#artificial man

[evilhorse]

And from the deep shadows, an artificial man stares...

[headlessmind]

artificial man

[empiricaldaily]

Before Darwin, the marvellous adaptation of animals to their environment was regarded as “evidence of benevolent purpose on the part of the Deity, but the theory of natural selection provided a scientific explanation of a vast collection of facts which had been serviceable to the theologians. The champion of cosmic purpose will say, it is Life that exhibits the important part of the divine plan; the rest is only stage scenery. We can now see, in a general way, how, given the chemical properties of living substance, ordinary physical and chemical forces were likely to set the process of evolution in motion. True, we cannot manufacture life in the laboratory, and until we have done so it is open to the orthodox to maintain that we shall never be able to do so. But for my part I see no reason why organic chemists could not, within the next hundred years, manufacture living microorganisms. It may take some time—say a million years—to cause these to develop by artificial selection into giraffes and hippopotamuses and tigers. When this has been achieved, no doubt the theologians will still maintain that MAN can only be made by the Deity, but I fear the biologists will soon refute this last hope. Whether artificial man will be better or worse than the natural sort I do not venture to predict.

Bertrand Russell. 1944.  (Title: The Value of Free Thought: How to Become a Truth-Seeker and Break the Chains of Mental Slavery)

[movies-derekwinnert]

Frankenstein *½ (1994, Kenneth Branagh, Robert De Niro, Helena Bonham Carter, Richard Briers, John Cleese) - Classic Movie Review 2034

Frankenstein *½ (1994, Kenneth Branagh, Robert De Niro, Helena Bonham Carter, Richard Briers, John Cleese) – Classic Movie Review 2034

  Kenneth Branagh comes a cropper as both actor and director of this plush band ambitious but stodgy and unconvincing 1994 version of Mary Shelley’s classic horror tale that just seems to be going through the motions.

Branagh seems astonishingly weary as Dr Victor Frankenstein, as if the effort of direction had used up all his energies, what with all the attention to the nervy, endlessly…

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[feelingpolitical]

Art goes yet further, imitating that Rationall and most excellent worke of Nature, Man. For by Art is created that great LEVIATHAN called a COMMON-WEALTH, or STATE, (in latine CIVITAS) which is but an Artificiall Man; though of greater stature and strength than the Naturall, for whose protection and defence it was intended; and in which, the Soveraignty is an Artificiall Soul, as giving life and motion to the whole body; The Magistrates, and other Officers of Judicature and Execution, artificiall Joynts; Reward and Punishment (by which fastned to the seat of the Soveraignty, every joynt and member is moved to performe his duty) are the Nerves, that do the same in the Body Naturall; The Wealth and Riches of all the particular members, are the Strength; Salus Populi (the Peoples Safety) its Businesse; Counsellors, by whom all things needfull for it to know, are suggested unto it, are the Memory; Equity and Lawes, an artificiall Reason and Will; Concord, Health; Sedition, Sicknesse; and Civill War, Death. Lastly, the Pacts and Covenants, by which the parts of this Body Politique were at first made, set together, and united, resemble that Fiat, or the Let Us Make Man, pronounced by God in the Creation.”

Hobbes, Leviathan, Introduction.1

Pretty sure I could write my whole Hobbes chapter on this first paragraph of the intro.