Critical Annotated Webliography by Joe Chan

Question 3: Frankenstein continues to occupy the popular imagination as a monstrous scientist. Analyze some of the ways in which Frankenstein haunts discussions of recent technologies.

1) Frankenstein of the future – Alisa Burns
In the article, Alisa Burns commented the story of Frankenstein and claimed her ideas on technologies these days. According to Burns, the creation of Artificial Intelligence is a paradox which could turn out haunt and control human at last, just as Frankenstein did with the monster and his dying ending. She illustrated that computers were developed to be smarter and smarter in recent years, and one of the most suitable example is Artificial Intelligence (AI), with its development, people’s life are becoming easier. Yet, when people numbly depend and attach themselves to technologies, technologies seemingly develop, the threat that technologies brought was not less than the comfort they made us. This is why Frankenstein ends with dying on his own creation’s hands when it came out losing control. It is therefore some people suggested that AI should be treated as children that need to be taught, for them to be well mannered and kind. But Burns said it is doubtful who could be the parent of these dangerous children as no one has the ability to control them. Burns sums up with reminding people not to be mindlessly dependent on technologies or it may one day be the monster in Frankenstein. AI keeps developing these days, which made computers and machines capable of things that human beings could not. Even this could bring comfort to humans’ life, but the awareness toward the developing technologies should not be taken down.

2) Technology and its dangerous effects on nature and human life as perceived in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and William Gibson's Neuromancer - Orlin Damyanov
The article is written by Orlin Damyanov, except the story Frankenstein, he also mentioned another novel, Neuromancer. Damyanov used the two novels as a comparison to see the similarity and differences between the two of them. In his findings, Damyanov found that although Shelley’s Frankenstein was published a lot earlier than Gibson’s Neuromancer, affects from Frankenstein to Neuromancer could still be easily seen. He reckoned Neuromancer shared some similarity with Frankenstein no matter in style or some part of the plot. Both Neuromancer and Frankenstein stated the danger of technologies. In Neuromancer, Artificial Intelligence and computers are parts of people’s life, and people were addicted to it, even cannot live without them. And in Frankenstein, the danger is easily seen, Frankenstein seeks for power from science, but turns out being killed by his own creation. The two novels revealed the true danger of technologies and from what we’ve seen, Frankenstein truly affects science fictions after it, although not every plot are the same, but we could always see the theme of dangerous technology is easily founded and should always be aware of.
The article uses comparisons to find out things about Frankenstein and Neuromancer, and at last we could see Neuromancer was affected by Frankenstein, whereas Frankenstein’s effects on technologies were even up to the level of imagination. The threat Frankenstein brought still lingers in many people’s mind, although we are still being mindlessly giving “life” to our technologies.

3) Frankenstein in the University - Luke Fernandez
The article was written by Luke Fernandez, who used this article to reveal his opinion on technologies. Frankenstein is a famous science fiction novel, although it is the first published science fiction, many other novels or fictions after it could be as successful as it did. Fernandez claimed that Frankenstein’s monster means technologies, and its escape intends to be technologies being out of control. Fernandez also uses other examples like famous movies, the Terminator series, A Space Odyssey and the Matrix, all of them including Frankenstein are about technologies out of control by human beings and at last gained power to control human beings in result. Fernandez looks into these fictions and aware of this potential danger, to be specific, he recognized the development of technologies do not merely affect people’s daily life, but also studies in universities. Fernandez do admits the comfort brought by technologies, and reckons that people should have a better use of the emerging technologies. Even people would have spotted the possible danger, they should not take themselves out of technologies, but to engage themselves to it, or else they would merely be victims if technologies turn out to rule human beings unfortunately. What people should is not either sit and watch things done or use technologies as they wish, but to find a way to better technologies, to ensure them not to be out of control.
The article had stated technologies are potential danger, the author also used Frankenstein as it very start of the article, which shows that Frankenstein and other movies had affected him a lot in the topic.

4) Thinking Though Technology: Frankenstein’s Problem (or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Technology) - Shari Popen
Shari Popen, the author of the article Thinking Though Technology: Frankenstein’s Problem, is a teacher who does not agree in changing her classroom and teaching structure into “chatroom” like many would do. She wrote her opinions toward technologies and also found the potential danger technologies brought, she is for sure aware of the dangers, but she does not agree that so much worry should be put on technologies. Although novels like Frankenstein has discovered some dangers that we should not ignore, but people have no need to be too worry about those dangers. As technologies are like children, just like Frankenstein’s monster, the monster seeks for his home and hope for caring, he requested those from Frankenstein but was refused at last, which made one of the reasons for the story ended up as it was. Technologies are in a sense similar to the monster, people should not merely use technologies for their benefits, but to find ways to educate the “monster”, to treat them just like a children in order to prevent from ending up like Frankenstein, who had to give up his life, being killed by his own creation.

5) TECHNOLOGY, SECURITY AND PRIVACY: THE FEAR OF FRANKENSTEIN, THE MYTHOLOGY OF PRIVACY AND THE LESSONS OF KING LUDD - K. A. TAIPALE
The article is written by K.A. Taipale, Taiple suggested that although the story of Frankenstein is terrifying, too much worry on technology is not necessary. Frankenstein’s monster in the story is out of control, this should be aware as technology is also a monster, but people should not forget the benefits that technologies brought to us. In these days, terrorism is everywhere to be seen, personal security is in threat, new technology should be invent in order to protect human’s safety and privacy, or else people may suffer even more than the frightening technology. Taipale claimed, technology is alike with the story of Frankenstein, it is as frightening as the monster when it first came, just like Frankenstein himself was killed by his creation, but as time goes by, technology is not that scary while human had seize more control and knowledge on it. It is therefore needless to worry too much of technology, but to use it in a better to protect oneself. (1184 words)
References:

1) Burns, A. (2002) Frankenstein of the Future. Washington State University, Retrieved March 01, 2009, from http://www.wsu.edu/~delahoyd/frank.comment4.html

2) Damyanov, O. (1996) Technology and its dangerous effects on nature and human life as perceived in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and William Gibson's Neuromancer. American University of Paris, Retrieved March 01, 2009, from http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5972/gibson.html

3) Fernandez, L. (2008) Frankenstein in the University. Campus Technology, Retrieved March 03, 2009, from http://campustechnology.com/Articles/2008/05/Frankenstein-in-the-University.aspx?Page=1

4) Popen, S. (1998) Thinking Though Technology: Frankenstein’s Problem (or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Technology). Analytical Teaching, Retrieved March 03, 2009, from http://www.viterbo.edu/analytic/Vol%2019%20no.%201/thinking%20through%20tecnology.pdf

5) Taipale, K.A. (2004) Technology, Security and Privacy: The Fear of Frankenstein, the Mythology of Privacy and the Lessons of King Ludd. Social Science Research Network, Retrieved March 04, 2009, from http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=601421