Thesis (M.A.(Visual Studies))--University of Pretoria, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references.

It is often remarked that we are entering into a biotech age that will afford us with the unprecedented means to remake human biology. The question is: should we use our imminent techno-scientific powers to ‘enhance’ and even ‘transcend’ our ‘natural’ limitations or remain human ‘as we have always been’? But is this the right question? This dissertation critically examines the human enhancement debate in bioethics and bioethics-adjacent literature. More specifically, it mobilizes a wide range of disciplinary tools to reflexively explore the discursive resonances, effects, and shortcomings of human enhancement as a conceptual framework. Through this exploration, I demonstrate that the well-established therapy/enhancement distinction depends upon deeply humanist ontologies that are insufficient for understanding and addressing the biotechnological ‘crisis’. In turn, I provide a posthumanist approach to thinking human nature, which highlights the relational, embodied, and differential character of subjectivity. Such an approach implies that we have always been cyborgs and, therefore, never been human as such. In doing so, I take a small step towards constructing post-enhancement frameworks for doing bioethics in our posthuman moment.

Chan Kit Sze Amy. / "June 2002." / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 332-354). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / Abstracts in English and Chinese.

This thesis investigates the figure of the cyborg as conceptualised by Donna Haraway in The Cyborg Manifesto (1991). The figure of the cyborg, as a transgressive figure in the late twentieth century within socialist feminist discourse, is problematized with regard to its efficacy as a creature that challenges the constructed nature of gender and contests the boundary between human and machine through its ambiguous nature. Haraway’s notions of the cyborg, which she bases partly on cyborg characters from Science Fiction literature, deny the ocularcentric traditions that have structured gender and the body. Similarly, Haraway does not engage adequately with the figure of the cyborg with regard to situating it historically. This thesis unpacks both the visual and the historical aspects that have structured the cyborg body. By engaging with these concepts, the cyborg emerges as a figure that is identified through visual signifiers of female deviance and pathology. By reading female deviance and pathology on the body of the nineteenth-century hysteric, similarities can be drawn between the hysteric and the cyborg. Through a reading of Alien (1979); Blade Runner (1982); and Star Trek: First Contact (1996) key cyborg texts of the late twentieth century, the figure of the cyborg, and its relation to the deviant pathologised female can be understood when read against the body of the hysteric and how it was visually coded and communicated

This thesis examines a recent trend in contemporary science and speculative fiction to produce new and/or alternative iterations of reproduction that are not limited by biology, gender, or species. Through Donna Haraway’s notion of “cyborg regeneration” and recent critical and theoretical revisionings of this concept, I investigate this trend in three key texts: Jeanette Winterson’s The Stone Gods, Nalo Hopkinson’s Midnight Robber, and Larissa Lai’s long poem “rachel” from her book of poetry Automaton Biographies. Each of these authors offers representations of reproduction that counter gender stereotypes and essentialism and produce new cyborg maternal or explicitly non-maternal figures unbound to patriarchal models of repronormativity and colonialist constructions of the mother. By portraying these nonunitary maternal figures and/or non-reproductive bodies, I argue that these sf texts present new forms of procreation that further feminist conversations about gender, the body, the limits of the human, future populations, and desire.

Submitted by Filipe dos Santos (fsantos@pucsp.br) on 2017-12-15T11:39:10Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Alexandre Manduca.pdf: 3026030 bytes, checksum: 94b697bfa164d58710ac8f4ab0b4dcf2 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-12-15T11:39:10Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Alexandre Manduca.pdf: 3026030 bytes, checksum: 94b697bfa164d58710ac8f4ab0b4dcf2 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-12-04 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / The selection presented in this thesis is the construction of a new human being by means of Biopolitics and of such discourses as the cyborg imaginary, the machine-body and the machine in the biological body. The artificially enhanced body brings life, as a biopolitical device, to a new level, fruit of a symptom of the cultural and communicational imaginary about new possibilities of body management that permeate the appropriation, manipulation and edition of life. It is believed that through a hybrid body the human being would be able to distend and expand itself in order to embrace machinic devices and to serve as an object within the capitalist logic and the consumption society. The Cyborgism in literature and in cinema contributes to this imaginary of a new human being who might be different ‒ a next human, from the classic Frankenstein’s monster to the most recent science fiction films, in which hybrid beings are patterns of overcoming a body that looks obsolete. Biopolitics reinforces this moment in a conceptual and precise way when it transfers to the human the management of one's own life, as observed both in Michel Foucault and in the studies of Giorgio Agamben, Antonio Negri and Nikolas Rose, the main guiding principle of this work. In such scenario, one sees a new journey of the next human, who, through the body, undergoes mutations and is extended by use of machinic experiments, such as grafts, prostheses, chips and silicon. These are potentialized for physically disabled people and for assistive technologies; also, in the Bioidentity phenomenon and in the quality of a body extended to all possible apparatuses, as a biopolitical element that does not cease to be biological. The trajectory of this thesis is to discuss the human as an unfinished project, not as a hybrid body or as a cyborg, but a body ready for the inclusion of the machine in the human through the interference in the DNA. It becomes thus pure information, without ceasing to be biological. The machine in the biological is the extended body, opening the possibility of adapting to the new machinic devices / O recorte apresentado nesta tese é a construção de um novo ser humano por meio da biopolítica e dos discursos do imaginário ciborgue, do corpo-máquina e da máquina no corpo biológico. O corpo artificialmente incrementado eleva a vida, enquanto dispositivo biopolítico, a um novo patamar, fruto de um sintoma do imaginário cultural e comunicacional sobre novas possibilidades de gestão do corpo, que permeiam a apropriação, manipulação e edição da vida. Acredita-se que, mediante um corpo híbrido, o ser humano possa se distender e expandir-se para abraçar aparatos maquínicos e possa servir como objeto dentro da lógica capitalista e da sociedade de consumo. O ciborguismo presente na literatura e no cinema contribui para esse imaginário de um novo ser humano que poderá ser diferente ‒ um próximo humano, desde o clássico monstro de Frankenstein, até os mais recentes filmes de ficção científica, nos quais os seres híbridos são padrões de superação de um corpo que parece obsoleto. A biopolítica reforça esse momento de forma conceitual e precisa quando transfere ao humano a administração da própria vida, o que pode ser observado tanto em Michel Foucault, como nos estudos de Giorgio Agamben, Antonio Negri e Nikolas Rose, principal norteador deste trabalho. Nesse horizonte, avista-se uma nova jornada do próximo humano, que, por meio do corpo, sofre mutações e é ampliado com experimentos maquínicos, como enxertos, próteses, chips e silício. Estes são potencializados para os deficientes físicos e para as tecnologias assistivas, no fenômeno da bioidentidade, e na qualidade de um corpo estendido a todos os aparatos possíveis, como elemento biopolítico que não deixa de ser biológico. A trajetória desta tese é a de discutir o humano como um projeto inacabado, não como um corpo híbrido ou ciborgue, mas um corpo pronto para a inclusão da máquina no humano por meio da interferência no DNA, tornando-se pura informação sem deixar de ser biológico. A máquina no biológico é o corpo estendido, abrindo a possibilidade de adaptar-se aos novos aparatos maquínicos

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-29T14:23:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dayse Alvares de Morais Silva.pdf: 2856273 bytes, checksum: ea5769069b450d7552ddae8a438d1815 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-11-03 / The research aims to analyze the formation of a Temporary Autonomous Zone (TAZ) in the network and the relationship of the bodies of the components of TAZ with virtual tools. To achieve this overall objective, the researcher uses the theoretical foundation of: Hakim Bey (2001), Michel Foucault (1987), Clifford Geertz (1978), Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1999) and Donna J. Haraway (2000), discussing the concepts of culture, perception, power relations and bodies in contemporary society both online and offline. The research methodology is presented through netnography, theoretically based Hine (2000) and Kozinets (2002). In research there is a perceived need to integrate netnography with other instruments of data collection: mixed form and discourse analysis. The results achieved in the research are: the interactions between bodies/virtual tools have generated a model of stimulus-response in some subjects who participated in the experiment, not causing a deeper interactivity with the virtual tool. We also had bodies in which the interaction body/virtual tools transformed the relationship with the world and his own need for change, modifying his feeling to touch the world, its social context, offering their bodies for a freer contact and reviewing their existence in a space marked by discourses of power / A pesquisa busca analisar a formação de uma Zona Autônoma Temporária (TAZ) na rede e a relação dos corpos dos componentes da TAZ com ferramentas virtuais. Para alcançar esse objetivo geral, a pesquisadora busca o embasamento teórico em: Hakim Bey (2001), Michel Foucault (1987), Clifford Geertz (1978), Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1999) e Donna J. Haraway (2000), discutindo os conceitos de cultura, percepção, relações de poder e corpos na sociedade contemporânea online e offline. A metodologia de pesquisa é apresentada por meio da netnografia, tendo como referencial teórico Hine (2000) e Kozinets (2002). Na pesquisa percebe-se uma necessidade de integrar a netnografia com outros instrumentos de coleta de dados: formulário misto e análise do discurso. Os resultados alcançados na pesquisa foram: as interações entre corpos/ferramentas virtuais geraram um modelo de estímulo-resposta em alguns sujeitos que participaram do experimento, não ocasionando uma interatividade mais profunda com a ferramenta virtual. Tivemos também corpos nos quais a interação corpo/ferramentas virtuais transformou a relação com o mundo e a sua própria necessidade de mudança, modificando sua sensação ao tocar o mundo, seu contexto social, dispondo seus corpos para um contato mais livre e revendo sua existência em um espaço marcado por discursos de poder

In the last forty years, significant developments in neuroscience, psychology, and robotic technology have been cause for major trend changes in the philosophy of mind. One such shift has been the reallocation of focus from entirely brain-centered theories of mind to more embodied, embedded, and even extended answers to the questions, what are cognitive processes and where do we find such phenomena? Given that hypotheses such as Clark and Chalmers‘ (1998) Extended Mind or Hutto‘s (2006) Radical Enactivism, systematically undermine the organism-bound, internal, and static pictures of minds and allow instead for the distribution of cognitive processes among brains, bodies, and worlds, a worry that arises is that the very subject of cognitive science, the ‗cognizer‘ will be hopelessly opaque, its mind leaking out into the world all over the place, thereby making it impossible to rein in and properly study. A seemingly unrelated and yet parallel trend has also taken place in feminist theorizing about the body over the last forty years. Whereas feminism of the 1970s and early 1980s tended to view ‗the body‘ as the site and matter of biological sex, while gender was a more fluid and socially constituted mode of existence, more recent feminist theory has questioned the givenness of bodies themselves. In other words, rather than seeing gender categories as manifestations of the already given sexed body, thinkers such as Butler (2000) and Lorber (1992) argue that the very notion of a body is often a product of scientific inquiry, which is itself a product of the power structures aiming to maintain a rigid binary between feminine and masculine gender roles. If the world at large plays such a constitutive role in determining who we are, then this implies that the tools we use, the language we speak, and the power relationships in which we are enmeshed are components of what it means to be embodied in any genuine sense. For thinkers like Haraway (1988) the image of the cyborg is most fitting for this new understanding of embodied subjects, as the cyborg is a coupling of machine and human. Gender and even biological sex will always be a technologically hybridized ‗monster‘ consisting of matter, machine, and mind. The overall aim of my project is thus to bring the two concurrent developments in theorizing about embodied subjects into discourse. As the cyborg features largely in recent feminist thought about embodiment, so too has it been a prominent metaphor in philosophy of mind, ever since Clark (2003) claimed that we ought to think of our ‗selves‘ more appropriately as Natural-Born Cyborgs. I therefore focus on this imagery as I go on to make the argument that this distributed account of cognition as well as of sexual identity is more fruitful for making progress in understanding ‗the human‘ more generally. Likewise, I argue that bringing the discussion of sex and gender into the arena of an otherwise asexual philosophy of mind, will shed light on some important facets of embodiment that have been overlooked but that ought to be addressed if we are to have an adequate account of ‗the proper subject of cognitive science.‘ My chapters include 1) a survey of the discourse between science and philosophy of mind leading to these embodied and extended approaches, 2) a first attempt at defending the extended mind thesis, 3) a discussion of how even the supposed resolution to the objections raised against extended cognition fails to properly take into account just how problematic subjectivity is, regardless of its being defined entirely organismic or not, as organisms themselves are highly malleable and socially constituted, 4) an explanation concerning how the same problematization of embodied subjectivity is ongoing in feminist theory, especially considering the phenomenology of transgendered embodiment, intersex, and technologically mediated bodies, 5) further elaboration on technologically enhanced bodies, exposing what I see as a continuum between bodies modified by ‗hard‘ technologies, such as implants, prostheses or surgeries, and those modified by ‗soft‘ technologies, such as gender norms, the social gaze, and technologically mediated metacognition, and last, 6) an argument for the image of the cyborg to replace ‗organism‘ in cognitive science, along with the corollary argument that cyborgs ought to represent not just embodied minds, but should also be the metaphor in attempting to understand ‗embodiment‘ more generally, which must, at its roots, be underpinned by gender and sexual identity. I argue that the imagery is fitting for the proper study of cognitive subjects as well as sexed and gendered bodies, but moreover, that just as the cyborg suggests a blending and hybridizing of seemingly unrelated elements, so too should the two areas of inquiry, philosophy of mind and feminist theory, pay heed to one another‘s use of this imagery and themselves begin to be more integrative in their approaches.

Mobile technologies are the latest technologies in the realm of communication media. They have the potential to flatten the world by making it a place where gender, age, class, race and nationality can no longer hold us back from being heard and being informed. We have learned that these technologies can help to liberate and empower us, and they can lead to a collective cognition as much as they can distract us from what we need to know about the world we live in. In Greece thousands of years ago, a selected number of Greeks had a public space called the Agora to discuss the issues that concerned the public, meaning each and every citizen. They were the first to be able to create the space and place were the word “democracy” could be brought into language; the very word that was used to start a new war in the era of a communication revolution in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. There are still issues that concern the public today such as wars, global warming, homelessness or human rights which are all matters of our collective cognition. However, today in an age of information revolution the public life of people and their collective cognition is being exercised mostly in the virtual spaces of the Internet. Simultaneously, some physical spaces are being abandoned by people. This thesis investigates the possibility of having physical public spaces that are enriched with communication media and not weakened by it. If architects rethink their designs based on a new understanding of the networked society it might be possible to turn this “networked individualism” into a networked collectivism. However, most designed public spaces fail to offer new possibilities that can transform space for the new generation of users. Here, the aim is to understand a new generation of users. Who have they become as a result of new communication media? And how can architects design in a way that responds to this new subject in architecture?

Mobile technologies are the latest technologies in the realm of communication media. They have the potential to flatten the world by making it a place where gender, age, class, race and nationality can no longer hold us back from being heard and being informed. We have learned that these technologies can help to liberate and empower us, and they can lead to a collective cognition as much as they can distract us from what we need to know about the world we live in. In Greece thousands of years ago, a selected number of Greeks had a public space called the Agora to discuss the issues that concerned the public, meaning each and every citizen. They were the first to be able to create the space and place were the word “democracy” could be brought into language; the very word that was used to start a new war in the era of a communication revolution in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. There are still issues that concern the public today such as wars, global warming, homelessness or human rights which are all matters of our collective cognition. However, today in an age of information revolution the public life of people and their collective cognition is being exercised mostly in the virtual spaces of the Internet. Simultaneously, some physical spaces are being abandoned by people. This thesis investigates the possibility of having physical public spaces that are enriched with communication media and not weakened by it. If architects rethink their designs based on a new understanding of the networked society it might be possible to turn this “networked individualism” into a networked collectivism. However, most designed public spaces fail to offer new possibilities that can transform space for the new generation of users. Here, the aim is to understand a new generation of users. Who have they become as a result of new communication media? And how can architects design in a way that responds to this new subject in architecture?