Blade Runner 2049: A Philosophical Exploration

✍ Scribed by Timothy Shanahan (editor), Paul Smart (editor)

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 273
• Series: Philosophers on Film
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Widely acclaimed upon its release as a future classic, Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049 is visually stunning, philosophically profound, and a provocative extension of the story in Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner. Containing specially commissioned chapters by a roster of international contributors, this fascinating collection explores philosophical questions that abound in Blade Runner 2049, including:

• What distinguishes the authentically "human" person?
• How might natality condition one’s experience of being-in-the-world?
• How might shared memories feature in the constitution of personal identities?
• What happens when created beings transcend the limits intended in their design?

• What (if anything) is it like to be a hologram?

• Can artificial beings participate in genuinely romantic relationships?

• How might developing artificial economics impact our behaviour as prosumers?
• What are the implications of techno-human enhancement in an era of surveillance capitalism?

Including a foreword by Denis Villeneuve, Blade Runner 2049: A Philosophical Exploration is essential reading for anyone interested in philosophy, film studies, philosophy of mind, psychology, gender studies, and conceptual issues in cognitive science and artificial intelligence.

✦ Table of Contents

Contents
List of figures
List of contributors
Acknowledgements
Note on the director
List of characters and cast
Foreword • Denis Villeneuve
Introduction • Timothy Shanahan and Paul Smart
1 We’re All Just Looking for Something Real • Timothy Shanahan
2 The Alphabet of Us: Miracles, Messianism, and the Baseline Test in Blade Runner 2049 • Stephen Mulhall
3 The “Miracle” of Replicant Reproduction • Fiona Woollard
4 Being-from-Birth: Natality and Narrative • Brian Treanor
5 The Best Memories: Identity, Narrative, and Objects • Richard Heersmink and Christopher Jude McCarroll
6 Breaking the Code: Strong Agency and Becoming a Person • Robert W. Clowes
7 The Joi of Holograms • Paul Smart
8 Androids Dream of Virtual Sheep • Wanja Wiese and Thomas K. Metzinger
9 Her Eyes Were Green: Intimate Relationships in Blade Runner 2049 • Timothy Shanahan
10 Artificial Economics • Paul Smart
11 The Eyes of God • Nigel Shadbolt and Paul Smart
12 What am I to You? The Deck-a-Rep Debate and the Question of Fictional Truth • Timothy Shanahan
Index