The reading this week touched on the issue of what it means to be human. It analyzed Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Androids emotions were artificial – yet some like John Isidore and Rachel Rosen had the ability to feel empathy, a basic human quality sucked out of life in this post apocalyptic world. This seemingly paralleled with the 1960s of real life society. Other parallels could be found – the government and their propaganda and drafting of minority groups for war. In the book, the government is apathetic, proliferating propaganda and dominating the people. Likewise, today’s governments wield such power, mostly through technology and arms, that they could destroy the world if they lose empathy, just as it was in the fictional book mentioned.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Week 10 - Blade Runner
Blade Runner is a cyberpunk genre movie based on P.K Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? It's message is that humanity relies on empathy - the one emotion that the replicants in the future world struggle to replicate. The more advanced replicants, however, such as Rachel and Roy Batty, start to learn more and more in their attempts to be considered human, prompting the question what makes someone human? If technological advancements in the future mean we can create artificial consciousness, the gap between human and robot will change, and the definition of what it means to be human will likely change as well.
The reading this week touched on the issue of what it means to be human. It analyzed Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Androids emotions were artificial – yet some like John Isidore and Rachel Rosen had the ability to feel empathy, a basic human quality sucked out of life in this post apocalyptic world. This seemingly paralleled with the 1960s of real life society. Other parallels could be found – the government and their propaganda and drafting of minority groups for war. In the book, the government is apathetic, proliferating propaganda and dominating the people. Likewise, today’s governments wield such power, mostly through technology and arms, that they could destroy the world if they lose empathy, just as it was in the fictional book mentioned.
The reading this week touched on the issue of what it means to be human. It analyzed Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Androids emotions were artificial – yet some like John Isidore and Rachel Rosen had the ability to feel empathy, a basic human quality sucked out of life in this post apocalyptic world. This seemingly paralleled with the 1960s of real life society. Other parallels could be found – the government and their propaganda and drafting of minority groups for war. In the book, the government is apathetic, proliferating propaganda and dominating the people. Likewise, today’s governments wield such power, mostly through technology and arms, that they could destroy the world if they lose empathy, just as it was in the fictional book mentioned.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment