In Hari Kunzru’s Wired article “You Are Cyborg,” he argues that, “In conversation, when people describe something as natural, they’re saying that it’s just how the world is; we can’t change it.” Kunzru’s interview with Donna Haraway illuminates the need to do away with the binary view of natural and artificial as two separate entities, suggesting that, ultimately, what is most natural is the idea of change itself and the dynamic nature of the human; in other words, the unwillingness and the inability to remain unchanged is the only thing that does not.
Haraway posits that “life is messier than” binary distinctions when it comes to not only the artificial and the natural, but in other aspects such as morality and gender. It comes as no surprise that someone who refers to herself as a “cyborg” would think so. What does come as a surprise is that this identity she self-applies is not hyperbole, which I immediately expected it to be. She describes the intimacy between people and technology convincingly, so much so that, after reading the article, I cannot deny the accuracy of such a name. However, that application does a lot in the way of emphasizing the binary itself. I read “cyborg” and I think “Robo-cop.” So I don’t like it.
Anyway: Identifying as a “cyborg,” a combination of the so-called artificial with the so-called natural, does as Haraway professes, allow people to reconstruct themselves, a most natural of human inclinations. N. Catherine Hayles emphasizes the desire to transcend the physical limitations of the body and the “natural” world through technology in her book, How We Became Posthuman, while touching on that other human desire, that of immortality. She says that “In a world despoiled by overdevelopment [and] overpopulation…it is comforting to think that physical forms can recover their pristine purity by being reconstituted as informational patterns in a multidimensional computer space” (36). I would argue that Hayles takes too great a leap here, and that the “cyberspace body” that is “immune to blight and corruption” is without the very human nuances of that which is physical. Real life is hardly “pristine.”
However, for some, the stakes are higher. The benefit of the physical/digital integration for people like wilde Cunningham are frankly astounding. What I like about this article, more than the idea that individuals with serious physical limitations have, via “Second Life,” the ability to take flight, is that it examines the concept of the individual as a dynamic part of a group. Aside from the confusion this causes in pronoun usage (which I found charming) this concept highlights the disappearance of the greatest of binaries: that of the self and the other. While some might insist that that distinction is a natural one, I contend that it is natural too to reach out to one another, something cyberspace engenders and continues to prove.
I like how you titled your post “I am not a Cyborg.” You’re resistant to identifying with such a strong title, as it entails. I too, wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m a cyborg. Like you, I think it borders on hyperbole, while at the same time it may actually be a reality for some people. I suppose it’s all perspective. I think the Second Life site is pretty crazy. It sort of reminds me of the Sims, but much, much more personal. The truth is that many people do live their lives through the Internet because of whatever handicaps they have. For some, it offers hope. But I think it’s a false sense of hope. I guess that doesn’t actually matter though…
Thanks, Adina. Have you actually tried Second Life? I remember watching an episode of “The Office” in which some of the characters use it, and I thought, Interesting. On the show, it’s kind of portrayed as being ridiculous to the point of being sad, and I get that, because SL a forum in which people tend to portray themselves the way they want to be seen – which is sometimes highly different from who they physically are. There’s a kind of vulnerability in that sense.
So, of course I’m (not-so) secretly dying to try it.
Hi Shannon! Great blog. Being defined as a cyborg freaks me out a little bit, too. But, I think what is core to the “human-as-cyborg” philosophy is the belief that our bodies, our minds, and what we understand as ourselves can be changed by and integrated with technology. I would contend this as more of an existential issue than a technological one.
Hi Natalie! I agree that we are heavily informed as humans by machinery; but I also feel that we are informed by the names we apply to ourselves. So, isn’t there a danger to calling ourselves “cyborgs”? Doesn’t that fundamentally change who we see ourselves as? When I think of machines, I think of purpose-driven objects that lack empathy. Unfortunately, that’s how the cyborg has been culturally skewed.
I thought the same when imagining a cyborg. I thought of Terminator. I do like Natalie’s example of Ripley from Alien as a cyborg.
Today I thought about how Siri could be a cyborg. We hear a female voice, but she is all information based. We don’t recognize her gender any other way than by listening.
I like the example of Siri. Clearly, “she” possesses qualities of both the machine and the human; I think the difference has to do with the body as being either fundamentally human or fundamentally machine. I suppose that the more those identifiers become blurred, the more apt the term “cyborg” becomes.