The ghost in the machine
humanity and the problem of self-aware information
pp. 371-379
in: Michael Hauskeller, Thomas D. Philbeck, Curtis D. Carbonell (eds), The Palgrave handbook of posthumanism in film and television, Berlin, Springer, 2015Abstract
Theories of posthumanism place considerable faith in the power of information-processing. Some foresee a potential point of self-awareness in computers as processing ability continues to increase exponentially, while others hope for a future in which their minds can be uploaded to a computer, thereby gaining a form of non-corporeal immortality. Such notions raise questions of whether humans can be reduced to their own information-processing: Are we thinking machines? Are we the sum of our memories? Many science fiction (SF) films have grappled with similar questions; this chapter considers two specific ideas through the lens of these films. First, I will consider the roles that memory and emotion play in our conception of humanity. Second, I will explore the question of what it means to think by examining the trope of sentient networks in film.