Final Blog

This post will be analyzing and contributing to a blog post created by Maggie Kaliszak titled “The Thing Power of the Haptic Suit”. The third installment in her blog series, Maggie introduces the reader into the world of Ready Player One by Ernest Cline and develops a discussion about thing power behind the haptic suits. In previous posts I have discussed new materialism by Jane Bennett, and Maggie further explores this reading to define the differences between agency, agent, actor and actant. She explored both texts very thoroughly prior to diving into the haptic suit.

The haptic suit serves to immerse a

Wade in Haptic Suit. Source: https://cdn.geekwire.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/180330-readyplayerone-630x428.png

 player into the OASIS and functions as a controller that uses your body to navigate the virtual reality. Maggie alludes that the effect of the suit doesn’t serve to immerse yourself into virtual reality, rather it functions to remove yourself from physical reality. It is an assemblage of many smaller pieces (gloves, goggles, electronics, and other body pieces) that furthers the immersion of the OASIS and permits physical sensations. The agency of the haptic suit extended beyond its physical effect on the user. The existence of the suit creates a larger disparity of economic class. Only the extremely wealthy can afford a full suit or an immersion rig like Wade eventually purchases. Not being able to afford a full suit creates a different experience.

Being able to afford a suit implies the ability to interact with the environment within the OASIS at a much more intimate level. Being able to feel objects and to immerse yourself creates an advantage in the OASIS in the Halliday Egg Hunt.

I want to further this discussion of environment on two fronts:

The first front that I want to acknowledge is the idea of virtual objects within this universe. If the wearer of the suit can feel, smell, hear, and see the environment surrounding them, does this virtual environment function just the same as a physical environment like we are adjusted to? Art3mis struggles to accept the love she feels for and from Wade, claiming that there could be no way that Wade could experience love in the OASIS claiming that she could be anyone, even a middle aged dude named Chuck living in their parents basement. However, the reader watches Wade struggle from symptoms of depression and anxiety that stems from his breakup with Art3mis. Every single pixel within the OASIS is not natural and challenges the binary of nature vs thing. To abide by this binary, everything experienced by Wade is merely an object including all touch and interactions with Art3mis. This suggests that these things had the power to allow Wade to feel the emotion of love and to experience loss and depression. If Wade had never met Art3mis, he would have been in love with a thing that reflected and manipulated the image of a person.

The second front is the availability of other physically stimulating gear, such as the sex robot that Wade purchased. Having money granted Wade the power to eradicate his desires sexually as well that ultimately breaks his immersion within the game. Within the OASIS he believes that he is having intimate relations with simulations, but this is broken every time he unplugs and looks at this grotesque sex toy. It deepens his depression and falters the effect of the virtual world to the point that he cares to improve his physical health and appearance.

This implies that there is an effect of physical objects on virtual objects and a complex assemblage of things that affect Wade’s emotional, physical, and social health. This will be important to monitor as society members with this technology under development in our real word. 

Works Cited

Kaliszak, Maggie. “The Thing Power of the Haptic Suit.” Dystopian Fiction Blog, February 28, 2020.                 https://dystopianfictionkaliszak.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-thing-power-of-haptic-suit.html

Blog 5: Creative Project

My interests with dystopian fiction peak when the environment has been overwhelmed with newer technologies. The idea of technology going too far or taking control over humans is a fascinating form of dystopia for me when it challenges the power dynamic of man and machine. In Ready Player One, I enjoyed the environment that surrounded the Oasis. In Black Mirror,  I enjoyed the way that social media changed and influenced humans to restructure their entire lives.

This setup of an environment attracts me because it seems entirely plausible considering the strength and intelligence of AI. Black Mirror sets up several environments resembling this struggle between man and machine, even when the machine has agency but does not function as an agent. Sometimes it does act as an agency and this creates an even scarier dystopia!

My creative project would focus around the effects that technology and machine have on humans and the environments that could stem from this. My visual project would develop an environment which focused on specifically humans subjected to machine control. This could be through virtual reality and intelligent AI and the presence of too much technology in their lives. It would demonstrate the effects of machine as both an agent and as a thing with agency to capture the ideas of Jane Bennett.  It will comment on how the assemblage of technology lead to the demise of humanity or how it would eventually lead to it.

This project would also have an element of nature that reflected how nature allowed for an escape from an oppressive machine laden society and how natural objects affect another group of humans. This would combat the binary of nature and man by showing the effects of objects that negatively impact the low-technology humans in forms of waste. It would generally highlight the relationship between thing and man, both positively and negatively. What does one group miss out on and what does the other endure? The project would have a protagonist highlighted that completely deconstructs the binary by being expose to both environments.

I am not sure whether this would be visual or creative, or some wacky combination of the two. Ultimately it would be focused on the environments themselves and comment on the effects held over the people.  It would narrate a mini story that highlights these characters and make sure that the viewer or player understood the environment. It might also incorporate an element of Panopticism and Docile Bodies to create an element of surveillance and the sinister element of the dystopia.

Something is just so fascinating about man versus machine and seeing the relationship between the two when the power dynamic switches! It would be super fun to explore and create something for the viewer that could submerse them into a world that they know longer have complete power or control in, while reminding them that this world is not as unfamiliar as it should seem. Its both sinister, frightening, and intriguing to see the technologies available for the future! Like look at this video of just glass technology that existed YEARS ago that most people don’t know could exist… Its terrifying to think of what is not disclosed to the public that could exist!

Blog 4: The Effect of New Materialism

New Materialism reflects how everything surrounding humans influences us, with everything being an agent and groups of agents forming an assemblage or environment. Jane Bennett asks her readers to deconstruct the binary of nature and human to understand these relationships. In dystopian fiction most authors write in an environment that will offer an environment that is both familiar and unfamiliar to the reader. Nature serves its own purpose in most of these books, often functioning as a symbol of freedom.

In each of these dystopian books we see or feel the effects of these objects. In The Road by Cormac McCarthy, we see the effects of both nature and the environment upon the man. One object that has a great effect on him is a Coke can that reminds him of how things used to be. It brings him joy and he lets the boy drink it to let him know what once existed, almost as an affirmation for the boy to trust the ways of the past. With nature, we notice a lack of wildlife that leads to a culture of cannibalism as humans turn on themselves for meat.

In Ready Player One, I previously mentioned in the last blog about Wades mirror and how it does nothing, yet it reminds him of his health and breaks his illusion of a false reality. It allows him to reengage himself with reality while otherwise completely escaping reality. We also see the environment he grows up in, the stacks, as an extreme case of poverty and overpopulation. It paints perfectly how society lost sympathy for lower social classes in this society. Stacks fall daily or weekly with people losing their lives and nobody cares. Similarly, in Parable of the Sower, we see gated communities contribute to an environment that isolates the lower social classes. This ultimately builds up angst and forms a revolution.

A non-novel dystopia is Wall-E, a movie by Disney that follows a little robot and his adventure to space. In this we see a world that has been ravaged and eliminated our familiar idea of nature, leaving a trash filled world rid of all forms of life. The presence of one cockroach ultimately shifts the entire narrative of the film, nature has come back. It leads him to a newer robot, one from space sent to find signs of life on Earth for humans to return. Fast forward to the sight of humans themselves: they are morbidly obese and being pampered to death by robots. Every object in this ship ultimately aids in the comforting and pampering of the humans and subdues them. The humans can’t think or move for themselves and rely on additional things to help them live. This assemblage made humans to comfortable and led them to devolve and lose their agency. The captain is alerted that life is back on Earth, and the humans can escape the ship and return to the planet.

https://www.newstatesman.com/sites/default/files/styles/cropped_article_image/public/blogs_2016/09/1.png?itok=d5KciYsf

In many of these dystopias, I mentioned that feeling of familiarity. We have virtual reality from Ready Player One, gated communities from Parable of the Sower, the commercialism from Wall-E, and well a Coke can like The Road. However, each one spins these objects and environments to make them equally foreign to us, a world where each has gone too far forward or been eradicated. This weird nostalgia formed around things present in our modern lives help to create a dystopian environment that feels all too possible and familiar to us.