tl86cyberpunk

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Response #8

Film: Mad Max Fury Road

Reading/Video: Noam Chomsky The Alien Perspective on Humanity-Jung and Naiv

Mad Max has catastrophe themes and government themes. Government themes in the sense of overthrowing a government that is corrupt by a man who hoards the water to seem like a god to people who are thirsting to death in a desert. This world is set up in a wasteland where people must shoot each other constantly to survive. The human race has gone back to tribal instincts with some helpful technology. The main goal is to get the wives to a safe place because they no longer want to be property, or their children to be warlords, and when that goal isn’t met they decide to take over their old home. They decide to also let the people have the water they deserve, because it’s a basic need someone with greedy intentions shouldn’t have control over.

The video The Alien Perspective on Humanity talks about government and the threat of nuclear war and how we are making things to destroy ourselves. This relates back to Mad Max Fury Road because that world is destroyed by humans and now they have radiation sickness and can barely survive. This very well could become our reality if we are not careful. The thought of an alien watching over us and seeing an advanced society that has the means to do wonderful things, but instead is making weapons and fighting wars is a bit depressing. We are a bit of a disappointment. However in that disappointment there is also a glimmer of hope. The mainstream may not be talking about important issues, but someone is. There are people that are at least trying to make a change even if they are small. This relates to Mad Max because the woman that takes the wives to bring them somewhere safe is rebelling against corruption and someone who is basically a dictator. They also search for something positive in a wasteland, which really shows the human spirit when it isn’t corrupt by greed and hate. They also use that spirit to overthrow the dictatorship and give water back to the people and not hoard it to themselves. If an alien were to watch us it would have a lot to be disappointed in, but in desperate times people do try to come together to fix what has become broken.

Would aliens be disappointed with us if they saw our behavior? Would they join us in war? Personally, war is disappointing to me and it makes me feel like we are taking steps in the wrong direction, but we honestly don’t know if other creatures and civilizations are just like us. Were just children that are trying to make our way through life, but will we kill each other in the end or will we find solutions to more important problems and flourish?

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FINAL

I did these two digital drawings with inspiration from the book The Girl Who Was Plugged In. These were made from the readings and could possibly be book covers or posters for this book.

[tl86cyberpunk]

Response #7

Movie: They Live

Readings/videos: The Perverts Guide to Ideology, The Society of Spectacle

 In the film They Live and the readings and video I watched, The Perverts guide to Ideology and The Society of Spectacle, I noticed a common theme. They all spoke of reality and how we view reality. A common topic was the veil we put on ourselves in our daily lives. We tend to be marketed to on a constant basis and demanded to like the things advertised to us. The Perverts Guide to Ideology mentioned Coke as an example of this. We are demanded to enjoy Coke and we buy it even though it doesn’t help our thirst. We live in a world that lies to us. Coke won’t help us be less thirsty it just tastes nice and we think it does because of the ads. Both the reading and the video talked about spectacle and how we don’t realize what the ads are really doing. They show us what we really want while showing the product as well. Our brains connect the two thus creating a sell. This is a dangerous consumer culture narrative. It can cause issues with spending habits. In the film They Live, the character puts on the glasses and sees the skeleton people inside human suits, but he also sees the truth behind the ads everywhere in the city. This film is mentioned in The Perverts Guide to Ideology and it talks about how we have to put glasses on to see the truth, because we are surrounded and immersed in the fake. The fake is our reality however. We have to be aware about the ads being shown to us and the things being told to us because they are not always the truth, and our best interest is not being measured. We seem to be more aware of how ads manipulate us now than we used to be. Someone who goes through life not aware of these tactics are in danger of spending on things they don’t need and constantly feeling the anxiety and pressure to be a good consumer. Our society is based on the foundations of consumerism and obeying that process. If we sway from that process, we are looked down upon. Honestly, They Live is an example of a very extreme case, but it can add good commentary on this issue. People are scared to truly see what is in front of them and would rather live blinded. No one likes to be forced out of their comfort zone and seeing life for the market it has become really pushes people and makes them uncomfortable. Hopefully more people end up noticing these issues and maybe stop the ads from taking over. In the metro in D.C. the ads now use sound instead of just being silent posters. We are being forced to interact with things we don’t necessarily want to. Free will is being challenged and people just need to be aware of that.

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Response #6

Film:

12 Monkeys

Reading:

Epilogue: Cyberpunk and Memory

When we watched 12 Monkeys in class I was really taken aback by how easy it was to make someone who isn’t crazy, think they actually are. James Cole was completely sane in the sense of his mission and what was going on, but the constant bantering from everyone else that he was insane drove him to that insanity. In Epilogue: Cyberpunk and Memory, it is mentioned that in cyberpunk stories memory is often easily manipulated and changed to fit the narrative. This is true, but to is also true in real life. Our memories can be changed by people implanting false recounts of things multiple times, or if someone has a horrible memory they could just be told something happen and they believe it. This is a horrifying look at how easy people can be manipulated. In a way this is psychological horror. Cyberpunk can be considered horror if you have fears in the subjects its displaying. I personally have a fear of being manipulated, it’s a horrible feeling, so this bothers me and my subconscious. We should really be careful with our memories and remember to stay guarded around people that have a tendency to try and manipulate situations in their favor. Psychology is also something we need to keep in check for the same reason. Yes, they can be trying to help us, but they might also have their own agenda and be using it to get what they want. In the movie the entire time they just wanted to call someone crazy and put them away, they didn’t care if James Cole was right or not. The fact they made this man believe he was insane just by telling him really showcases this underlying motive. They didn’t really assess the man they just assumed he was nuts from the beginning it seems. People who are manipulative also have a tendency to make you think your emotions are overreactions and wrong. This can affect how you perceive yourself and can even change how you recount memories. This is an implant of someone else’s opinion on what you are experiencing. Psychology and memory play hand in hand with each other. Our sense of time can also be manipulated by others and even our own memories. People tend to forget what day it is just because it feels different or they lose track of time. Right now, I just realized its 2 in the morning and I have been writing this for a few hours. Our sense of time isn’t always as accurate as we would like to believe it is. Time is a concept we made though to keep up with scheduling and daily life. So, who is to say it is actually 2 in the morning. Who is to say I spent time with my friends today and not yesterday. We put weight and hope that our memories are accurate and not implanted, and that the time we are experiencing is accurate.

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Response #5

Film:

Alien

Reading:

Introduction to War in the Age of Intelligent Machines

Even though alien does not focus on AI and it is more of a monster movie, the themes are still prevalent. AI can either be a wonderful thing or a terrifying thing. When reading the “Introduction to War in the Age of Intelligent Machines,” I realized how terrifying AI could possibly be and the fact it wasn’t just fiction. While watching something like Alien we do get scared by the fact the AI, that looked really human, ended up betraying the crew. The company used the technology against the crew basically and made it into a weapon. That is kind of what this reading talked about. The fact we mostly want to use this awesome technology for weapons or war says a lot about human beings. We really do seem to love destruction and power. The only reason they wanted the alien was to make a weapon from it. They weren’t really interested in how the Alien lived or if they could communicate with it. We don’t really sit and think how to coexist with things, we either try to destroy or use other organism and things we create. If we were to let AI get into the wrong hands it could also be used for destruction. It could also get fed up with being used for those purposes and think humans should just disappear. This is just a toxic way of thinking. We shouldn’t make things just to use them to hurt others. Things like Alien end up happening. The alien in Alien could have whipped out the human race, but it was more important to get a weapon. That company let an entire crew of intelligent people die, except one, without their knowledge of the goal just because they wanted to get technology to probably harm other humans. Technology can be amazing and help people and further our exploration of the stars and keep us safe, but after reading about military weapons and seeing how we treat each other I am not sure if that is ever really the goal. If our goal is always to just make a bigger weapon and to hurt each other, do we really deserve AI? Do we deserve any technology? I do worry that one day in the future we could destroy ourselves, because we think we can do whatever with our inventions.

The reading also shed light on if robots and AI had a historian. I had a moment of reflection. I don’t make weapons, but as a human being a type of villain in someone else’s story really bothers me. It made me wonder if the human race as a hole would be a villain and if they would hate us if they got to a point of feeling. I can’t imagine being created just to be a slave or to be used to hurt others. Was the AI in Alien really the bad guy? Or was it just more humans?

[tl86cyberpunk]

Final Project Proposal

-2 to 3 digital and traditional drawings.

-Based on the scenes of a book I read (I'm still deciding. I havent read one well yet) i plan to make two or three of these drawings then edit them in photoshop. The sketch will develope while I read, and after I will push it further.

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Response #4

Movies:

Gattaca

Robocop

Tetsuo

Video:

Advancing the Front

Readings:

Cyborg Manifesto

 The themes exspressed in all these films and the reading, is the idea of modifying the human body. Cyborgs are already a thing, the adding of glasses could be considered this. We modify our bodies in many ways that seem simple to us now but are actually pretty advanced. If we take this idea of modification and fixing ourselves, there could come a time when we go overboard. In Robocop they took a person’s dead body and changed it into a machine. The main character had no say in what was happening to him, this is when advancement could be considered toxic. Yes, we should advance as a species and get better, but we shouldn’t force that on everyone if that isn’t their desire. Robocop is an example of taking this too far and harming an individual. Tetsuo is an example of humans taking technology too far to the point they fetishize it and become overtaken with mental and machinery. Things like pacemakers are good because they can make people have a longer more normal life. Becoming a full-blown machine just makes you a robot with some human elements. I think this wouldn’t be considered a cyborg or good. It would be like taking a robot and adding human organs to see where it goes. In Gattaca they take making a perfect human and baby to the extreme to the point they discriminate against people who where made naturally. Nothing is wrong with having flaws, flaws and mishaps are usually what drive humans to do amazing things. If we breed out or genetically remove all of the flaws in the human DNA were not human we become a different species, or a different kind of human. This is not always bad, but it should be examined on how we would treat these types of humans. In Gattaca they got special treatment, which should not be how we go about these things. Technology is always advancing, and we can’t really stop it, but we need to learn how to coexist in a healthy manner. We can’t become too reliant, we can’t be the technology, but we can use it to help our daily lives. We need to find out how to deal with laws and discrimination if genetics start to become tampered with, so that we can avoid the common themes in these movies of discrimination. We should welcome technology and change, but not to the point we don’t prep for it or understand what we are putting in or on our bodies. Education is important to move forward. Cyborgs are the future we can’t avoid, but we can plan for. We should be excited yet cautious and we have these films and writings to think of different scenarios.

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Response #3

Movies: Pulse, The Entire History of You

Reading/Ted Talk: Connected, But Alone?

The themes expressed in all of these readings and movies is isolation. Isolation in society, in our families, in our friendships, and just in our lives. In Pulse the world is taken over by ghosts. Depression in Japan and its high suicide rates is obviously an inspiration this this movie. These people are under so much pressure by society they feel alone, and they end their lives or isolated themselves. In the movie the first suicide is of a man that had friends, and people that cared about him, but he saw the forbidden room (something on the media, which I found symbolic) and was so overcome with the emotions he had he hung himself. In The Entire History of You the main character becomes obsessed with the body language his wife has at a party and ruins his life. Yes, she did cheat on him, but he has done this behavior before. He obsessed and could not disconnect with his technology in his head to really connect with his family and solve the issue. The entire family was pulled apart. The wife also decided to lie instead of telling the truth and this shows how people were losing touch, they can’t work through their relationship issues, and instead decide to cheat to spite each other. The man also did spiteful things instead of being a mature adult about the situation, because I feel he simply did not know how to properly communicate. In the ted talk I really sat and thought about the things she said about how we are so reliant on technology that we have no idea how to be alone. In the movie Pulse, a big issue is finding other people because they do fear being left alone after everyone dies. No one in society right now can always handle being disconnected. I get fidgety if I don’t know where my phone is. I hate spending time by myself in my room. When watching this ted talk it really jumped out at me how bad our reliance on technology has gotten. Not just for helping us do jobs, but also emotionally. We care more for robots than people sometimes, because we think they are more human than us. When you really sit and analyze the movies and the ted talk, you start to worry if we don’t fix this problem. Black Mirror episodes are not that far from reality, people can put chips in them now. The technology isn’t that advanced concept wise, its just a camera to keep your memories. This small technology can cause a huge problem with communication and life and mental illness. It can cause people to overthink and ruin their lives. If were all so plugged in and something like with Pulse happens we wouldn’t stand a chance. The ted talks had a point about needing to realize the dangers of our situation and work to better this so we can communicate and be there for each other. So we can learn to be alone.

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Response #2

Movie: Robocop

Reading: What Robocop Tells Us about the Neoliberal City, Then and Now

           In the reading it talked about how Robocop played with the theme of privatization and building over “old Detroit” to make anew Detroit. When watching this movie, you could see how the privatization of everything was becoming corrupt, this tends to happen when you give certain people, or groups of people too much power. The company basically owned the city, then owned the police force, and even mentioned being the military. However, when owning these places, they also wanted to tear it down or take it apart to implant their own versions. An example would be the robots for the police force, and how they were tearing down a city people lived in to build one for those who could a afford it. When you privatize that much stuff the welfare of the people isn’t investigated, these companies want money in the fasted way they can. They may say its for the better of the city or country, but in the end, it is not always benefiting the ones living there or working there. It puts money into the company’s pocket. The theme of building over the old and making new things is also a huge theme talked about in the movie and reading. The cooperation does this as well on the inside, with the younger people trying to push out the old. The company wants to build on top of a city that already has its history and citizens but doesn’t care. They are treated like the trash on the street needing to be thrown out. They wanted the bad guys arrested and cleaned up off the street, but what about the workers? Or just the people that live there. They have no say in what’s happening, which is concerning. Where will they live or work? What will happen to them if they can’t afford this new life? We don’t get these answers because the company doesn’t care. What happens when the police force is replaced by the robotic cops? Privatization brings up a lot of questions and concerns. Yeah it can help with cleaning up the area and making it look nicer, which is a good thing. However, it doesn’t really the actual people trying to make a living there if they have no help to be better as well. Change is only a good thing if it actually helps people. I feel as though these companies wouldn’t bother with that. They just assume most of the people that live in “old Detroit” are all criminals, even though some of those people are also being victims of the crimes, like the cops. The cops working with the Robocops would be a great idea, but not the robots taking over the jobs. If something goes wrong, it could mean disaster. Robocop explores privatization and the dangers of that concept. It also looks on the concept of getting rid of the old to bring in new things, and that isn’t always the best idea.

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Welcome To The Machine Response #1

I chose the Film Metropolis and the book Marx and Metropolis: The Farce of Religion in the Face of Dystopia by Mary K Leigh.

The themes expressed in these works have a lot to do with dystopia, revolution, and alienation. The book talks about the alienation of the workers, because of the machine. These workers have become a part of the machine, which leads to their revolution. They use religion as a reasoning, but I find this may be an excuse rather. No one really wants to start a revolution against a stronger power that has suppressed them. It is a huge risk, by using religion as an excuse it seems less like its for selfish reasons. The workers in this movie were so alienated because of their jobs the main character didn’t even realize what was going on. He took it upon himself to take the ten-hour shift and the entire time wanted it to end. He felt their suffering, and thus understood them. This story is based on dystopia because the rich and well off are living a wonderful life while common people are hidden away and worked almost to death. Some of the workers even died while working. This city was and is being built on the backs of others who get no credit and have every right to start a revolution, they live and work in horrible conditions. Someone has to do the work, but it should be evenly distributed and not ten hours a day. These people see Maria as a savior or someone who talks of a savior, because they need one. However, their faith in this woman lead them to destroy the machine and rise up, just from the image of her telling them to do so. The mob mentality in this movie is extreme. The way the workers get worked up and excited for a revolution, makes me think further that religion was just an excuse to do so. The real Maria never wanted destruction, she wanted a peaceful change, and they knew that. These people were manipulated by an outside force, the inventor. This can also happen with the state. The father tried to do this, but the inventor had other plans. The workers are doing what others want even while revolting.

               I expected a different ending to this movie, I thought the workers were going to overthrow their leaders so that they could live comfortably. Instead they and the leader shook hands. I am not sure this will solve the problem of the workers being over worked. At the end of the book this is touched on and I can understand why it was a bit jarring. I think in order to really have change the workers have to be either integrated into the above society or the above society integrated below. I don’t think there will ever be a utopia unless there is no below or above. Society doesn’t usually allow equality if it isn’t forced to. Hopefully there would be reforms in this metropolis, ones that make this world more equal.