Machines Like Us? Modernism and the Question of the Robot

AI Narratives ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 165-186
Author(s):  
Paul March-Russell
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Walter Benjamin ◽  
Emile Zola ◽  
Machine Intelligence ◽  
Georg Simmel ◽  
Modernist Literature ◽  
Machine Technology ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Karel Capek

This chapter examines the technophobia of modernist literature towards the question of machine intelligence. The chapter takes Edmund Husserl’s ‘Philosophy and the Crisis of European Man’ (1935) as its starting point, in terms of the tension between a vitalistic conception of what defines the ‘human’ as opposed to the apparent sterility of machine technology. Husserl’s lecture is contextualized alongside critical thinkers Walter Benjamin, Gustave Le Bon, and Georg Simmel, and literary writers Albert Robida and Emile Zola. The second section concentrates upon Samuel Butler’s Erewhon (1872), with its satirical depiction of machine intelligence, in contrast to H. G. Wells’s grotesque rendering of the Beast Folk in The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896) as a form of cyborg life. The final section, focusing upon representative texts by modernist authors such as E. M. Forster, Villiers de l’Isle Adam, Raymond Roussel, and Karel Čapek, argues that they respond variously to the templates of Butler and Wells.

scholarly journals A EMERGÊNCIA E “CRISE” DA CONCEPÇÃO MODERNA DE TEMPO E SUAS IMPLICAÇÕES NA REFLEXÃO HISTORIOGRÁFICA E FILOSÓFICA CONTEMPORÂNEAS

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (28) ◽  
pp. 48-71
Author(s):  
ANTONIO NELORRACION GONÇALVES FERREIRA
Keyword(s):  
Gilles Deleuze ◽  
Walter Benjamin ◽  
Human Sciences ◽  
Philosophical Reflection ◽  
Modern Conception ◽  
Palabras Clave ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Political Character

Este artigo busca abordar algumas das principais reflexões teórico-metodológicas (algumas com um caráter mais nitidamente político) sobre o tempo no campo das ciências humanas na contemporaneidade. Tem-se como ponto de partida um breve esboço da concepção moderna de tempo. Já que é a constituição e “crise” dessa noção em seus vários desdobramentos que aparece como condição de possibilidade das reflexões que serão aqui abordadas, como: o “campo de experiência” e o “horizonte de expectativa” de Reinhart Koselleck, o tempo redimido em Walter Benjamin e o devir e o acontecimento no tempo não-reconciliado de Gilles Deleuze. Palavras-chave: Tempo. Modernidade.Político.   THE EMERGENCE AND “CRISIS” OF THE MODERN CONCEPTION OF TIME AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR CONTEMPORANY HISTORIOGRAPHICAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL REFLECTION Abstract: This article tries to address some of the main theoretical-methodological reflections (some with a more clearly political character) about the time in the field of the human sciences in the contemporaneity. The starting point is a brief outline of the modern conception of time. Since it is the constitution and "crisis" of this notion in its various unfoldings that appears as a condition of possibility of the reflections that will be addressed here, such as Reinhart Koselleck's "field of experience" and the "horizon of expectation", the redeemed time in Walter Benjamin and the becoming and the event in the unreconciled time of Gilles Deleuze. Keywords: Time. Modernity. Political. LA EMERGENCIA Y “CRISIS” DE LA CONCEPCIÓN MODERNA DE TIEMPO Y SUS IMPLICACIONES EN LA REFLEXIÓN HISTORIOGRÁFICA Y FILOSÓFICA CONTEMPORÂNEAS Resumen: Este artículo busca abordar algunas de las principales reflexiones teórico-metodológicas (algunas con un carácter más nítidamente político) sobre el tiempo en el campo de las ciencias humanas en la contemporaneidad. Se tiene como punto de partida un breve esbozo de la concepción moderna de tiempo. En cuanto a la constitución y “crisis” de esa noción en sus diversos desdoblamientos que aparece como condición de posibilidad de las reflexiones que se abordarán aquí, como: el "campo de experiencia" y el "horizonte de expectativa" de Reinhart Koselleck, el tiempo redimido en Walter Benjamin y el devenir y el acontecimiento en el tiempo no reconciliado de Gilles Deleuze. Palabras clave: Tiempo. Modernidad. Político.

scholarly journals Rio de imagens: cultura midiática na Belle Époque

2020 ◽  
pp. 205-224
Author(s):  
Carmem Lúcia Negreiros de Figueiredo Souza
Keyword(s):  
Rio De Janeiro ◽  
Walter Benjamin ◽  
Georg Simmel ◽  
Belle Epoque ◽  
Friedrich Kittler ◽  
Belle Époque

No Rio de Janeiro das primeiras décadas do século XX, tecnologias e novas funções econômicas e simbólicas das imagens e produtos assinalam o nascimento da cultura midiática com intenso fluxo de informação tipográfica e visual. As crônicas literárias registram novos modos de ver e narrar a cidade, a partir do diálogo com as imagens que alteram a estrutura da percepção dos sujeitos. Tomando por referência as crônicas de João do Rio, Olavo Bilac, Benjamin Costallat e Lima Barreto, o artigo analisa o impacto do cinema, da imprensa e da vitrine na produção de novas sociabilidades e sensibilidades no espaço urbano. Para a abordagem sobre o que se convencionou chamar Belle Époque consideramos como baliza temporal o período de 1890-1920 e serão utilizados, na reflexão, conceitos de Walter Benjamin, Friedrich Kittler, Georg Simmel, Jonathan Crary e Jean-Yves Mollier.

scholarly journals Film Costume as a Visual Narrative Element

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 92-100
Author(s):  
Jelena Vojković
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Walter Benjamin ◽  
Roland Barthes ◽  
Psychological Test ◽  
Visual Narrative ◽  
Ridley Scott ◽  
Invasive Approach ◽  
Non Invasive ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Narrative Element

This research is an attempt to try to define the semiotic elements of film costumes that result with certain final feelings of the viewer. Looking through the semiotic theory of both Roland Barthes and Walter Benjamin and the specifics of (theatre and) film costume as a means of influencing the viewer and his/her thoughts, feelings and overall catharsis, the identity of a certain film has been set through an analysis of various elements. Furthermore, it has been noticed that psychological results by one observing a film can be various and lean more on known philosophical and psychological tendencies i.e. Freud’s theories or the ones of M. Merleau-Ponty or Lacan. To make it less verbatim, the example for the analysis that has been chosen is the 1982 science fiction film Bladerunner directed by Ridley Scott. With surreal messages and multi-layered meanings of its visual and audio presentation, it seemed like a perfect starting point for the research of the subconscious mind of the viewer. Finding a non-invasive approach to viewer’s impression, the costume itself could be observed both independently and in correlation with other film elements. By combining the results of all film levels via a visual psychological test by Robert Plutchik, known as Plutchik’s wheel of emotions, it is plain to see that a final impression still lies in a personal analysis. We find a prevalence of certain thoughts that lead the viewer to change his/her perception and, ultimately, to catharsis.

Kulturphilosophie in Weimar Modernism

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Michael Krois
Keyword(s):  
Conservative Approach ◽  
Georg Simmel ◽  
Ernst Cassirer ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Symbolic Forms ◽  
Philosophy Of Culture ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
New Thinking ◽  
Scientific Phenomena ◽  
Philosophy Of Symbolic Forms

The Weimar Republic was one of the most fertile epochs in German philosophy, and its effects are still being felt today. The call for “new thinking” was shared by otherwise disparate approaches. The phenomenologists sought to find the “beginnings” of knowing in pre-scientific phenomena, while thinkers at the forefront of what would later be known as analytic philosophy found a new approach to philosophy in the analysis of language. A third approach took its starting point from the fact of culture and sought to find a new orientation for philosophy in the study of the historical world. This movement, known as “Kulturphilosophie” (the philosophy of culture), was often regarded as a more conservative approach to philosophy. This chapter highlights the characteristics of Kulturphilosophie. The discipline was pioneered by the sociologist Georg Simmel and perfected by the philosopher Ernst Cassirer especially in his monumental, three-volume masterpiece, The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms.

The Moral Basis of State Independence

2021 ◽  
pp. 52-63
Author(s):  
Anna Stilz
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
The State ◽  
National Defense ◽  
Moral Foundation ◽  
Political Independence ◽  
Moral Basis ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Kantian View ◽  
Alternative Reading ◽  
Central Claim

The chapter takes as its starting point the central claim in Arthur Ripstein’s defense of a Kantian approach to war, namely that each state has a right to be independent from the determining choice of other states. The state’s right to independence is the basis for its permission to use force in national defense, and also for in bello restrictions that limit the permissible means of waging war to those necessary to stop aggression. But what morally justifies the state’s right to independence? And can this right be accounted for on Kantian grounds? Specifically, Stilz focuses on whether the Kantian view, as Ripstein reconstructs it, provides a philosophically satisfying basis for attributing a right to political independence to the state. In the final section, she outlines an alternative reading of Kant that may provide a more compelling moral foundation for this right.

Béla Balázs: The Face of Cinema

October ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 148 ◽  
pp. 53-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noël Carroll
Keyword(s):  
Walter Benjamin ◽  
Max Weber ◽  
Bela Bartok ◽  
Georg Simmel ◽  
Zoltan Kodaly ◽  
Karl Mannheim ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
Michael Curtiz ◽  
The Face ◽  
Gyorgy Lukacs

Herbert Bauer, known to the world as Béla Balázs (1894–1949), led the sort of life about which contemporary intellectuals might fantasize. He knew everyone and he did everything. Born in Hungary, he included György Lukács, Karl Mannheim, Arnold Hauser, Béla Bartók, and Zoltán Kodály in his circle, among others. He knew the filmmakers Alexander Korda and Michael Curtiz before their names were Anglicized. He studied with Georg Simmel and met Max Weber. As time went on, he came, so it seems, to know virtually every major European intellectual—Stefan Zweig, Robert Musil, Walter Benjamin, Sergei Eisenstein, Erwin Piscator, and on and on. He lived in the midst of a universe of conversation that dazzles us as we look back enviously upon it.

scholarly journals Religious experience and desire

2018 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 355-373
Author(s):  
FIONA ELLIS
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Epistemic Value ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Starting Point

AbstractI offer a new approach to the old question of the epistemic value of religious experience. According to this approach, religious experience is a species of desire, desire in this context involving a kind of experience which is cognitive and unmediated. The account is inspired by Levinas and Heidegger, and it involves a conception of experience which is shared by a disjunctivist account of perception. Perceptual disjunctivism is my starting point, and it provides the ground for the ensuing discussion of desire. In the final section of the article I argue that the parallel between perceptual disjunctivism and a Levinasian conception of desire points to a further strength in the account of desire here presented, namely, by suggesting the possibility of a disjunctive style response to scepticism about religious experience.

Space-form and the acousmatic image

2007 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Denis Smalley
Keyword(s):  
Personal Experience ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Space Form ◽  
Music Performance ◽  
Spectral Space ◽  
Production Of Space ◽  
Spatial Concepts ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Acousmatic Music ◽  
Basic Ideas

AbstractThe analytical discussion of acousmatic music can benefit from being based on spatial concepts, and this article aims to provide a framework for investigation. A personal experience of soundscape listening is the starting point, and uncovers basic ideas relating to the disposition and behaviour of sounding content, and listening strategy. This enables the opening out of the discussion to include source-bonded sounds in general, giving particular consideration to how experience of sense modes other than the aural are implicated in our understanding of space, and in acousmatic listening. Attention then shifts to a source-bonded spatial model based on the production of space by the gestural activity of music performance, prior to focusing in more detail on acousmatic music, initially by delving into spectral space, where ideas about gravitation and diagonal forces are germane. This leads to concepts central to the structuring of perspectival space in relation to the vantage point of the listener. The final section considers a methodology for space-form investigation.

Three Models of Coexistence

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Vasilev
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Starting Point

Chapter 2 examines some prominent models of multicultural coexistence, and defends deliberative models as most consistent with the demands of solidarity. Through their emphasis on reason-giving and empathetic imagining, deliberative models offer a basis for the practical and democratic realisation of solidarity’s core tenet of responsibility across difference. Nevertheless, it is also conceded that a deliberative approach brings with it its own set of problems that impede the expansion of solidarity. Specifically, where deliberation ensues from a starting point of marginalisation and disrespect, we can expect it to replicate, rather than overcome, these non-ideal conditions. The final section brings this problem to light in preparation for the subsequent chapters, which focus on how it can be overcome.

Cyclotomic and double angle polynomials

2004 ◽  
Vol 88 (512) ◽  
pp. 208-214
Author(s):  
K. Robin McLean
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Cyclotomic Polynomials ◽  
Angle Condition ◽  
Mathematical Exploration ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Computer Aided ◽  
Definition Of

One admires and applauds the enterprise of anyone who uses Gauss’s 1801 Disquisitiones arithmeticae as the starting point for mathematical exploration. I enjoyed McKeon and Sherry’s description of their journey [1] and the challenge of their conjectures. They drew attention to a class of polynomials that satisfy what they called the double angle condition ((1) below). Unfortunately, their failure to work with an appropriate definition of cyclotomic polynomials seriously handicapped their computer-aided attempt to classify double angle polynomials. Once this is remedied, a pleasant classification emerges, at least for polynomials with rational coefficients, without recourse to a computer. The main aim of this article is to present this classification. A brief final section considers McKeon and Sherry’s conjectures about irreducible double angle polynomials.

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