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Chapter

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"human" points to the seriated nature o f these changes. But finally th,. swers to questions about the posthuman w i l l not be found in books, , | least not only in books. Rather, the answers w i l l be ie mutual creatio, i, ,|,, planet full ofhumans struggling to bring into existence a future in whicl i can continu to survive, continu to find meaning for ourselves and ,,, children, an d continu to ponder our kinship w i t h and differences fron 111 . intelligent machines with which our destinies are increasingly entwined.
a i l w K

C O N C L U S I O N

WHAT TO BE

DOES

IT

MEAN

POSTHUMAN?

VV'liat, finally, a r e w e to make of the posthuman? At the b e g i n n i n g o f this ' book, 1 snggested thal the prospect of becoming posthuman both evokes ' terror aud excites pleasure. At the end of the bool- pcrliupi I can s u i n m a i rize tlie implicationsof the posthuman by interroga! i i ir, the JOurces o f this >'terroi a i id pleasure. The terror isrelatvelyeasytoundei si ai id l'osl vvilli its dual eonnolalion ul siipersoding the hiiiiian and i . 11 i i l , 1 lints that l l n i lays n i "llie human" mav lie nunibered S i m u i . i an hers (notably lans Moravee Iml also my U C L A colleague Michael Dyor and many otliers i believe that this is true not only in a general inti lli i tual sense that displaces u n e definition of "human" with another bul also in a < dis tuibingly literal s e n s e that envisions humans displac d as the dominant fornioi l i l e u n i h e planet by intelligent machines. 1 1 i i n i a n s can either go gently inlo ihal i ^ o o d nighl, joining the dinosaurs as a species that once ruled l l i e earth bul is now obsolete, or hang on for a while longer by becoming machines themselves. I n either case, Moravee and like-minded thinkeis believe, llie a e o f llie human is drawing tu a cise. The view echoes llie deeply | i c s s slie si nliments of Warren Me! inlloch in his od age. As noled earlier, he ninarked: " M a n to my mind is about the nastiest, niosl i li si i nei ve ul all llie animis. I don't see any reason, if he can evolve machines that can have more fun than he himself can, why (bey shouldn't take over, enilave us, quite happily. They might have a 1 < il i n o r e fun. Invent bettcrganies iban w e e v e r d i d . " Is it any wonder that faced with suchdismal scenaril IS, most people have understandably negativi i eactions? I f this is whal I be pi >sl human means, why shouldn't it be resisted?
1 2

Fort u n a ! ely, these views do not exhaust the meaningsul I he posthuman. As I have repeatedly argued, human being is first of all cinbodied being, and llie coniplexilies of this embodiment mean that human awareness

2 8 ,

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Eleven
C v

Conclusin

285

unfolds in ways very different from those of intelligence embodied in bernetic machines. Although Moravee s dream of downloading huma] consciousness into a computer would likely come i n for some hard knoeks in literature departments (which tend to be skeptical of any kind of tran scendence but especially of transcendence through technology), literary stud ( s share with Moravee a major blind spot when i t comes to the signifi canee o ^mbo^Tmenty'This blind spot is most evident, perhaps, when literary and cultural critics confront the fields of evolutionary biology. From an evolutionary biologist's point o f view. modern humans, for all their technological prowess, represent an eyeMjjin kln the histoiyoflife, a species faiteo recent to have significant evolutionary impact 011 human hiological behaviors and structures. I n my view, argnments likc lliose ihal jared Diamond advances i n Guns, Gems, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies and Why Sex Is Fun: The Evolution of Human Sexuality si muid be taken scriously. The body is llie net resull ol lliousands of vears of sedimented evolutionary liistorv, and il is naive lo lliink llial ihis hislory dees not affect human behaviors at eveiy level of thoughl and action. Of course, the reflexivity llial loonis large in cyberneles also inhahits evolutionaiy biology. The models proposed by evolutionary biologists havejmcoded within theni cultural attitudes and assuniplions formei I by the same histoi-y they propose to analyze; as with cybernelics, observer and system are reflexively ^uncl up w i t h one another. To take only one example, the computer module model advanced by Jerome H . Barkow, Leda Cosmides, and John Tooby in The Adapted Mind: Evolutionary Psichology and the Generation of Culture to explain hi i m a i M -VI >h il H >nary psychology testifiesa^-l^ast as much to the importance ol Information technologies invsnaping)contemporary worldviews as it does to human brain function. Nevertheless, these reflexivegjhjplexia'eSjdo not negate the importance o f the sedimented history incarnated within the l><ly. In terpreted through inetaphors resonantwith cultural meanings, llie liody itself is acongealed metaphor, aphysical structure whose constrainls a mi possibilities have been formed by an evolutionary histoi-y that intelligent machines do not share. Humans may enter into symbiotic relationships with intelligent machines (already the case, for example, in c o m p u t a as sisted surgery)-they may be displaced by intelUgonTrnachines (already i n effect, for example, at Japanese and American^^embhjplants that use robotic arms for labor); but there is a limit to how^semlessTiumans can be ailiculatedwitli intelligent machines,whichremamdstinctivelydifferent from humans in their embodiments. The terror, then, though I does not yjiisappeaV in this view, tends away from the apocalyptic and toward a more
4 5

modrate view of seriated social, technological, politii al and culi changes.

-al

Whatabonl I he plea^nres? For some people, including me the posthuman evokes 111< rxhlaratingprospect o f gettingout o f some of I he od I >oxes and opening np newways of ihinking about whal being I an ineans. In positing a shill from presenee/absenee lo patleni/raiidoniimKi, I have sought to show 1 K>w these categories can be transfer 1 ied fmni llic4n :ide to arrive at newkindsjof cultural configurations, which may soon rejjder such dtialitiesfibsoli le if they have not already. Thisproei ssol liansformationis fueled/by tensions between-the assumptions encoded m paltern/l andomnessasoppn.' 11 topresence/absence. I n Jacques I ) e i 1 idas perl lanceof presenee/absenee, presence is allied w i t h Logos, God teleologyin general, wilh an originary plenitude that can acl to I signification and give ordei a n d mcaning lo llie trajectoiy of histoi \ '' I 1 11 ol Kric Hayelock,; gothers,demonstrateshowinPlatos HepubUt i b i s viewof originaiy presence authorized a stable, coherentselfthal. ould wilni s, and testify to a sluble c< iherent reality. Through these and othei HUMUS the metaphysics <>l presence front-loadedmeaning into the syslem. Mcaning was guranle'ed because a stable origin existecl. I l is now a familiar story howdeconsli in l i o n exposed the inability o f systems toposll thi iirown origins, thus ungn ding signification and r e n d e r i i i L mea g indeterminate. As ( h e picsence/abscaice hierarchy was deslabih/i d a n d as absence was privili ;g -d ovei pn '.sence, lack displaced plenil 1 a Ir und desire usurped certitude. Imporlanl as these moves have been in l a l e Iwentieth-centmy thoughl l h c \ -. I 11 lool< place within the compass of t h e presenee/absenee dial e<-tic. < lu: leis lack only ifpresenceispositedorassiimed; one isdriven by desire 0111) il the objeel of desire is conceptuali/.ed as something to be possessed |usl as the 1 net aphysicsof presence requin I an originary plenitude lo ai la ulale a stable self, deconstruction required a metaphysics of presence to ai 11< ulale the destabilization of that self. By <un 1 asi pallern/randomness is underlaid by a very different set of assumptions. 111 ibis dialectic, meaning is not front-loai led into the system, and the 0 1 igiu (loes not act to ground signification. As w i I lave seen for multiageni siniulalions, complexity evolves from highly recursive processes being applied l o simple rules. Rather thanproceedingalong a trajectoiy toward a known end, such systems evolve toward an o| 11 luture marked by contingen- \ a n d 111 ipredictability. Meaningisnotguaianleedbyacoherent origin; rather, i l is made possible (but not inevitable) by the blind forc of evolution linding workable solutions within given pai.nneters. Al though pal le 111 li 11 ni iin inally been the privileged term ( (01 example, amongthe
7
1

286

Chapter

Eleven

Conclusin

287

electrical engineers developing information theoiy), rand ness lias _ creasingly been seen to play a fruitful role i n the evolution orcoin])lc.\ y _ tems. For Chris Langton and Stuart Kauffman, chaos accelerates the evolution of biological and artificial life; for Francisco Vrela, randomness ls the froth of noise from which coherent microstates evolve and to which living systems owe their capacity for fast, flexible response; for Henri Ulan noise i s llie bodv's inurinuring from which emerges coniplex coniiiiiimealion between dilerenl levis in a biological svslem. " Mlhniigli
n S s 8 9 1

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glitechnologieal maslery the ultmale privilegeol inunortality,he an need not be

110I abandoning llie aulonoinolis liberal subjecl bul is expandng its per( (

i ralives mo llie reabn of llie poslbuman. Yel llie poslb

recuperaled back into liberal humanism, or need it be construed as antilniiiian I ocated within the dialctico! pattern/raudoiniiessandgrounded in embodied actuality rather than disembodied inloi nialion, llie posthuinan ollers resources for rethinking the articulation ol humans with intelligent machines. I - M \ plore these resources, let us return lo I'.ale .idea that thoseorgaiiisms ihal sumve will tend lo be the 01 i o s wln ISI mil 1 nal structures are g I metaphors for the complexil ii s withoul Whatkindof 1 nvironments will be created by the expandinv, powei and sophistii ii > ( intelligent machines? As Richard Lanham has poinlci I mil m i l i inlorination-richenvironinents created by ubiquitous eonipiiting Ilie: liiniting factor is not the speedofeomputers, orthe ratesof transniss 11 gh liber-opticcables, or the aiiioiuit of data that can be generated am I sloi ed I iather, the scarce coi 1111 o111 \ is human a t t e n t i o n . I t makes s e n s e then, that technological innovatlonwill focusoncompensatingfor l bis bottleneck. Anobvioussolut ii i u 1 s l o i les i gu i 111 c 11 i gei 11 machines to all nd lo llie choices andtasks that di I have lo be done by humans. For e x a n i | ile l In re are already intelligcnl agenl programs tosort email, discardiii" nnwanted messages andprioritizing the rest. The programs work along linea similar to neural nets. Ibc\ tablale l be choices the human operators make, and they feed back llir. in fon nal recursive loops to reacljusl the weighls given to various kinds ol email aildicsses. After an initial learning period, the sortingprogenie 1 il 1 ove ireand more of the email management, freeing humans
14

diese models dillei in iheii specifics 11u \ agrei in seeingrandommss aot simply as the lack o l pallern bul as llie Creative ground h o m which pattern can emerge. Indeed, it is not too much lo say llial in lliese and s lar models, randomness rather than paltern is investid willi ploniludo If pattem isthereali/alion ol a cerlain sel ol possibililies, randomness is llie much, much larger set ol ever\ ibing clse. I rom phenoniena llial ca mol be icndered coherent by a given syslem'i ;anizal tothose the system ca I perceive at all. I n Gregoiy Haleson's cybei nelic episteiuologv, randomness is what exists outside the con linos of the box in which i sysleni i s Incaled il s i lie larger and unknowable coniplexity lor which the peicepliial pri icesses ol an organisni are a iiielaphoi. Signilieanoe is lichieved b\ i \iihilionary processes that ensiire the suiviving svslems are llie -s whn.se organizaons 111. i. 11111.11 < mctaphors foi this c plexit) unthinkable in itself.
11

When Vrela and bis coaiilhors arge u i'.iiilnxlicil Miiitl llial ihere is no stable, cohorcn I se II bul only ai il inous ageiils riinning pri igrams, ihey envision pallern as a liinitation llial drops awav as human awareness expands beyond conseiousness and'encounteis llie enipliness llial, in anOtllCI" guise i i ii lid i i |ii.ill\ w i l l be called I he i baos llolll which all loi nis emerge.
12

What do the !se dovelopmonls mean lor I he posthuman? When the S6US envisi 11 's tu i iiinded in presence ident i (ied wilh original \ guaran ees and (el. ol' igii al 11 a | < i lories, associated with solid foundat \ and lgica! coherence, the poslliiiiiian is likely to be seen as anlihuman because it envisions tbeci inseious inind as asniall subsystem running i l p i ogi ain ol sellconstruclion and sell assurance while remaining ignor.ini ol the actual dynamics olconiplex sysleins. Hu the posthuman does not n a ll\ mean llie endofhnnianily II signis inslead the endof a cerlain concepl ion ol I he human, a eonception I bal mas have applied, atbest, lo llial l i a d I lilil anitywlio I lad 1 he u i all 11 powei and lcisu reto conceptual i/.e llie insel ves as autonoinoiis beings excrcising their will through individual ageney and choice. ' What is lelhal is not I he posthuman as such bul the gi allingol llie
1

l o; 11 M 1 b 1 i 1 ; 111 (:ntion to other matters. 1 1 trapolate from these relatively simple programs to an environ1 in ni 1 bal as( IharlcsOstman likestopul iI,si 1 pplessyntheticsentienceon deniand, hiinian conseiousness would riele on lop of a highly articulated and coiuplex eomputational ecology i n which inany decisions, invisible to biiman attention, would be made by intelligeul machines. Over two deca les ago |oseph W'cizciibaiiin foresaw usl aicb an ecolog\' and passionatel) argued thatjudgmentis auniquelyhuman functionandmustnot In 1111111 111 IVI ir to computers. W i t h the rapid (l< 'velopment of neural nets and 1 xpi 11 | irograms, it is no longer so clear that sophisticated judgments c a mol be inadeby machines and, in some instanees, made more accurately t h a n by Iminans. But the issue, in Weizenbauin's view, involves more
15 16

2 8 8

Chapter

Eleven

Conclmlon
h >

/
I I :

289
K M |

than whether or not the programs work. Rather, the issue is an etbical in perative that humans keep control; to do otherwise is to abdcate their r sponsibilities as autonomous independent beings. What Weizenbauiu argument makes clear is the connection between the assumptions u n < | i girding the liberal humanist subject and the ethical position that humans not machines, must be in control. Such an argument assumes a visin of tlie human in which conscious agency is the essence of human identity. Sacrifice this, and we humans are hopelessly compromised, contaminated with mechanic alienness in the very heart o f our humanity. Henee there is an urgeney, even panic, in Weizenbaum's insistenee ihal iuclgment is a uniquely human function. A t stake for him is nothing less than what it means to be human.
T

17

I n the posthuman view, byccmlrasl, conscious agency lias never been "u control." I n fact, the very illusion of control bespeaks a fundamental ignoranee about the nature of the emergeul processes through which conseiousness, the organism, and the environmenl are consliluled. Mastery through the exercise of autonomous will is merely the stoiy conseiousness tells itself to explain results that actually come about through chaotic dynamies and emergen! slriietnres. I I , as Donna 1 laraway. Sandia llarding, Evelyn Fox Keller, Carolyn Merchant, and other feminist critics of science have argued, llie re is a rea! ion ainong the desire lor niaslerv, an objectivist accounl ol science, ai id llie iniperialisl pro je. 'I ol sube lui ng nature, ilion the posthuman ollers resources for the const niel ion ol anolhei kind of acc o u n t . I n this account, emergence replaces teleolog\ icllexive epistemology replaces objectivism; distribuled cogniliou replaces autonomous will; enibodinienl replaces a bodv seen as a supporl sysleni lor llie niind; andadynaniic parinership between humans and inlelligenl machines replaces ( b e liberal buniauisl subjecl's nianifosl < lesl i i y toclom i nato and control nature. O f course, diis is not necessarily what the posthuman nill meanonly what it can mean i f certain strands among its complex seriations are highlighted and combined to crate a visin o f the human l bal uses the posthuman as leverage to avoid reiilscribing, and llius repealing, some of the misakes of the past.
18

excellent response to John Searles famous "Chines. ,,,, , , asituation in which communicalion in ( binse c a n l a k c , wilbout tbe actors knowing what their actions mean, Searle chal, n g e . l i b c idea that machines c a n l l i i n k . Suppose, Searle said, l l i a l l i e is s l i i e l . m s i d o aroom, he who km i w s not a word of < b u i. s i Texis w i i l l e n m < I 'se are slid through a sloi ni the door. He has in the room with hi 111 basketsi i f Chnese cliaractcrs a n d a rulebook oorrelalingthe svinliols wrillc the lexts with other symbols in (be basket. Using the rulebool In assembles strings of cliaractcrs andpushes them out the d o o i M i l i ;h his C l ise interlocutors take these si rings to be clever responsos to the | i i i i i.s Searle has not the leasl i d e a of tbe meaning of the texis he has | lueed Therefore, it would b e a niislake to say that machines can lliink, he arges lor like him, tliey p r o d u c e comprehensible results withoui pn hending anything themsch'es. In Uutchins's neat interpreta!ion Si irle's argument is valuablepreciselybecauseit makes clear that itis not Searle bul ib.-cutir room that knows < bmese. In this distribuled cognilive system, llie Chnese room km >.\ s m o r e iban do any of its compon. 111 s incln ling Searle. The situacin ol modern humans is akin to that of Searle in the Chnese room, for eveiy day we particpate in systems whose total. m i i \ . < apacity exceeds our indo i.lual knowledge, including such devi.,, as c u s with electronic ignition systems, microwaves w i t h computer chips 1h.1i precisely adjust power levis fax machines that warble to other la\ mai limes, and electronic watches llial eoinnuinicate with a timing radio wave to set themselves and c o i 11 1 1 1 In o date. Modern humans are capabli ol more sophisticated cogniliou than cavemen not beeause inodoros a i . s m a i le 11ulchins c o n eludes I m i beeause theyhaveconstructedsmartei . nvironments in which
20 21

Just as the posthuman need not be antihuman, so it also need not be apocalyptic. Kdwin I lulehins addressos llie idea of distribuled cogniliou lluoiigh bis iiii .inced sludy ol llie navigational systems o f oceangoing ships. His molieiilous rosean'h shows llial the cognilive sysle 'sponsi
19

bleforlocatinglheshipin spaceand navigalingit succossfiilly resides not in humans alone bul in llie complex interaclions within an en\ imniuonl I bal i ncludes both b u man anclnonlmman actors. His studyallowsliiin togivoan

to work. I lulehins w o u l d no doubt disagree with Weizenbaum's view that uilgnii ni si Id be reserved for humans alone I ,iko cognition, decisionmaking is distributed between human and nonl un agents, from the steam-powered steering system that suddenly failed on a navy vessel Hutchins was sludyingto thecharts and pocket calculators that the navigators were ilion lorced to use to calclate their posilion. He convincingly shows llial Mu ,1 adaptations to changed circumstances were evolutionary and emboda 111 al herthan abstract andconsciously dosigned(pp. 347-51). The sol 111 ion lo tbe problem caused by this sudden lailure of the steering n i c c b a n I S I I I was ' clearly diseovered by llie organi/al |of tbe system as a whole| be11111 11 w as diseovered by any ol t b e par 1 ipants"(p. 361). Seenin this p . 1 s p e e t o e , t b e prospectof humans workingi 11 1 larlnershipwithintelligenl machines is not so much a usurpation of human right and responsi-

288

Chapter

Eleven
;i

Conc/ui/on

289

than whether or not the programs work. Rather, the issue is an eth(. perative that humans keep control; to do otherwise is to abdcate theirl i l,i sponsibilities as autonomous independent beings. What Weizenbaun' argument makes clear is the connection between the assumptions un.| girding the liberal humanist subject and the ethical position that humans not machines, mustbe in control. Such an argument assumes a visin oftlie human in which conscious agency is the essence of human identity. Sacrifice this, and we humans are hopelessly compromised, contamnale | ||, mechanic alienness in the very heart o f our humanity. Henee there is an urgeiicy, even panic, in Weizenbaum's insislonoo llial udgmenl is uniquely human function. At stake for h i m is nothing Less than what it means to be human.
I( r| ( NV 17 a

I n the posthuman view, by contrast, conscious agency has neverbeen'm control." I n fact, the very illusion of control hespeaks a fundamental ignorance about the nature of the emergent processes through which conseiousness, the organism, and the environment are constituted. Mastery through the exercise of autonomous will is merely the story conseiousness tells itself to explain rosolis llial actually come aboul through ehaolic dynamics and emergent structures. I I , as Donna I laraway, Sandra I larding, Evelyn Fox Keller, Carolyn Merchant, and other feminist critics of science have argued, there is a relation among the desire for mastery, an ol ijeetivist account of.science, and the imperialist projecl ofsubduingnalure, then the posthunian olfers resources for the construelion ol anolher kind of acc o u n t . I n this account, emergence replaces teleology; reflexive epistemology replaces objectivism; distributed cognition replaces autonomous will; embodiment replaces a body seen as a support system for the mind; and a dynamic partnership between humans and intelligent machines replaces ti i e liberal humanist subject s manifest destiny to domnate and control nature. O f course, ubis is not necessarily what the posthuman u II meanonly what it can mean i f certain strands among its complex serialions are highlighted and combined to crate a visin of the human that uses the posthuman as leverage to avoid reinscribing, and thus repeal ing, some of the mistakes of the past.
18

Just as the posthnuia -ed not be antihuman, so it also need not be apocalyptic. Kdwin I lulehins addressos llie idea of distribuled cogniliou ihrougb his nuanced study of the navigational systems of oceangoing ships. His inelioiilous research shows llial the cognilive system responsible forlocatingllieship in s|iaccand navigalingil successlully resides not in humans alone but in the complex interactions within an environment that includesbolh human and noiihuinan aelors. 1 I is sludvalli >ws 111111 lo gis i an
19

excellent response to John Searle's famous "Chnese room Byimagining asituation i n which communication in Chnese can t . i l . place w i i h < , t t | actors knowing what their actions mean, Searle challenged t h e i d e a that machines c a n t h i n k . Suppose, Searle said, that h e is sluek insidearoom, he who k n o w s not a word o f < 'I 'se T e x i s written in I l m e s e are s l i d through a slol in thedoor. Helias i n the r o o m with h i m b a s k c l s o f ( hiriese cliaractcrs a m i a rulebookcorrelatinglhe gymbols wrillen 011 l l i e lexts with other symbi ils in the basket. Using l l i e 1 ulebook, h e assembles si rings of charaelei s a n d pushes them 0111 l l i e d o o i Vdthough his Chnese mterlocutors take l h e s e strings to be clever respon .i is to their i n q u i r i i s, Searle has nottheleasl ideaofthe meaning o f the texis h e has p i o d u i e d Therefore, it would b e si aketosay that machines can llunl. h e aig, lorlikehim, they produce comprehensible results wilhoul e o i n p i e h e n d i n g anything themselves. 111 Hutchins's neat interpretation S i arli argument is valuable preeisely beeause it makes clear that it is not Sea 11< I n i 111 ie entire room that knows Chnese. I n this distributed cognitivi s y s t e m llie (.'hiese room knows more than do anyof itscomponents, including Searle. The situacin ol modera humans is akin to that of Searle In 111 < < lmese room, for everydax w e particpate in systems whose tolal cognilive 1 a p a c i t y exceeds our individual knowledge, including such de\ ices as cars with electronic ignition systems, microwaves w i t h computer ehlps thal preeisely adjust power levis fax machines that warble to other lax u i a e l s, and electronic w a l e h e s llial communicate w i t h a timing radio w a v e l o set themselves and corred theil d a t e . Modern humans are capableol moro sophisticated cognition than cavemen not beeause moderns a r e smarter, Hutchins concludes, I mi b e e a u s e l l i e v l i a x e consirueted s m a r l e i c u vi r o n ments in which towork. Hutchins would no doubt disagree w i t h Weizenbaum's view that u d g m e n l si I d b e reserved for humans a l o n e , L i k e cognition, d e c i s i n making is d e l n b u t e d between human and nonhmnan agents, from the steam poweied steering system that suddenly lailed o n a navy vessel Hutchins \\a . sludyingtothechartsandpocketcalculators thatthenavigators w e i e then l'orced to use to calclate their position. He convincingly shows I bal these adaptations to cbanged circo 111 si a i ices were evolutionary and 1 n 1 b o d i i d rather than abstract and consciously < lesigned (pp. 347-51). The sol ni m u l o the problem caused by this sudden 1.1 i 111 re of the steering
u ie 20 21

mechanism \\ as "clearly diseovered by the organi/al

|o tbe system as a

whole| beforc il was diseovered by anyof the participants"(p. 361). Seenin thispersj 11 ' l e e , theprospectof humans workingin partnership with intelligent n i a e b i n e s is not so much a usurpation of I an right and responsi-

Conc/i/on

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I)ilityasitisafurtherdevelopmentin theconstrucli I elislrihi id ' |,. ^ tion ci i\ i 10111 i n i ii s, a construction that has been ongoing foi 11 sands f
( (

Mo. Usochangedin thisperspectiveistierelationof humansubjectiyii to its environment. Nolongeris human will soen as llie sourec In un | j emanates I lie mastery necessaryto dominate and control theenviro enl Rather, the distributed cognition o f the emergent human subject corr ! lates within Bateson s phrase, becomes a metaphor forthe distributed COgnil Ivi system as a whole, in which "thinldng" is done by both huniai J in nilniinan actors. "Thinldngconsists of bringing these structures intoc ordination s o they can shape and be shaped by one another," I lulehins w o ile i p. :> l(i). Toconceplualize I he human in these le i n s is nol toimperi]
xv ||( l a n

-fiiiictionalityexpands beeause the parameters o tbe cognilive syslein it nhabits expand. In this model, it is not aquestion ol li i a \ ngthebod) behind i but ratlw'i i ifextending embodied awareness in bigbls' speeilie local and imaterial ways that would be impossible without elecl ronie pros! hesis As we have seen, cybernetics was born i n a froth ol noise when Norbert \Viener firsl t l i o u g h t o f i t a s a w a y t o m a x i m i z e h u m a n polenlial in a world that is in essence chaotic and unpredictable. I.ike mans othei pioneers, W'ienei helpod toinitiateajoumey that would prove tohave sequences nore lai reaching and subversive than even his lor lable powers o f maginal c< luid conceive. As Bateson, Vrela, and others would laler arge, the se crashes within as well as without. The chaotic unpredictable nature of complex dynamics implies that subjeclis ii\ is cniergent rather V tliangivi I I distributedratherthanlocated solis usness,emergingfrom and Integrated into a chaotic world ralhci ib; 11 upyingaposition of mastery and control removed from it. Bruno Lal bis arguedthat sve liase never been modeni; the seriated hisl o \ ol cybernetics emerging fro elss'orks al once malerially real, soeialls n-gulaleil, and discursively consl riielodsuggests, for similar reasons i bal wehave alwaysbeen postliu n i . n i . " Thepuipose of this book has been to el licle ihejourneys that have made this realization possible. I f the threi storii stoldherehow informal K m los! its body, how the cyborg was constructed in lliepostwar years as lochnological artifact and cultural icn and how the human becanie tbe poslhuman have at times seemed lo presenl llie posthuman as a trans i al i o n lo be feared and abhorred rather iban ss -elconiedandem1 ;

III unan survival but is preeisely to enhance il foi the more we understand llie llexible, adaptive si niel mes llial coordnale eiivin lents and the metaphors that we ourselves are, llie hellerwe c a n lasliion iniages o f ourselves llial aceurately relleel ihe complex inlerplays that ultimately make tlieenlire worldonesysleni. This view oftheposi human also offei s resources for thinkingin more sophistiealed waysaboul virtual lechnili unes. As l(ingas I he I ansubjectis envisioned as an autonomi IUS sell will ainliiguous boundai ios i lie lmman-computer interlaci can only he parsed as a divisin bel wecn Ihe sol i d i t y o f real lifeon one sido and the Ilusin of virtual realilv mi llie other, thus obscuring the lai reaching (bangos inilialed l > \ llie dovelopmenl of virtual technologies. (>nls I one thinksol llie subjecl asan autonomous self independen il ol llie envii ent is one likely toexperience thepanicperformedby Norbei l Wi< 'in T S Cyhcnictics ai id Bei na rd Wollc's Limbo. This view of the.self ai ithoi i/es I he leai I bal il I he l > < MI manos ai e lueaelied al all, there will be nolhing lo stop llie sell s c pele dissolution By COntrast, when the hiiinan is seen as par ol a distribuled syslein llio full oxpressioil ol hmiian eapabilily can be seen precisis lo drpnul mi I be spliec ralhei than being iniperiled by i l . Wriling in anolhei conlexl, I liitehins arrivesal an insigbl proloiindlyapplicable to virtual leclinologies What used lo loo! like internaliza!ion |ol thoughl and subject ivit) | nox\ appears as a gradual propagacin ol organized binctioiial properties across a sel ol inalleable inedia" (p. 312). This visin is a polen! aulidole lo (he viesv llial pases vil luality as a divisin between an inerl body llial is lefl beliind and a dis embodied subjei I ivit y that inhabits a virtual realin, llie consl niclion of s n luality perlnned by (lase in William (ibson's Ncuionum, ci when he delights in tbe "bodiless e\ulla!iou of evberspace' and leis, abose all. droppingback hito i lio un-al ol'lbe bod\. " T.scoiil rasl, in I he i le I bal I lulehins presenls and llial llie poslhuinan helps lo aulborize liiunan

braced, llial n ai tion has everything to do w i t h how the posthuman is consirucled a in I mu l e e , i . ind. The best possible' lime h i eontesl for what the posthuinan ineans is now, before the trains of thoughl il embodies have been laid i Ii is\ n so lirmly that it would take dynaniile loebango t h e m . A l though some i n i i a ni vorsions of the posthmnan point toward the antihumana m I the apocalyptic, we can craft others that ss il! beconducivetothe long-range sun Ival of humans and o f the other lile l'orms, biological and artificial, with whom we share the planet and ourselves.
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