The Coded – i
by Fyn Paulina Bonita
Introduction: X [ a gesture ]
As Donna Haraway writes in Simians, Cyborgs, and X: The Reinvention of Nature [1991], “ ‘Our’ relations with ‘nature’ might be imagined as a social engagement with a being who is neither ‘it’, ‘you’, ‘thou’, ‘X’, ‘X’ nor ‘they’ in relation to ‘us’. The pronouns embedded in sentences about contestations for what may count as nature are themselves political tools, expressing hopes, fears, and contradictory histories. Grammar is politics by other means.” [Haraway page 3]
It took time for me to find a way to explain my connection to beings and why this is important to me. In some ways, the birds from my past have made me aware that my connection to nature is stronger than it seems. After that first encounter that I can remember as a child everything changed. My relationship with beings changed. Instead of seeing them as the other, I started to see them as a part of me. Because of this experience, every encounter I have had after that has been different. Every encounter I will have in the future will be different and every being I meet will be different from me. But I will choose our connection over our differences. Every time. This is why I pay close attention to my ways of writing and ways of reading.
In my writing, I have changed the text and quotes of my sources by using [X] to stop the (re)production of violence. Like the separation of nature from ‘us’, the academic standards are a form of violence. They are not inclusive but gendered, unsafe, and triggering. I have made the same decision as in my last work [24:30] “Tell the believing X to lower their Gaze”, to not follow these standards.
And as I wrote in [24:30], I write the same for you in The Coded (eye) i: “You will get confused when you see the X because you will want to define, and the X makes it harder for you to do so.” But “What if you could not know or see the exact nature of someone? How would you define then? Maybe you shouldn’t.”
In [ 1935 ], Alan Mathison Turing created a computing machine with limitless memory and a scanner that moves back and forth through its memory. This machine would search, find and write down its findings on its own by modifying and improving itself. And with this program, the machine was able to decipher codes. (Copeland chapter 3)
Through this research, Alan Mathison Turing discovered machine learning – the ability for a machine to learn through experience.
In today’s world, Artificial Intelligence is all around us. Our phones, cars and computers are upgraded to a level that we do not have to do the work. Artificial Intelligence does it for us. Artificial Intelligence can follow our every move because of the algorithms. We have created creatures that can think and learn just like us, only they are faster. But then again, Alan Mathison Turing did imagine a machine that could do that. Artificial Intelligence and I are different. Yet, I would not say that (A)i is unfamiliar. In all the movies and series I have watched, (A)i is presented as this X like machine creature created for us. In these movies and series, (A)i is always seen as X that can not feel. And this fictional experience is all too real for my X, too familiar. My X will never belong in the present while forever being reminded of the past. Never able to escape – is that what it means to come from X, who have been property?
I would not want this for any X. Nor would I wish this violence for the machine-like creatures. Guinan sites in Star Trek – The Next Generation [ 1989 ]:
“Well, consider that in the history of many worlds, there have always been disposable creatures. They do the dirty work. They do the work that no one else wants to do because it’s too difficult or too hazardous. And an army of DATA’s all disposable… You don’t have to think about their welfare. You don’t have to think about how they feel – whole generations of disposable X.”
We are both X who do not belong. Today, Artificial Intelligence is the other, the X that is feared by the norm, the unfamiliar, the unknown. Through them, we reproduce the same structures and violence of otherness. In this research, I ask what are the ways in which Artificial Intelligence is kept as the other? Why is Artificial Intelligence positioned as such, and are there other ways of gazing at them? I will answer these questions by comparing their X to that of my own.
Donna Haraway, Simians, Cyborgs and X: The Reinvention of Nature. Routledge, [ 1991 ]
Sarafina Paulina Bonita, [ 24:30 ] “Tell the believe X to lower their Gaze”. [ 2020 ]
B.J. Copeland, Artificial intelligence. Britannica, [ 2021 ]
Gene Roddenberry., Star Trek – The Next Generation. (series), [ 1989 ]
Oculus Sinister
“What starts, then, as an apparently moral argument about whether to be for or against violence quickly turns into a debate about how violence is defined and who is called “violent” – and for what purpose.” [ Judith Butler page 4 ]
“These violent delights have violent ends.”[ (A)i, Westworld [ 2016 ]
Westworld (series) [ 2016 ], created by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, is an American dystopian science fiction that tells the story of a Wild-West themed amusement park. This technologically advanced park allows the guests [ X ] to indulge in their wildest fantasies and entertain themselves with the androids – (A)i. These fantasies have violent consequences for the (A)i, whose program blocks them from hurting X. And as (A)i lives in a daily loop of violence, X are free to do with them as they wish.
Besides X who visit the park, (A)i also face their makers daily. X wipe their memories clean of the abuse and fix their external and internal damages to send them back into their loops. – The loops are storylines that (A)i invite X to participate in and, the further X goes into the park, the more disturbing and thrilling the adventures become.
As (A)i gets updated with a new code, a so-called defect (virus) appears in their system. This defect (virus) which is contagious, allows (A)i to access their memories. (A)i starts to remember the horrors of their interactions with X. And as the virus continues to spread, unusual events arise. Some (A)i start glitching, step out of their loops or possess strange behaviours. One (A)i produces the ability to harm. And when (A)i start defending themselves against X using the same violent tools, X experiences the (re)production of their created violence, the loop. X find themselves in their worst nightmare as (A)i seeks to gain power over X. (A)i and X fight to control the loop till either (A)i or X loses.
The story of Westworld has allowed me to see that there will always be those who can stop violence but they won’t, and there will always be those who want to stop violence but they can’t. Violence seemed to have “changed” but we should rather say it has evolved. Our social world is changing, technology is growing and our ideas are expanding. But in many ways, we still uphold the same norms and codes to X and the spaces X find themselves in. (A)i has become a tool for this, the tool through which we wield violence, and the tool that receives it.
But of course, Westworld is just fiction and as (A)i in Westworld say; “It doesn’t look like anything to me.” – because this series is created to entertain.
Judith Butler, The Force of Non-Violence. Verso, [ 2020 ]
Jonathan Nolan & Lisa joy, Westworld (series), [ 2016 ]
The (A) and I;
In my previous work, [24:30] “Tell the believing X to lower their Gaze”, I spoke about X in (other) (black) public (white) space. I researched how these spaces affect X through my own lived experience, through my X. There is more to my X than the Gaze of (other) (black) public (white) spaces. I have discovered a value in my lived experiences that I have taken for granted. However, I have found that I take my X for granted and all my X does for me. I have allowed (other) (black) public (white) spaces to define my X time and time again, believing that they own a part of me, like property. A property that should remain in the place where X, who belong to the norm, decided I should stay.
If this is who my X is – a property of X who belong, X who are the norm, my X never saw that for me. My X fought so hard to protect me time and time again. Yet, here I am.
“Perhaps we need a moratorium on saying “the X”. For it’s also possible to abstract “the” X. When I write “the X”, I see nothing in particular. To write “my X” plunges me into lived experiences.” [Adrienne Rich page 215]
Just as Adrienne Rich writes in her book Notes Towards A Politics of Location [1984], I see my X, I see scars, disfigurements, discolorations, damages, losses and what pleases me. Nourished bones and teeth of a smile that brightens up a room. My X is who I am. Adrienne Rich writes, “To say “the X” lifts me away from what has given me a primary perspective. To say “my X” reduces the temptation to grandiose assertions.” (Rich page 215). My X knows when it is time to leave the party early. X knows the weird tingling sensation in my hands because I fear the police or when they ask me to leave the line at the airport. X knows that my breathing problems appear when my X is perceived, and I feel captured in the binary. X knows the headaches and stomach pains from being silent in places where my X does not belong. The jaw pains, chest pains, back pains, hips pains. But also the feeling of no hunger because of love. Warmth in places because of affection, because of touch. Muscle activation with excitement and relaxation after a long day. My X knows, and I would not want to lose that sense of connection, that form of feeling alive.
So no, I would not exist without my physical traces, that is why (A)i is not like X, because (A)i has no traces to prove their lived experience. Adrienne Rich states: “To locate myself in my X means more than understanding what it has meant to me to have a vulva and clitoris and uterus and breasts.” (Rich page 215). It is through the wear and tear of my X parts that I understand how my X experiences things. (A)i will never have that, because their X parts will always be replaced. In Westworld, (A)i is (re)made to forget, I believe that there is cruelty in replacing X parts of (A)i, leaving no traces of their “physical data” intact. Not just for them but for us. Adrienne Rich continues: “It means recognizing this (white) skin, the places it takes me, the places it has not let me go.” (Rich page 215). To be able to understand X lived experience is to see ourselves and our X. But how will (A)i ever be able to see me when they can not see themselves.
(Re) Productions
Judith Butler states in The Force of Non-Violence [ 2020 ] that “Violence against the other is, in this sense, violence against oneself, something that becomes clear when we recognize that violence assaults the living interdependency that is, or should be, our social world.” [ Butler page 25 ]
From a very young age, I learned who was called violent. When I became older I understood how unfair this was. Now I know how unfair it still is in many ways. There is a right and wrong to violence that we have learned to understand. However, (other) (black) spaces have always faced the violence from public (white) spaces more. (Other) (black) spaces have reacted to that violence with non-violent ways. Yet, (other) (black) spaces have almost always received violence back from public (white) spaces. (Other) (black) spaces have reacted to violence with violence, to stop violence – to then have public (white) spaces react back again with violence. (Other) (black) spaces experienced violence because of X who belongs to those spaces. I am in those spaces. I have faced the violence of public (white) spaces. Yet, I have also faced violence in (other) (black) spaces. Violence is all around me, all around us. Violence is in the movies we watch, the music we listen to and the games we play. Violence is on the streets, in relationships, in institutions and communities. Violence is everywhere, in some ways celebrated and wanted with consent and in many ways accepted as a fact, a part of life – but never really with consent.
Different types of X experience different types of violence. And many X experiences more than just physical violence. The violence of the mind can do as much if not more damage, specifically to X, who are not the norm. It can leave invisible traces on X who do not belong, and they will carry these traces with them as a part of their X. As a part of their lived experience. My ancestors and my X know that.
X (re)produce what X witness and experience. Just as bell hooks explains, “Domination reproduces itself in different locations employing similar apparatuses, strategies, and mechanisms of control.” The (re)productions that affect my X through this reality are left neglected. I have felt the physical and emotional desire to belong to (black) spaces. While facing the fears of surviving public (white) spaces. I have lived with the pressure of knowing my X will never be enough. My X believes that I will always have to work harder, that work is all my X is good for because of my history. I have never consented to the pressure nor the physical and emotional labour. Still, they are there. (Re)productions of power affect X and, therefore, the (re)production of violence also affects X. But it also affects (A)i who X created, and there is power in creation – thus, (re)production. (A)i and I are both neglected in that. X who created (A)i are not aware of the future consequences and responsibilities in creating (A)i. Just as they are not aware of the responsibilities and consequences of the past that till this day affects my X.
The more (A)i learns about my X and our history through the stare of public (white) spaces, the more (A)i will (re)produce the depiction of the reality that X, who are the norm, have given to them. But as I expressed before, it is not the fault of (A)i. It is ours. We have neglected (A)I.
It seems that we as X do not realize that (A)i has never consented to be the way they are. We have created them. And therefore, the image we see of (A)i drives us to believe that (A)i will develop to become that image and nothing else. (A)i is stuck just as much as I am – always defined by X who are the norm. And just as much as (A)i and I are stuck, we also share a fate. My history is the fate of (A)i, and their future loops are mine. My walk of life is pre-decided by the norm, just like the loop of (A)i is programmed. I, however, am willful and not programmed to the same extent as (A)i. I am willful because my ancestors were willful and I am grateful for that. But who will (A)i be thanking with their memories hidden? Who will protect them?
Sara Ahmed, Strange Encounters: Embodied Others in Post-Coloniality. Taylor & Francis Ltd, [ 2000 ]
Judith Butler, The Force of Non-Violence.Verso, [ 2020 ]