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You’re currently reading “Forum Responses,” an entry on C-LIT 146: Class Forum
9.7.06 / 6pm
In class we were discussing the controversy over transparent and opaque technology. If there were cyborgs living amoung us (as in Asimov’s story Evidence), would you prefer to know that the man running for governor, or even the person walking down the street was partially robotic? Or would you rather not know? Does it matter if you can actually see the technology of robots? If they act and functions as humans do, why does it matter if you can see their inner parts?
9.8.06 / 2am
When I was reading “The Girl Who Was Plugged In,” I didn’t think so much about the double. I considered Burke and Delphi as one in the same. For me, the story raised the question of how much one could be disconnected from their identity. It seemed as if Burke was just accidently put in the wrong body; that she was truely, in her mind, Delphi. If the mind and body are separate, then it seems possible, for me at least, for one to get accidently stuck in another’s body. I know this may seem far-fetched, but it is often portrayed in media that one could feel foreign in one’s own skin.
9.9.06 / 6pm
Hearing the essay topics has really proven to be interesting… I expected this class to be so down by the book and like “this is how robots were portrayed in the 1960s” but it turned out to encompass philosophy and different aspects of ..robots and everyone sees it so differently. It really makes you think…
9.10.06 / 3am
I am nominating one more robot of the week. Isaac Asimovs robot R. Daneel Olivaw. This robot is a recurring character in the robot series and later in the foundation series. Daneel is a huminiform robot who first serves as a police detective on one of the first colonized planets. Daneel eventually acquires telepathic abilities similar to the robot from liar but unlike that unfortunate robot Daneel is a model too complex to fall for a 3 law contradiction.
Daneel finds it possible to play the laws off against eachother to gain a large amount of freedom of action, even acquiring the ability harm humans in select cases for the greater good of humanity. Daneel survives with replacement parts for more than 20,000 years during which he has a large influence on human government and survival.
9.11.06 / 12am
I agree with the comment made about Delphi and Burke being the same person, I too viewed them as one. For me it’s difficult to consider their relationship in the sense of “the double” because of the fact that I see Delphi and Burke as one, rather than as separate entities, unlike say Clara and Olimpia who are obviously distinct. Addtionally, I feel as if overtime P. Burke would have completely vanished and Delphi would be left to stand alone. Overall the story was somewhat confusing at times, but more importantly extremely disturbing, especially considering Delphi’s existence is based on P. Burke’s extinction, which again takes away from the idea of “the double.”
9.11.06 / 4am
When discussing transparent and opaque technology, Clark continuously refers to our brain as a computing mechanism made up of invisible, seamless technologies that resist direct control of its different components. More specifically, he claims that it is more difficult to configure and isolate aspects of our mind, than other tools and technologies that we use everyday. Do you believe that the brain’s lack of “flippability” (as he likes to call it) is what distinguishes it from a computer? More importantly, can that defining characteristic be used to distinguish between a human and a robot?
9.11.06 / 4pm
Technology is a huge part of our everyday lives. There are not many of us who can imagine living without our cell phones or computers. About a year and a half ago my computer needed to be repaired and I was without it for over a month, while school was in session. I ended up spending more time on campus to be in computer labs to do homework and check email, only the basic operations. What would you do if you could not use your computer for a month? How would that effect your daily life?
9.12.06 / 5am
I wonder if, as we learn more about the mind, the mind will be more “flippable,” to continue on the thread that Ardit began. Psychology speaks of “insight” and “the observer self.” If a person with a mental illness has insight, they still have their problem, be it delusions or obsessive compulsions or whatever, but they can recognize themselves in the grips of the illness and have some distance from it, as did the man toward the end of the movie “A Beautiful Mind.” The observer self is similar. It is the part of the self that can, through gaining understanding about a habitual self-defeating pattern, say, recognize oneself doing the pattern even while at first feeling helpless in the midst of it, and eventually help the part of the self that acts gain more mastery and less helpless-habit. Imaging of the brain may isolate more and more what all this is about. When C. L. Moore in “No Woman Born” speaks about how we will watch the mouth of an upside-down face because it is in the position we are used to looking at, she is isolating a mental “habit” that could thus be observed and corrected, I suppose. If we suddenly had to look at others that way often, would our brain eventually correct because we need eye contact for understanding, or would we all become good at lip reading of a sort? I haven’t actually tried this to find out if C. L. Moore is even correct – I’ll have to ask my daughter to stand on her head for me, but you can’t really talk well on your head, I think. . .
9.12.06 / 6am
After reading Helen O’Loy I began to question the difference between human beings and humanoids. In this story Helen was exactly like a real woman, she was even a great cook and seemed to have “emotions”. If a real human body is not necessary in order to live, as seen with Helen’s body which was also a creation, and since her thoughts were a sum of the hormones they had implanted in her, then are we just a sum of hormones, chemical balances and imbalances which make up our “unique” self?
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This is the class forum for Comparative Literature 146: Robots, with Lisa Swanstrom. This is where we will post discussion questions, pose research proposals, and share work.
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