Anthropomorphic Machines: Alien Sensation and Experience in Nonhumans Created to Be Like Us
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Anthropomorphic machines: alien sensation and experience in nonhumans created to be like us by Tessa Gwendoline Leach ORCID 0000-0002-0560-7667 Doctor of Philosophy (Arts) June 2018 School of Historical and Philosophical Studies This thesis is submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of the degree i Abstract This thesis is positioned at the intersection between technology studies and the nonhuman turn in the humanities. It argues that typical approaches to the study of technology omit any consideration of the alien nature of nonhuman sensation and experience. The discussion of metaphysical theory aimed at redressing this omission is grounded in this thesis in the study of specific case studies of anthropomorphic machines, objects which are typically surrounded by human-centric rhetoric. There are four main case studies presented. The first, the Microsoft Kinect for Xbox One, is a sensor designed for use in videogames. The second is the “robot tortoises” (Machina speculatrix) designed by William Grey Walter in the 1940s and 50s. The third is the language- using artificial intelligence program SHRDLU developed by Terry Winograd between 1968 and 1972. The fourth is the concept of the gynoid (female humanoid robot) and particularly the gynoid sexbot. Each of these case studies has previously been analysed in Science and Technology Studies, Cultural Studies or Engineering, and this thesis builds on this past work by giving primacy and due consideration to the alien in these anthropomorphic technologies. The thesis aims to decentre the anthropomorphic qualities of machines that are often foregrounded in both engineering and critical texts. This is done both by emphasising the alien nature of nonhuman sensation and experience, and through anthrodecentric theory and language. An emphasis on maintaining a suitable posthuman tone is, it is argued, essential to this “alien phenomenology”. This is not a frivolous exercise; alien phenomenological work (or the study of the way nonhumans sense and experience their worlds) helps to diffuse the persuasive influence of anthropomorphism as it is applied to technological artefacts, and to develop a more critical study of these objects and contextualise human perspectives of them. Numerous metaphysical and critical theories of technology are discussed. The most attention is given to object-oriented ontology (OOO), particularly that put forward by Graham Harman. Other approaches used include Actor-Network Theory (ANT), postphenomenology, biosemiotics and panpsychism. Full acceptance of the ontological commitments of any particular theory is avoided, and instead they are both deployed and critiqued as lenses through which to perform the work of alien phenomenology. ii Declaration This is to certify that: i. The thesis comprises only my original work; ii. Due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used; iii. The thesis is fewer than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of tables, maps, bibliographies and appendices. Tessa Leach Student ID: 257978 26th June 2018 iii Acknowledgements This thesis would not have been possible without the guidance and support of my supervisor Michael Arnold. He has encouraged me to work on what most interested me while helping to ensure the consistency and integrity of this text. I cannot thank him enough. I would also like to thank my secondary supervisor, Angela Ndalianis. She first sparked my love of robots and brought me into contact with many influences that I might not have otherwise encountered. Thank you to the other research students and early career researchers who have helped to foster a sense of camaraderie and expose me to new influences. Particular thanks must go to postgraduate members of the department of History and Philosophy of Science (University of Melbourne) and TTRU (Transformative Technology Research Unit). Thank you to the administration in the School of Historical and Philosophical Studies. Thank you to the people in my life who made it possible for me to finish this thesis, particularly Katy Mitra, Cal Leach, Sue Mitra, Gill Mitra, Jason Marriott and Harry Leach. Katy Mitra in particular read and commented on my drafts and offered lots of encouragement. I have had so much support from these people, all of whom have endured my monomania magnificently. Special thanks to Russell Deighton and Stuart Thomas, who have worked so hard to help me to reach my goals. My father, John Leach, died in 2010, but I thank him for teaching me curiosity and intellectual honesty from a young age. In recognition of the anthrodecentric preoccupations of this thesis, I also feel that I should acknowledge the work of some of the nonhumans that have been instrumental to my completion. In particular, thank you to my computer for a stellar performance over four years, to the University of Melbourne library, and to the numerous cloud services that I used. A special thank you to all the nonhumans that I used as case studies in this thesis – I hope that what I have written allows them to persist in memory if not in material embodiment. iv Table of Contents Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 1 The value of taking nonhuman perspectives seriously ........................................................... 3 Why focus on anthropomorphic machines? ........................................................................... 9 A note on language ............................................................................................................... 16 Guiding questions .................................................................................................................. 19 How do we ask machines about their experiences? .................................................. 19 What does sensation mean for machines? ................................................................ 20 To what extent is the sensation of anthropomorphic machines relevant to their cultural role? ............................................................................................................... 22 Structure of this thesis .......................................................................................................... 23 Chapter 1: Literature Review ................................................................................................... 27 Contemporary Western philosophy of technology ............................................................... 28 Actor-Network Theory (ANT), Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO) and alien phenomenology .................................................................................................................... 35 Actor-Network Theory (ANT) ...................................................................................... 35 Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO) ............................................................................... 38 Alien phenomenology ................................................................................................. 44 Chapter 2: Kinect and “Natural” Interfaces ............................................................................ 52 The Objects Themselves ........................................................................................................ 53 NUIs ............................................................................................................................. 53 Kinect-brand and Kinect-artefact ............................................................................... 57 The Kinect-brand ........................................................................................................ 63 Kinect-artefact 1.0 ...................................................................................................... 69 Kinect-artefact 2.0 ...................................................................................................... 72 Communication, sensation and relation in the Kinect-artefact ........................................... 78 “Waking up” the Kinect-artefact ................................................................................ 78 Kinect Sports Rivals .................................................................................................... 85 Alien phenomenology of the Kinect-artefact ....................................................................... 92 Desire in the Kinect-artefact ...................................................................................... 94 Death of the Kinect .................................................................................................... 95 v Chapter 3: Grey Walter’s Tortoises and an Introduction to the Perspective of Robots ....... 99 Umwelten and cybernetics ................................................................................................. 100 Robot tortoises .................................................................................................................... 106 Tortoises and time ................................................................................................... 111 Sensation, experience, and consciousness ........................................................................ 113 Chapter 4: SHRDLU and Bidirectional Postphenomenology ................................................ 123 What is (or was) SHRDLU? ................................................................................................... 124 SHRDLU’s Umwelt and mind ...................................................................................