Week 3 Popular Media Review

Anthropomorphism in Westworld

This weeks reading was all about the relationship human beings have with technology, particularly technology involving robotics and our growing ties with the internet. Hollywood has been using satire to illustrate man's reliance on technology for decades. From episodes of the Twilight Zone, to Bladerunner, to Terminator, the media has long been obsessed with the scary thought of humanity relying too much on robotics to our ultimate end. Most recently the fear of robotic takeover has been illustrated in HBO's Westworld. 

Westworld is a series that follows the people behind the scenes of an amusement park populated solely by robots (or androids) that are completely indistinguishable from a human being. People come to Westworld to role-play what life may have been like in the American West during the 1800's, and to spend their vacation acting without consequence. You can murder, rob, rape, save, or maybe even love the android characters to your heart's content. Since they're androids and not people, ethics are thrown out the window in this amusement park. Needless to say, each guest who attends Westworld is going to have their own approach to how they are going to enjoy the park, and sometimes the results are shocking. What reminds me of Turkle's book however, is the fear that human beings may develop more empathy for a robot than they will for other people.

Obviously robots now are much more primitive than the ones portrayed in Westworld, but as artificial intelligence is developed (and the idea of commercial sex robots is apparently soon to become a reality), I think that both as educators and as members of society we need to be aware of the impact this technology can have on our human relationships. Turkle mentions a man in chapter seven who is virtually married in Second Life and married in real life. The man finds it easier to speak with his virtual partner rather than his real wife, and personally I cannot see how that is healthy or appropriate. If that virtual wife eventually evolves into a sex-robot then I think the impacts it could have on a person's mental health could be very detrimental. Keeping in mind that meaningful human relationships are superior to ties with technology or worse, ties with technology meant to mimic human behavior is going to paramount in the coming decades, particularly for those of us who are going to influence subsequent generations in our own classrooms. 

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