Recommendation of dystopian science-fiction

Let me put it straight from the start, how can dystopian science-fiction not be the best genre of literature and genre of cinema ever?

Well... It is true that actually a relatively small amount of dystopian science-fiction is well-put together, and there is a lot of trash at there, particularly in the science-fiction genre. But still, I just love how dystopian literature can make you reflect on society, the values therein and our personal attitudes towards them.

I just thought I'd share some of my favourite dystopian books and films – ones that I've made me think the most and have been the most interesting to read/watch:

Films

• Gattaca, Andrew Niccol

This is a dystopia different from the one usually depicted. Instead of an authoritarian government imposing its tyrannic rule over people, here we witness a society in which people are split by the quality of their genetic makeup. With technological advances, humans have been able to change the genetic makeup of individual, creating 'super'-humans capable of performing better in certain tasks. While highlighting the ethical dangers attached to bio-technology's advancement, and the easiness with which society can fall into a racist mode of functioning, it is also a reflection on what – in the end – makes us profoundly human.

• Ghost in the Shell, Masamune Shirow 

Science-fiction anime, one of the greatest of its kind! This time its a reflection on technology, artificial intelligence, and again, what makes us human. Are we just machines that accumulate data and rearranges it in a particular way, or is there something more... a soul so to speak?

• Ex Machina, Alex Garland

Recent Hollywood movie. Great watch. Between a thriller and dystopian, the aesthetic of the movie is fantastic. At the core of this movie is a reflection similar to the above, artificial intelligence and technology. However, this movie deals more with our relationship with said AI, what would come out of it, and also the place for survival instincts.

Books

• 1994, George Orwell

Classic dystopia, cannot be missed to get in the genre! Big Brother, hyper-surveillance, authoritarian regimes, love story, it's all there, and it never goes out of fashion. As timeless as ever, it reads great and you should give it a read if you haven't already.

• We, Yevgeny Zamyatin

George Orwell's 1994 is completely inspired by this book. The themes at the centre are basically the same. This is the modern dystopian fiction's originator! It is quite original and experimental in its writing, but such great food for thought! 

• The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula le Guin

In this seminal science-fiction, winner of both the Nebula and Hugo awards, Ursula le Guin portrays a frozen world, where a society as evolved independently from the rest of humanity. The catch here is that this society does not have a binary division of gender. There is no man or woman, instead their reproductive system and cycles are different from the ones we are used to. Individual express traits associated with both masculinity and femininity, but to such a point that it becomes difficult to distinguish them, and indeed is it even all that necessary to make that distinction? This is the sort of question at the heart of this novel, which is a must read for a more modern take on the dystopian genre.

Social Media as a Passport to the contemporary world

I find it interesting how social media has taken such an important part of our everyday life. Outside of the discussions of whether they stifle everyday interaction or change our engagement with the social world, they are also an invaluable way of interacting with the contemporary world.

I myself am not particularly good at using social media, and do wonder sometimes how I can get more than 30 views on my blog posts, or more 5 likes on a tweet. Regardless of that, I am also eager to participate on social media platforms. There is a wealth of opportunities of interaction, and wealth of knowledge on these platforms. It also appears to me that these digital platforms can also be the ground for cooperation and discussion and as such, why not consider them?

I am currently reading a book on Ai Weiwei (Ai Weiwei speaks) in which he discusses subjects from art and architecture, to philosophy and digital culture. For those who are not familiar with the artist, he is a Chinese  artist, whose work has been both recognised internationally, but also highly controversial in his home-country (link to bio).

His approach is one of merging political issues with artistic creation. Both are can serve as fuel of thought on the other. In his own words, "everything is art, everything is politics" (from the book Weiwei-isms). I find this statement really important – in the Anthropocene especially – but also a source of inspiration in our creative and politically engaging endeavours.

Beyond that, if blogging is a way not just of interpreting and presenting reality, but also to create realities, then social media becomes our passport to different realities, different worlds. And maybe we should take advantage of that.

Here's a quote from Ai Weiwei highlighting that change needs to start from the present and into the future:

"we're actually a part of the reality, and if we don't realise that, we are totally responsible. We are a productive reality. We are the reality, but part of reality means that we need to produce another reality"

– Ai Weiwei speaks, p. 7

Through the anthropocene

Through the Anthropocene is a blog about our time, about change and about the anthropos. In it, I will discuss social changes that are happening around the world as well as environmental changes that are effecting the planet and people. This will be an ongoing process and the evolution of this blog will reflect my uncertainties and doubts. At the same time, unveiling these doubts is important to attain any kind of certainty – and it is particularly in the 'post-truth' world that coming to one's own certainty by allowing uncertainty becomes important. Indeed, the radical political changes that we are witnessing (I don't even want to name them because you can probably discern what I am referring to) appear to me as a rush to certainty, and a will to certainty too. For all that is comprehensible about this position, allowing uncertainty is extremely important, and also enlightening. Allowing uncertainty forces us to be more careful about our certainties, take time in deciding what is good or bad, allow the possibility of being shown wrong. Besides being an important direction to navigating the anthropocene, this approach is also the one I will be adopting in this blog.

Now, above I have mentioned to concepts that may need clarification.

First, what is the Anthropocene? The anthropocene refers to a specific meaning in geology and a more abstract one in social sciences and humanities. The first one directs to the increasing role that humans have in affecting the geological makeup of the earth. While scientists have been discussing for a while whether there are enough indicators to establish that we have entered a new geological epoch, it is safe to say that, even if the actual designation is still being debated, the scale of environmental change that humans can induce is quite remarkable, going beyond simple ecology and anthropogenic climate change.
The second meaning of the term, used in social sciences and the humanities, is much broader in scope, much more fluid and abstract. Scholars are still to find a proper definition of the term. But its value may be find precisely in that it is so hard to define, or that agreement cannot be met. Because of this, discussions about what the anthropocene means – what conceptual changes does it occur, what new practices will be like in such an age – are flourishing. I personally think that such a new concept is highly interesting for thinking through the changes occurring in our age in relation to how we are affecting, and being affected by the environment.

Secondly, it seems important also to understand what the anthropos is. Etymologically, anthropos is greek for Man. This is quite simple. But why use a new concept of anthropos, when we already have a work for designating the same thing. Well, one of the interesting thing about the anthropocene is that it gives us lots of new concepts to think about, and one of those is that of anthropos. I mean, it is quite important to think of the anthropos, about Man, about humanity, about what unites us as humans – or is it not? When considering events such as Brexit, Trump's election and the general rise of far-right politics across Europe, I can't help but sense a loss of humanist values. A loss of a general conception of humanity; something we are all engulfed in. This is lost in the face of individual self-interest, self-serving interest. And nothing wrong with that neither. But still there comes a point when you have to ask yourself the question:  would I die to save a fellow human, whoever that may be? This is probably to be taken case by case, but still. How far does my understanding and empathy extend? How far do I go noticing similarity, before it turns into difference? How far do I go calling someone a fellow friend, before they become a stranger, someone so different, so impossible to understand that I can no longer refer to them as human at all. I am obviously pushing it a bit here, but you know where I am getting at. Redefining the anthropos, putting back the anthropos at the centre of discussions, but without fetishising is nonetheless, appears to me quite important given our current global context.

Anyways, I shall stop this post here. But be sure that I will come back to these questions later. Feel free to comment, or follow the blog if you want to be part of the discussion!

PS: I found the work of B. Latour particularly helpful to get interested and start thinking through the anthropocene. Particularly good is Politics of Nature 

Getting started

This is my first post on Blogger.

I have another blog at philonaut.wordpress.com, but since the name philonaut was taken, and I couldn't think of a good name to call my blog, I just called it 'something complicated'.

It maybe reflects my own thought process, which is also rather complicated.

So join me on this journey of complicated things, when I just try and talk about a lot of things to make them less complicated.

(I might actually change the name of the blog because it is quite strange... I'm not sure I can do that actually. Let's hope so)