Schedule

‘Good’ conversation is good rather than ‘disappointing’ — it does not merely chew over factual disputes or retreat into a play of disembodied concepts — because it, and it alone, allows conversational partners to challenge one another and to learn from one another in a fashion which brings all things about each partner into play. […] nothing is less polite than rigorous conversation pursued to its end. (Richard Gunn)

Doing the reading

We aim to read about 25-35 pages per day. That number is an average - which means some days we read more and other days we read less. There will be days of class for which we need to read closer to 50 pages, and days of class where the entire reading is half a page. It’s hard to have anything to say (or to write) if a person doesn’t read very much. Good ideas come from the way we process the ideas of others, same as good habits, good manners, good morals, good instincts - always from other people. This is a list of readings that will give you new ideas to make your own ideas and writing original and interesting to other people and to yourself.

It is not possible to do well in this class without doing the reading.

Our detailed schedule of readings is below. Any reading that is not hyperlinked is available in Blackboard or is a book you purchased for this course.

Supplementary readings are optional and you are not required to read them, though you are encouraged to!

Detailed Schedule

Our full schedule of topics as well as readings for these topics can be found below.

I also try to include reasons for why we are spending time on these topics (I think I owe you that), as well as discussion questions that you can use to guide your reading and note-taking. Some of these discussion questions are required which means that you should come prepared to share your thoughts about that question. So please look at both the schedule below and the attached document regularly. (As usual, sign into that document with your Drake login info.)

Why we’re learning what we’re learning

Date: 8/24

Topic: Welcome! + Policies + Intro

Readings: Nothing for today - but read the course syllabus for next time, and start on the readings for next week.

Viewings: None

Discussion Questions: Not much to discuss here, but if you have questions about the policies and expectations you need to speak up now or forever (until the end of the semester) hold your peace!

Date: 8/26

Topic: What is Aesthetics? + Everyday Aesthetics

Readings: The whole syllabus (this whole website) as well as the Drake University Academic Integrity Policy.

Skim this page: Wikipedia: Aesthetics and also this one if you have time Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Aesthetics of the Everyday

TODO: Syllabus Quiz on Blackboard (Due this week, see BB)

Viewings: (please do not watch the entire 4.5 hour loops, just glance at those and absorb the vibe) Solarpunk aesthetic, Machine fabrication, Coding, Hacking, Cybercore

Optional: CARI - Consumer Aesthetics Research Institute

Discussion Questions:

  1. How does aesthetics ““work””?

  2. What are some everyday aesthetics you’ve encountered?

Date: 8/31

Topic: Aesthetic Theory and Rhetoric

Readings: Christopher Bartel - Aesthetics and Video Games Ch. 1 : Aesthetics

and skim (or read, if you have time)

Barry Brummett - Rhetoric of Machine Aesthetics Ch. 1

Viewings:

Optional: SEP - Heidegger’s Phenomenological Approach to Art

Discussion Questions:

  1. Think of some everyday objects that ‘make claims’ or ‘make arguments’ in the way we’re talking about.

  2. How do you think rhetoric relates to other parts of life? Art, morality, science, etc.?

Date: 9/2

Topic: Aesthetics and the Unconscious

Readings: Slavoj Zizek - section on antisemitism from The Sublime Object of Ideology Susan Sontag - Against Interpretation

Viewings:

Optional: Daniel Kahneman - Systems 1 and 2 Zenil, Soler-Toscano, Gauvrit - Aesthetic Preferences Bill Livant - The Hole in Hegel’s Bagel

Discussion Questions:

  1. What are some examples of beliefs we form before we really get a chance to think about them?

  2. What is - in your own words - Zizek’s point? You don’t need to agree with him - but be careful, and try to get this as precisely right as you can so that you’re not mischaracterizing his argument. Was there anything you particular agreed or disagreed with?

  3. What is the main thesis of Sontag’s essay? Was there anything you particular agreed or disagreed with? What do people tend to look for in art? (That’s an anthropological question). What should we look for in art? (That’s a normative question).

Date: 9/7

Topic: Labor Day - NO CLASS

Discussion Questions: You have the day off but if you want, here’s a lingering question for you especially in light of Sontag’s essay:

  1. Defend the following claim or make an argument against it : “When one makes art, one imparts meaning to it.”

Date: 9/9

Topic: Games and Play

Readings: David Graeber - What’s the point if we can’t have fun?>

Christopher Bartel - Aesthetics and Video Games Ch. 2: Three Attitudes to Play

Viewings: Two Crows Play in Snow on Car

Optional:

Discussion Questions:

  1. What parts of Graeber’s argument did you find interesting and why? Was there anything you particulary agreed or disagreed with?

  2. Bartel discusses three kinds of play. We’ll get into each of them in more depth later on - but for now: what are they, and what do you think of these three kinds of play? Are they anthropologically accurate: that is, do people really play in these ways? Are there any kinds of play that are left out?

Date: 9/14

Topic: Machine Aesthetics

Readings: Brummett - Rhetoric of Machine Aesthetics, Ch. 2 (Mechtech),

Viewings: Howl’s Moving Castle, Steam engine, Anime steampunk aesthetic, Massive machines

Optional: (WARNING: weird, uncanny, sexual themes, etc. - not mandatory whatsoever) H.R. Giger

Discussion Questions:

  1. What do you think Brummett means when he refers to an aesthetic as a subject or as an object?

  2. A lot of what Brummett seems to do when describing specific aesthetic qualities is mixing history, popular belief, and philosophical analysis all together. What do you make of this way of thinking?

  3. Throw a picture (along with your name) in the slides of something that you think qualifies as ‘mechtech’ based on what you’ve read.

Date: 9/16

Topic: Machine Aesthetics : Repetition

Readings: Bauhaus, The Charnel House - Repetition, Repetition, Repetition

Viewings:

Optional: Bauhaus - Influence on Everyday Life, Le Corbusier’s Machines for Living Repetition Compulsion - World Historical Rhythms in Architecture, Abigail Cain - What Steve Jobs Learned from the Bauhaus

Discussion Questions:

  1. Come up with some (ideally, unusual!) examples of repetition that you encounter in life.

  2. Can you think of machines that don’t seem to feature repetition in their design or behavior? (Maybe another interesting unspoken thing here is that the behavior is part of the design when it comes to machines.)

Date: 9/21

Topic: Electrotech and Electronic Aesthetics

Reading: Brummett - Rhetoric of Machine Aesthetics, Ch. 3 (Electrotech)

Viewing: Neon Genesis Evangelion - Control Room, A circuit, Circuit diagram, 2001: A Space Odyssey Trailer Vetroo K1 Pangolin Tower Case, Kanto mATX, HYTE Y70 ATX Mid-Tower Case, Windows 95 Ad, Apple vs PC,

Optional: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 1 Ep. 8: I Robot, You Jane (I don’t have a link to this one - but it’s a good example of ‘evil computer’ and I highly recommend it!)

Discussion Questions:

  1. What exactly is electrotech? Focus on getting the concept right by explaining what characterizes it: what makes electrotech electrotech, as opposed to something else?

Date: 9/23

Topic: Electrotech and Electronic Aesthetics

Reading: Brummett - Rhetoric of Machine Aesthetics, Ch. 3 (Electrotech)

Viewing: Neon Genesis Evangelion - Control Room, A circuit, Circuit diagram, 2001: A Space Odyssey Trailer Vetroo K1 Pangolin Tower Case, Kanto mATX, HYTE Y70 ATX Mid-Tower Case, Windows 95 Ad, Apple vs PC,

Optional: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 1 Ep. 8: I Robot, You Jane (I don’t have a link to this one - but it’s a good example of ‘evil computer’ and I highly recommend it!)

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is the role of electricity in electrotech? Can there be non-electrical machines that you would still be willing to call electrotech?

  2. Talk about the importance of the occluded interior of electrotech. Why is this the major departure from mechtech?

Date: 9/28

Topic: Chaotech and the Aesthetics of Machine Decay

Reading: Brummett - Ch. 4 (Chaotech)

Viewing:Abandoned mechtech, Abandoned electrotech - focus on the device, not its environment

Listening: : The Caretaker - All You Are Going to Want to do is Get Back There , William Basinski - Disintegration Loops (also see Wikipedia - Distintegration Loops)

Optional: The Aesthetics of Decay - Beyond the Beautiful

Discussion Questions:

  1. What’s so attractive about decaying technology? Think outside the box here, come up with your own explanations.

Date: 9/30

Topic: Chaotech and the Aesthetics of Machine Decay

Reading: Brummett - Ch. 4 (Chaotech), (skim) Tech Noir - Wikipedia

Viewing:Abandoned mechtech, Abandoned electrotech - focus on the device, not its environment

Listening: : The Caretaker - All You Are Going to Want to do is Get Back There , William Basinski - Disintegration Loops (also see Wikipedia - Distintegration Loops)

Optional: The Aesthetics of Decay - Beyond the Beautiful

Discussion Questions:

  1. Nature is sometimes described as ‘wild’ - is there any distinction to be made between ‘wild nature’ and the ‘abandoned’?

  2. Abandoned is a big, heavy, emotional word. Write about abandonment - try to go beyond the personal here, try to capture aspects of this as a feeling that is broad and felt in many times, places, and people.

  3. Distinguish abandoned/decayed mechtech from abandoned/decayed electrotech.

Date: 10/5

Topic: Analog and Biological Computation

Reading: Chapter 1 of Joshua Clover’s The Matrix Matrix Digital Rain

Viewing: Watch the Matrix (required! )

Listening:: The Analog Thing audio improv Analog hybrid music - start around 34:00, Computing with Fungi

Optional: Analog computers, Ancient and analog mechtech - the Antikythera mechanism

Discussion Questions:

  1. What do you think of Clover’s essay?

Date: 10/7

Topic: Cybernetics

Readings: Stafford Beer - Designing Freedom Ch.1

Viewings: Cybersyn, living plant controls a machete through an industrial robot arm

Optional: Norbert Wiener - Cybernetics Wikipedia - Cybernetic Art

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is Beer’s point?

  2. This topic is certainly a lot more `mathematical’ in a way, but it bears on a term that comes up a lot in cyberpunk: cybernetics. So (assuming you’ve been reading some Neuromancer…) - what’s the relationship between Beer’s term cybernetic and that used in the cyberpunk genre? (If you have not started Neuromancer, don’t stress about this question)

Date: 10/12

Topic: FALL BREAK - NO CLASS

Date: 10/14

Topic: The Uncanny and the Sublime

Readings: (Skim) The Uncanny Valley, Edmund Burke - A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (Fragments) Freud - The Uncanny (Unheimlich) (Fragments)

Viewings: Look around online and find examples of both the uncanny and the sublime - add these to the slides with your name.

Optional: The “uncanny” is the experience of a loss of control Wikipedia - Digital Sublime

Discussion Questions:

  1. Can something be uncanny and sublime? Can something be neither?

  2. Burke v. Freud 1v1 cage match - who wins?

  3. Give an example (a new one) of the sublime.

Date: 10/19

Topic: Cyberpunk

Readings: Neuromancer Ch.s 1-3

Interview with Gibson (excerpt, really short)

Optional: Full interview

Discussion Questions: Discussion is expected as usual but there aren’t any particular questions today. Talk about whatever you want related to the topic!

Date: 10/21

Topic: Cyberpunk

Readings: Samuel R. Delany - Time Considered As a Helix of Semiprecious Stones from The Big Book of Cyberpunk

Samuel R. Delany - (Interview) on Capitalism, Racism, and Science Fiction

Discussion Questions: Discussion is expected as usual but there aren’t any particular questions today. Read the piece and be prepared to engage in quality conversation about it!

Date: 10/26

Topic: Cyberpunk

Readings: James Tiptree Jr. - The Girl Who Was Plugged In from The Big Book of Cyberpunk.

Optional: Phil Neel - Labor in the AI Labyrinth Pt. 1

Discussion Questions: Discussion is expected as usual but there aren’t any particular questions today. Talk about whatever you want related to the topic!

Date: 10/28

Topic: NO CLASS - Work on Draft

Readings: None

Date: 11/2

Topic: Blade Runner (1982)

Read: Barbara and Karen Fields - Racecraft Introduction (read Ch. 1 also if you want! read the whole thing if you want!)

(Skim) Wikipedia - the Turing Test

Warning: The youtube video below depicts a conversation with a (fictional) racist and the movie below includes a (non-graphic) scene of sexual harassment. Watch with your own discretion.

Watch: Blade Runner Watch a bit of this dialogue with “Measurehead” from Disco Elysium, starting at the embedded timestamp

Discussion Questions:

1. What is the Fields sisters’ argument, precisely? (Please be careful to get their argument right. Re-read if you need to, come talk to me about it, seek out other sources, etc.)

2. What are the relationships between the human/replicant divisions of the Blade Runner universe and the racial divisions described by the Fields sisters?

3. Can intelligence be a criterion for humanity?

Date: 11/4

Topic: Computer and Electronic Music

Readings: Fisher - Interview w/ Burial

Viewing: Wendy Carlos

Listening: Burial - Archangel, Sample breakdown of Archangel, (some of) Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 85-92 Nils Frahm - Says

Optional: Burial - Forgive Ikonika - Please William Basinski - Disintegration Loops oneohtrix Point Never (feat. The Weeknd, Caroline Polachek) - No Nightmares Quarta 330 - Sunset Dub (Documentary) Delia Derbyshire - The Delian Mode

Discussion Questions:

  1. What are the main attraction factors in electronic music for those who enjoy it? What does high-bpm electronic music do for the cyberpunk genre of film and games?

  2. Burial describes his production process, in particular the use of pitch-shifted vocals. What effect do these achieve?

  3. What do you make of the use of ‘natural’ samples in electronic music? Is it commonplace? Does it work?

Date: 11/9

Topic: Nostalgia and Retro

Readings: Interview V. Mannucci, V. Mattioli, Mark Fisher - Nostalgia and Lost Futures Tech Nostalgia matters because it’s the history of us (skim) Vaporwave

Optional: old games Is electronic music a threat to culture? Technological revolutions and techno-economic paradigms Halt and Catch Fire - 90s Nostalgia

Discussion Questions:

  1. Expand on Ulanoff’s discussion of tech nostalgia in terms of your own experiences with technology.

  2. Is nostalgia dangerous? Healthy? Neutral?

  3. Describe some “lost futures”.

Date: 11/11

Topic: Gamer Aesthetics and Aesthetics of Speed

Readings: Aesthetics Wiki- The Gamer Aesthetic

Viewings:

Optional:

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is a gamer? Do gamers constitute a community? If so, is it based on a shared aesthetic experience?

Date: 11/16

Topic: Environment and Visual Design

Readings: How Architecture Shapes Videogame Play Dithering (Skim)

Viewings: Architects react to Elden Ring Architecture How do video game graphics work? Games that don’t fake the space Procedurally generated city Procedurally generated dungeons

Optional:How Computer Graphics Work Creating a scene in Unity First generation of console games Video game crash of 1983

Myst

Discussion Questions:

  1. What elements of the core technological aesthetics (mechtech, electrotech, chaotech) appear in video game environments?

  2. What are some quirks or differences between natural environments and videogame environments, and what are their aesthetic impacts or effects on players?

Date: 11/18

Topic: Goal-Seeking Aesthetics

Readings: Christopher Bartel - Aesthetics and Video Games Ch. 3: Goal-Seeking Aesthetics

Play: Play some Tetris and also some Mario. Or something else that fits the bill of ‘goal-seeking’ aesthetics in gameplay (in which case, tell us about it in class)!

Discussion Questions:

  1. What are some of the goal-seeking aesthetics that appear in games you like?

Date: 11/23

Topic: Dollhouse Aesthetics

Readings: Christopher Bartel - Aesthetics and Video Games Ch. 5: Dollhouse Aesthetics

Play: Find a game which features dollhouse aesthetics and play it a bit - then report back in class!

Discussion Questions:

  1. We know some examples of dollhouse play: character customization, for one. Find some more, and discuss them.

Date: 11/25

Topic: NO CLASS // GIVE THANKS

Discussion Questions: Turkey: Pros and Cons?

Date: 11/30

Topic: Noise and Chaos

Readings: Perceived randomness (Apophenia) Perlin noise in No Man’s Sky

Viewings:

Optional: Kolmogorov Complexity

Discussion Questions:

  1. How do you define chaos? Can chaos be constructed? How can you use chaos in a game?

Date: 12/1

Topic: AI Art, Pixel Art, and Slop

Readings: (skim) Wikipedia - Artificial Intelligence Art Eryk Salvaggio - From Interactive to Interpassive Waneella and Liam Wong on the Artistic Allure of Japan Wikipedia - AI Slop

Viewings: Waneella - pixel art landscapes and slice of life

Optional: Welcome to Slop World: how the hostile internet is driving us crazy Quiz - Real or AI? This Machine Kills (podcast) - ScamGPT - How AI Supercharges Fraud, ft. Alice Marwick

Discussion Questions:

  1. Get into the weeds: why is pixel art specifically easy to see as ‘artisanal’ - as something tailored with care by a human being? Some of this is knowledge, context, etc. - we kind of are aware that it is so. But if we didn’t know anything about the kind of person, or the kind of context in which pixel artworks are produced - then what is it about pixel-artworks themselves that would indicate this kind of personal, attentive, human care?

  2. Pixel art could be said to be a form in which the content of what is depicted appears. When (for which content) is it the “right” form?

  3. AI art is recently a hot topic - with many ethical concerns coincident. Many dispute that it is ‘real art’. What do you think? Don’t stop at your instinct - think through the opposite perspective, also - and arrive at a judgment.