Italiano [English below]

 

Alla fine di Novembre 2015 sono stato invitato a Mosca, al National Center for Contemporary Arts, per partecipare al simposio “Limits of the Human: Human, Inhuman, Overhuman, Antihuman”, curato da Dmitry Bulatov e Madina Tlostanova, che ha visto intervenire, oltre ai curatori, Richard Doyle, Victor Vakhshtain, Jens Hauser, Nina Sosna, Wladimir Velminski, Michael Kurtov e Dmitry Galkin. È stata una bella esperienza, l’evento di apertura di un ampio e pluriennale progetto interdisciplinare, “The Human Condition“, curato da Viktor Misiano, costituito da mostre, master e conferenze in vari centri culturali moscoviti.

Di questo evento ho scritto qui e qui. Una selezione degli interventi, tra cui il mio, “The Evolving Human Inheritance. From Symbols to Life”, disponibile online in video, è stato ora pubblicato nel volume: Viktor Misiano, Darya Pyrkina (a cura di), The Human Condition, Mosca, National Center for Contemporary Arts, vol. I, 2018, bilingue (russo/inglese).

La seconda sessione, il secondo giorno, intitolata “Topologie viventi/Agenzie non umane” e curata da Dmitry Bulatov, era incentrata sulla vita, sul vivente e il non vivente, sulla possibile eredità umana, sulla Vita Artificiale, sull’Intelligenza Artificiale e la Vita Sintetica, sulle Bioarti e sulle relazioni tra arte e scienza. Di seguito il testo di presentazione:

“The principle question of this session may be formulated concisely in the following way: “How can simple localized actions create truly complex patterns?” Our intention is to consider this problem, using the examples that have emerged as a product of technological activities of the modern man. Among such agents are programmable matter, symbiotic forms and hybrids, “semiliving” entities and other manifestations of life existing “at the edge of chaos” and disorder. All these nonhuman subjects, interacting with one another, engender a complex systemic whole – a new sphere of existence, wherein the role of humanity is not of primary concern. How then can the effects of such self-organization be analyzed? How can this borderline state be located, beyond which the improbable manifestations of new technologies become our daily reality? What role can art and philosophy play in making sense of this new world and the orientation of our values within it? The participants in our session, “Living Typologies / Nonhuman Agencies” – philosophers, sociologists, art and new media theoreticians – answer these and other questions.”

Alcune delle mie slide

 

English

 

By the end of November 2015 I was invited in Moscow, at The National Center for Contemporary Arts, for a lecture at the Symposium “Limits of the Human: Human, Inhuman, Overhuman, Antihuman”, curated by Dmitry Bulatov and Madina Tlostanova, with the presentations of the curators and of Richard Doyle, Victor Vakhshtain, Jens Hauser, Nina Sosna, Wladimir Velminski, Michael Kurtov and Dmitry Galkin. It was a great experience, the opening event of a wide pluriannual interdisciplinary project, “The Human Condition“, curated by Viktor Misiano, consisting of exhibitions, masters and conferences in many cultural centers in Moscow.

I wrote about this event here and here. A selection of lectures, among them mine (“The Evolving Human Inheritance. From Symbols to Life”), which is also online in a video, has now been published in the volume Viktor Misiano, Darya Pyrkina (eds.), The Human Condition, Moscow, National Center for Contemporary Arts, vol. I, 2018, bilingual (Russian/English).

The second session/day, “Living Topologies/Nonhuman Agencies”, curated by Dmitry Bulatov, was focused on life, living and non-living, human possible inheritance, Artificial Life, Artificial Intelligence and Synthetic Life, Bioarts, and on the relationships between art and science:

“The principle question of this session may be formulated concisely in the following way: “How can simple localized actions create truly complex patterns?” Our intention is to consider this problem, using the examples that have emerged as a product of technological activities of the modern man. Among such agents are programmable matter, symbiotic forms and hybrids, “semiliving” entities and other manifestations of life existing “at the edge of chaos” and disorder. All these nonhuman subjects, interacting with one another, engender a complex systemic whole – a new sphere of existence, wherein the role of humanity is not of primary concern. How then can the effects of such self-organization be analyzed? How can this borderline state be located, beyond which the improbable manifestations of new technologies become our daily reality? What role can art and philosophy play in making sense of this new world and the orientation of our values within it? The participants in our session, “Living Typologies / Nonhuman Agencies” – philosophers, sociologists, art and new media theoreticians – answer these and other questions.”

Some of my slides