Art, Literature and Science in the Age of Robotic Culture

Art, Literature and Science in the Age of Robotic Culture

Introduction

Robots, certainly despite the fears that crop up from their creation, are illustrated fictionally in movies and literature as ultra-convenience. As depicted in fiction, robots could provide more relaxation time for humans, performing tiresome and boring everyday tasks or demanding physical projects. For a number of science fiction viewers or readers, assistance in the hard work of the everyday is one of the more appealing aspects of speculative technology. Meal preparing, housecleaning, commuting, landscaping, grocery shopping and even getting dressed are, in much science fiction, unnoticed or taken care of by nonhuman means, in point of fact removing the influence of daily necessities from the story, while simultaneously illustrating what life might be like if such tasks were carried out by non-human means or, in the case of bleak views of the future, demonstrate what life would be like without human or robotic attention to such tasks (Landon, 2002). This is intelligently portrayed in the 1922 movie “The Electric House” starring comedian Buster Keaton where almost everything is "automated" i.e. the soup is delivered from the kitchen by means of a toy train, the staircase is an escalator, and the library has an automatic book selector. In addition to this, all devices in this electric house go haywire before the film ends.

Discussion

In the age of robotic culture, technology provides information and communication anywhere through handheld computers and cell phones. Microwaves are there to prepare a full meal in minutes and a number of other productivity-enhancers or time-savers are common (Alkon, 2002). This is exactly what Buster Keaton demonstrated in his movie “The Electric House” which was focused on automatic appliances, simply modern and innovative household devices, offering an amazing deal of comic ...