Projects

Our experiences are enhanced or augmented as we interact with this world through artificial interfaces, blurring the boundaries between corporeal and synthetic environments. Computer scientist Ray Kurzweil speculates that in the distant future, the human species might withdraw into an entirely virtual world, leaving robot avatars to safely interact with the physical world on our behalf. If we understand this to be the new mode of ‘being’ do we also need to recalibrate our notion of what is ‘real’?

Within this theme students have considered how we can navigate this paradigm shift. Where are the boundaries of the self when we create digital identities? Does ‘being human’ matter? What is the nature of ‘being’ without physical dimensions? How have relationships changed as a result of the internet? What are the potential consequences of AI?

Spanning topics such as social media, posthumanism, gamification, artificial intelligence, human-machine interfaces and augmentation, and their social, ethical, or practical consequences, these projects consider how online identities can be plural or flexible and the ways in which we define ourselves as human or other.