Alien phenomenology, or, What it's like to be a thing / Ian Bogost.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bogost, Ian.

Series:

Posthumanities

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ontology.

Metaphysics.

Phenomenology.

Physical Description:

166 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 22 cm.

Other Title:

What it's like to be a thing

Place of Publication:

Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, [2012]

Summary:

Humanity has sat at the center of philosophical thinking for too long. The recent advent of environmental philosophy and posthuman studies has widened our scope of inquiry to include ecosystems, animals, and artificial intelligence; yet the vast majority of the stuff in our universe, and even in our lives, remains beyond serious intellectual concern.

In Alien Phenomenology, or What It's Like to Be a Thing, Ian Bogost develops an object-oriented ontology that puts things at the center of being-a mode of thought in which nothing exists any more or less than anything else, in which humans are not the sole or even primary elements of interest. And unlike experimental phenomenology or the philosophy of technology, Bogost's alien phenomenology takes for granted that all beings interact with and perceive one another. This experience, however, withdraws from human comprehension and becomes accessible only through speculative thought based on metaphor.

Providing a new approach for understanding the experience of things as things, Bogost also calls on philosophers to restructure their craft. Drawing on his background as a videogame designer, Bogost encourages professional thinkers to become makers as well-engineers who construct things as much as they think and write about them. Book jacket.

Contents:

Alien phenomenology

Ontography

Metaphorism

Carpentry

Wonder.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780816678976

0816678979

9780816678983

0816678987

OCLC:

759910006