Kat's Webliography

Question 4: "From Frankenstein to the Visible Human Project, technological 'progress' has always forced society to re-evaluate the meaning of 'life'." Discuss critically.

Although finding the answer to the meaning of life is a philosophical question that will possibly go unanswered forever, the way we, as a society, evaluate the meaning of ‘life’ in terms of what we do know has been greatly affected by technological progress. From looking at Frankenstein to the Visible Human Project the meaning of ‘life’ has been a constantly developing idea, continually abstract and intangible yet strangely omniscient and ‘real’. In order to critically discuss the ways in which society has been forced to re-evaluate the meaning of ‘life’ I will be looking at the population’s evaluation of ‘life’ in the past by looking at views on ‘life’ in the period surrounding Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein; what ‘life’ is in terms of religion and ‘life’ as disordered by the Visible Human Project, with discussion on this. I will also look at what ‘life’ is in terms of advancements in cloning and A.I.

An interesting look at the evaluation of life in the eighteenth and nineteenth century is available on the US National Library of Medicine’s “Birth of Frankenstein” web page[1]. This page is particularly useful when looking at the popular view scientists and physicians of the period held, that the bodies of the dead might be brought back to life. Although fairly short in content it is a helpful introduction to possible means of resurrection; electric shocks, smelling salts and vigorous shaking and begins to shed light upon the evaluation of life as renewable from as early as the 1700s.

In terms of religion ‘life’ is of phenomenal importance. An excellent site on the meaning of ‘life’ through the language of religion is ‘The Meaning of Life' [2]. Obviously the site is soaked with religious discourse but it is definitely valuable when looking at the way people have evaluated life for hundreds of years. The purpose of ‘life’ in very general terms is to ‘love and worship your God,’ which is the reason moral debate continues to surround the cloning of human life. I think discussion of life from a religious point of view, being that God is our creator, not the scientist, will help in the examination of cloned ‘life’ and AI.

Discussion surrounding the Visible Human Project (VHP) seems to focus in part on the boundary between the body and what we can loosely term the soul. Stuart J. Murray’s critical look at Catherine Waldby’s writing on the VHP gives insight into what the VHP does to bodies and ‘life' [3]. Murray looks comprehensively at Waldby’s dialogue on the value of life and the destruction of the binary distinctions between the actual and the real. I think this page is useful as it gives a critical overview of Waldby’s research and allows the reader to assess issues raised by Waldby, after they have been written, which we would not otherwise get.

Views on ‘life’ have been greatly disturbed by progress of the phenomena of cloning. Dr Patrick Dixon’s on-line book “The Genetic Revolution”[4] is a fantastic source looking at, among other things, cloning humans, patenting human clones, creating designer people and the “potential [of such experiments] to devastate the planet.”[5] Dixon discusses ‘life’ as a commodity like software on a floppy disk. He suggests that the cloning of humans is a step towards viewing ‘life’ of ‘real’ humans as progressively less important and sees cloning as a loss of individuality. Dixon also notes that, “there is more to life than life” and moreover, “you and I are more than the sum of our constituent parts. There is more to a human consciousness and individuality than just a bunch of chemicals.”[6] I think Dixon’s clear view on cloning and genetic interference opened my eyes a lot with regards to what ‘life’ is becoming and will offer some very helpful links to the discussion of A.I. later in my essay. It is quite a lengthy read but well worth it, especially Chapter 9- A Practical Response.

The view of American society as represented by world leader President Bush, in Melanie Hunter’s Cybercast News Service Article[7], provides some additional insights into what the future of cloning may hold. Bush is uncompromisingly against cloning, and sees life as a creation not a commodity. In Hunter’s article on Bush and cloning we are privy to the views against cloning by a multitude of organizations including Concerned Women for America and The American Centre for Law and Justice. This article notes that society is very much concerned with the protection of human life. I think this article will be extremely helpful when discussing life in terms of religion and views on cloning in general.

Artificial Life has also raised many questions as to what ‘life’ is: can a “machine” have life? Rinku Dewri’s [8] article on artificial life discusses ‘life’ from a scientific standing point, as a merely “pre-defined course of functional activity carried out by organic entities (cells) and a series of changes determined by some bio-chemical reactions. All other complex phenomena that occur originate from these two basic attributes only.”[9] I think Dewri’s perspective is very useful in terms of discussion on the artificial as possessing ‘actual life’ and on ‘life’ as being able to be created. Again it is fairly lengthy but is also very in depth and helpful.

AI Research’s Homepage [10] shows that there is a great deal of interest in creating a ‘new form of life’. From the history of AI, to choosing your own HAL child to speak with, the realisation that AI is closer than we think and the intelligence of a new form of ‘life’ is frighteningly real. This site is quite beneficial when looking at AI as ‘life’ and the implications this has for the future. It is fairly comprehensive and has an understandable section concerned with background information on the development of AI and whether or not it can be considered as ‘life’. You are also able to converse with “Alan” a form of AI thereby giving hands on experience in dealing with intelligence in its non-human form.

The meaning of ‘life’ is being constantly evaluated and re-evaluated; technology and the progress in this field being one of the main reasons for this. The websites that I have discovered would all be extremely helpful with the construction of an essay related to this topic and also gave me some new perspectives as to how I view ‘life’. I think that carrying out a webliography before writing an essay gives you many advantages as a writer and allows you to assess Internet resources critically before using them in an academic environment.

[1] U.S. National Library of Medicine. ‘Frankenstein: Birth of Frankenstein’ (February 2002)(accessed 20 August 2004).

[2]'The Meaning of Life' (updated daily)(accessed 17 August 2004).

[3]Stuart J. Murray. On ‘Catherine Waldby’s The Visible Human Project: Informatic Bodies and Posthuman Medicine’ (15 January 2002)(accessed 20 August 2004).

[4]Dr. Patrick Dixon. ‘The Genetic Revolution’ (c 1995)(accessed 18 August 2004).

[5] Dixon, "The Genetic Revolution."

[6]Dixon, "The Genetic Revolution."

[7]Melanie Hunter. ‘Bush: ‘Life is a Creation Not a Commodity’.’ (4 October 2002) (accessed 20 August 2004).

[8]Rinku Dewri ‘Artificial Life: A Programmers Perspective’ on ‘The AI Depot’ (accessed 21 August 2004).

[9]Dewri, "Artificial Life"

[10]Ai Research. (2001)(accessed 20 August 2004)