How we became posthuman : virtual bodies in cybernetics, literature, and informatics / N. Katherine Hayles.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hayles, N. Katherine.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Artificial intelligence.

Cybernetics.

Computer science.

Virtual reality.

Virtual reality in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (366 p.)

Place of Publication:

Chicago, Ill. : University of Chicago Press, 1999.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

In this age of DNA computers and artificial intelligence, information is becoming disembodied even as the ""bodies"" that once carried it vanish into virtuality. While some marvel at these changes, envisioning consciousness downloaded into a computer or humans ""beamed"" Star Trek-style, others view them with horror, seeing monsters brooding in the machines. In How We Became Posthuman, N. Katherine Hayles separates hype from fact, investigating the fate of embodiment in an information age.Hayles relates three interwoven stories: how information lost its body, that is

Contents:

Contents; Acknowledgments; Prologue; 1. Toward Embodied Virtuality; 2. Virtual Bodies and Flickering Signifiers; 3. Contesting for the Body of Information: The Macy Conferences on Cybernetics; 4. Liberal Subjectivity Imperiled: Norbert Wiener and Cybernetic Anxiety; 5. From Hyphen to Splice: Cybernetic Syntax in Limbo; 6. The Second Wave of Cybernetics: From Reflexivity to Self-Organization; 7. Turning Reality Inside Out and Right Side Out: Boundary Work in the Mid-Sixties Novels of Philip K. Dick; 8. The Materiality of Informatics; 9. Narratives of Artificial Life

10. The Semiotics of Virtuality: Mapping the Posthuman11. Conclusion: What Does It Mean to be Posthuman?; Notes; Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780226321394 (electronic book)

9781282538764

1282538764

9780226321394

0226321398

OCLC:

609856880

Publisher Number:

2027/heb05711 hdl