature)Fake nature fake identity grey zone

between human and androidAndroid are indistinguishable from humans

empathy test

Westworld

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFmKvY6PN2M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAy8YnKvHQ4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQVWP8fP5To

Identity-crisis

Power hierarchyAnnual, decisive personality testsBuster FriendlyMercerSurvival of the fittestCentral irony

Fulfillment & Humanity?

Empathy and fusionHuman = non-androidEmpathy solely towards other humansDoubt creates a dilemma despair and

resignationInter-subjective identity formation as key to

humanityThe empathy box

Aliens?

Marital relationships ~ Rachel RosenReconciling the diminishing distinction

between humans and androidsMercer: “the basic condition of life to be

required to violate your own identity”Enlightenment – The Tomb World

Mercerism

Religion called MercerismEstablish ethical, moral norms of behaviorCreate empathetic fusionShame / blushing reaction

Mercer, the person ~ Jesus?

Repetitive cycle – no forward momentumOpposed to Kierkegaard – the individual + God

Humans and Animals

SquirrelsSisyphusMankind’s inherent stupidityWrong choicesHopelessnessCollective path to doomSelf-destruction / Existential angst

Blade Runner, 1982