Technology Anxiety in British and American SF: Artificial Intelligences As Catalysts For
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Technology Anxiety in British and American SF: Artificial Intelligences as Catalysts for Ontological Awakening A dissertation presented to the faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences of Ohio University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy Christopher A. Sims June 2012 © 2012 Christopher A. Sims. All Rights Reserved. 2 This dissertation titled Technology Anxiety in British and American SF: Artificial Intelligences as Catalysts for Ontological Awakening by CHRISTOPHER A. SIMS has been approved for the Department of English and the College of Arts and Sciences by George Hartley Associate Professor of English Howard Dewald Interim Dean, College of Arts and Sciences 3 ABSTRACT SIMS, CHRISTOPHER A., Ph.D., June 2012, English Technology Anxiety in British and American SF: Artificial Intelligences as Catalysts for Ontological Awakening Director of Dissertation: George Hartley This project examines the representation of technology anxiety human subjects feel when encountering artificial intelligences in four British and American SF novels: 1) Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? 2) Neuromancer 3) 2001: A Space Odyssey 4) The Cloud Atlas. While many critical investigations of these novels focus on the dangerous and negative implications of AIs, this work uses Martin Heidegger's later writings on technology to argue that AIs might be more usefully read as catalysts for human ontological realignment. Such a transformation leads technologically saturated humans away from an imperious ontology of “enframing” that Heidegger sees as the danger of modern technology and toward the saving power that changes the human posture with respect to beings from a colonial, domineering stance to a pious posture of abetting. I contend that it is not enough to simply read the danger AIs pose without seeing the salvation they also reveal. Approved: _____________________________________________________________ George Hartley Associate Professor of English 4 To my lovely wife, JoAn 5 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to sincerely thank my director George Hartley for introducing me to Heidegger and for patiently helping me out of my cave and setting me on the path of thinking. I thank him for his time, patience, support, and criticism. I would also like to thank Joe McLaughlin, Kasia Marciniak, and Robert Briscoe for their time, counsel, guidance, support. Their feedback and ideas helped me keep an open mind throughout the project and attend to (at least some of) what was missing. 6 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract ............................................................................................................................... 3 Dedication ........................................................................................................................... 4 Acknowledgments............................................................................................................... 5 Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 9 Outline of the Project .................................................................................................... 22 Chapter 1: Heideggerian Introduction....................................................................... 22 Chapter 2: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? .................................................. 22 Chapter 3: Neuromancer ........................................................................................... 24 Chapter 4: 2001: A Space Odyssey .......................................................................... 24 Chapter 5: Cloud Atlas: A Novel .............................................................................. 25 Conclusion: ............................................................................................................... 27 Chapter 1: Technology Anxiety in Science Fiction, Artificial Intelligence, and Heideggerian Technology Studies .................................................................................... 28 Part I: The “Essence” of Technology: Technology as Ontology, Ancient Technology, and Modern Technology ............................................................................................... 31 Being, beings, and Dasein ......................................................................................... 33 Technology in Ancient Greece: Techné.................................................................... 35 Ancient Technology .................................................................................................. 39 Modern Technology .................................................................................................. 42 Part II: The Danger of Modern Technology ................................................................. 45 Enframing: Ge-stell ................................................................................................... 47 Imposition of Humans; Imposition by Humans ........................................................ 49 Enframing as the Will-to-Power ............................................................................... 54 The Ravishing of Nature ........................................................................................... 55 The Danger of Enslavement ...................................................................................... 58 Part III: The Saving Power of Modern Technology ..................................................... 61 The “Saving Power:” Not Simply a Reversion to the Past ....................................... 63 The Ancients: Not Simply Better than Us ................................................................ 66 Heidegger is Not Anti-Technology ........................................................................... 68 7 The Free Path to Salvation ........................................................................................ 70 Meditative thinking, Enlightenment, Releasement from Enframing ........................ 72 Part IV: Heidegger, Technology Anxiety, and Artificial Intelligence .......................... 85 Technology Anxiety: Fear of Enslavement to an AI ................................................ 86 Being Looking upon Human beings ......................................................................... 91 A Voice from Beyond ............................................................................................... 94 AIs as Self-Standing Objects .................................................................................... 95 Contemplation of AIs and Detachment from Enframing .......................................... 97 Chapter 2: The Dangers of Individualism and the Human Relationship to Technology in Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? ............................................... 106 Preface ........................................................................................................................ 106 “The Dangers of Individualism and the Human Relationship to Technology in Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” ................................................... 110 Chapter 3: AIs, Hatred of the Body, Cyborgs, and Salvation in William Gibson’s Neuromancer................................................................................................................... 149 Part I: Case: From Anti-Human to Post-Human ......................................................... 151 Part II: Molly: Cyborg and Model of the Proper Relationship of Humans and Technology ................................................................................................................. 194 Part III: Peter Riviera: Psychopath Empowered by Technology ................................ 205 Part IV: Conclusion: Ambiguity and the Mitigation of Technology Anxiety ............ 212 Chapter 4: HAL as Human Savior in Arthur C. Clarke’s 2001: A Space Odyssey ........ 217 Part I: The Wonder of Space: Distance, Dimension, Scope ....................................... 218 The Wonder of the Intelligent Non-Human ............................................................ 234 Part II: Man as Artificial Intelligence ........................................................................ 247 The Programming of Pre-Technological Man ........................................................ 249 Modern Technological Man .................................................................................... 259 Post-Technological Man ......................................................................................... 264 Part III: Artificial Intelligence: HAL as Agent of Detachment from Enframing ....... 273 Chapter 5: David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas: Cloned A.I.s as the Leaders of an Ontological Insurrection Against Corpocracy and Enframing ........................................................... 294 Part I: Technology as the Root of Western Sickness .................................................. 296 Part II: AI as Savior: The Ascension of Sonmi~451 .................................................. 336 Part III: Conclusion ..................................................................................................... 367 8 Works Cited .................................................................................................................... 374 9 INTRODUCTION The purpose of this work is to examine technology anxiety expressed in four novels that prominently feature artificial intelligences.