Yuk Hui ~ On The Becoming of Prometheus ~ part 2
Besides being presented as a sort of transhumanism, which aims at improvement of the human species (e.g. Nick Bostrom), more interestingly, it is considered as a possible response to global capitalism, as an ultimate exodus by pushing capitalism towards its limit, therefore its end (in its identification with or relation to accelerationism). This talk attempts to take another standpoint by firstly proposing to examine the figure of Prometheus and the nature of such prometheanism. It is centred on two basic questions: 1) isn’t prometheanism a universalism which adopts a specific relation between human and technics? And if so, how can one think of prometheanism as a true global politics? 2) is prometheanism equivalent to automatism? A positive response to the second question is doubtful, on the contrary, I will propose that the current development of automatism has produced what I call ‘algorithmic catastrophe’ which doesn’t necessarily lead to a leftist prometheanism, if not its opposite.