This week’s SHAPE seminar will be by Prof. Jane Goodall (formerly UWS) whose talk will be titled “Robotics and the Resurgence of Animism”.
Abstract: If a scientifically educated public is one that rejects magical and symbolic interpretations of events, are we seeing the end of animism? To put it another way, have we got to a point where an animistic view of the world is definitively at odds with a scientific view? Cultures of anime and animation are curiously placed in this cognitive stand-off: on the one hand, they are often deeply invested in technological hypothesis, and informed by sophisticated knowledge of advanced technologies, both in their chosen story lines and in their development of creative media. Some of the most celebrated robotics specialists have become interested in ‘the uncanny valley,’ the point at which a robotic construction so accurately resembles a human that it gives us the creeps. Perhaps animism continues to haunt the technological mind. Time: Fri May 9, 10.30am Place: Muniment Room, S401 (under the central clock tower, level 1, Main Quad, USYD) David Dr. David Macarthur | Senior Lecturer & UG Coordinator Philosophy Department, SOPHI | FASS THE UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY NSW, 2006 | Australia Ph: +61 2 9351 3193 http://www.arts.usyd.edu.au/departs/philos/staff/profiles/dmacarthur.shtml
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