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Thesis Info

Abstract: 200-500 words: This thesis is divided into three parts, designated by the three words in the title: Part I, Cyborg, Part II, Human, and Part III, “And”. Each word designates a different level of questioning I shall engage in. The first part of this thesis, Cyborg, will deal with the cyborg phenomenon’s announced fidelity. It aims at critically evaluating the contributions and stakes of the cyborg phenomenon by examining its impact on the understanding of technology from the perspective of theories of technoculture. I shall examine in particular the fields of the postmodern and the mythological from which the cyborg has drawn its force. The second part, Human, will deal with the cyborg’s distrust of and antagonism against humanism. As the cyborg phenomenon conjures up a force marked by the name, “posthuman”, it hopes to make the claim that humanism as a habit of thinking and the notion of human can be liquidated in understanding technology. I evaluate the validity of this claim from a Heideggerian perspective in relation to the ontological. The third part of the thesis, And, aims at looking at the Cyborg and Human again as each indicating meanings of technology and the conditions of their constitution that are already shared. I propose to use the conjunctive “and” to re-frame the question of technology in order that shared concerns of the Cyborg and Human are not lost in a polemics that separate them as enemies.