Prototype micro-robot (still from animation): Steven Middleton 2009.
Prototype micro-robot (still from animation): Steven Middleton, 2009 In Kevin Kelly's book: Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines (London: Fourth Estate, 1994) he describes an experimental capsule in which he is nurtured and protected by a complex amalgamation of the 'living and the manufactured'. He concludes: 'The realm of the born - - all that is nature -- and the realm of the made -- all that is humanly constructed -- are becoming one. Machines are becoming biological and the biological is becoming engineered' (p.2). This allusion to vivisystems - (from L. vivus: alive), a melding of mechanical and natural systems is evoked in Steven Middleton's new design for a micro-robot that will be used in performance by Stelarc when it is eventually built.
Middleton's micro, six-legged autonomous insectoid robot, complete with jointed, movable tail is a hybrid scorpion/spider, without the deadly mandibles. Even so, it carries within its design a sense of both fear and wonder (we may be stung with the scorpion's tail), horror and disgust (insects rise from dead or decaying matter, which they invade), the abject and the 'clean and proper body' (Kristeva) (the ambiguity of the thing that violates borders, threatens our sense of order and disorder). In literature the insect is most definitely linked with pollution and leaky boundaries, indeed in Franz Kafka's short story 'Metamorphosis' the main protagonist gradually turns into what he considers to be a disgusting insect in which his humanity (whatever that is) was compromised.
The insect is decidedly other to the human, it's whole body is an exoskeleton. But for the human, technology itself has become an exoskeleton in that it provides a metaphorical armouring or illusion that it will render us better, more viable, more human?
The very fact that the robot is small enough to enter the body through one of its orifices (and here on the tongue it is dangerously close to the human throat) is threat enough! Since the tongue is a vital instrument in human speech and communication, a physical link is created between the robot's body and language and is metaphoric of the various bots that crawl the web. As search engines, these bots strip away code, search websites, interpret information and ultimately help us in our reactions with online communication. Like insects that scurry around in the night these little aids crawl the web without us being aware of them. They are in fact, out of control. According to Kevin Kelly 'The marvel of the 'hive mind' is that no one is in control, and yet an invisible hand governs, a hand that emerges from very dumb members' (p.16)
Middleton's image of the close proximity of the robot to an intimate part of the human body, suggests that we (as a species) may have to learn to accommodate other species in order to survive (communications technology being vital to productivity, social networking, information sharing). This recognition, alliance and incorporation of other species into the human is already evident in biomedical procedures in which the human body is enhanced by xenotransplants, creating a hybrid - human/not human (porcine derived products are used in replacing human body parts). The scale of the robot also alludes to a futurist notion of the design of nano-scale, nano- robots that will be introduced into the human body for targeted drug delivery, virus search or disease monitoring. For the moment at least, nano-robots are still in the research and development phase.
When I look at the image of the robot on the human tongue, the movement of the robot (in the animation) and the apparent passivity of the human I am reminded again of Donna Haraway's pronouncement in 'A Cyborg Manifesto' in Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature (New York; Routledge, 1991), pp.149-181: 'Our machines are disturbingly lively, and we ourselves frighteningly inert'.
Steven Middleton's work may be found at:
http://home.vicnet.net.au/~stevem/
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