Shaping The Meaning Through Simulation and Constructing Alternative Reality in Ian Mcewan’s Machines Like Me

Year 2023, , 1 - 19, 20.09.2023

İsmail Avcu

https://doi.org/10.33692/avrasyad.1194514

Abstract

Ian McEwan uses elements of science-fiction and puts forwards some vague issues about artificial intelligence in Machines Like Me, thus leaving the reader in a technologically advanced, sci-fi utopia dominated by hyperrealism, subjectivity, and consumerism, which later turns into a moral dystopia with discrepancies of humankind’s interaction with AI humanoid robots. He offers a retro-futuristic universe where notions such as morality, human nature, and free will are challenged in an environment generated by postmodern tactics of historiographic metafiction and intertextuality as well as simulation. McEwan also provides us with a postmodern picture of contemporary individuals and conditions in which thin lines between the intrusion of artificial intelligence into our lives and the representation of truth and reality are blurred.
Making use of theoretical concepts such as postmodern simulation, historicity, and production of knowledge under how McEwan presents the major subject matters in the novel with the reflection and depiction of a futuristic world of artificial intelligence, this article tries to answer the questions about the condition of the postmodern individual who struggles with the issues of discerning reality and truth haunted by the existence and intrusion of AI Adams and Eves.

Ian Mcewan’ın Benim Gibi Makineler Romanında Simülasyon Yoluyla Anlamı Şekillendirme ve Alternatif Gerçeklik Oluşturma

Abstract

Ian McEwan Benim Gibi Makineler adlı romanında bilimkurgu öğelerini kullanarak ve yapay zeka hakkında belirsiz meseleleri öne çıkararak, okuyucuyu sonrasında ahlaki bir distopyaya dönüşen, yapay zeka insansı robotların insanlarla uyuşmayan etkileşimlerinin var olduğu, teknolojik olarak gelişmiş, hipergerçekçilik, öznellik ve tüketimciliğin hakim olduğu bir bilimkurgu ütopyasının ortasında bırakır. Yazar aynı zamanda ahlak, insan doğası ve özgür irade gibi kavramların, postmodern tarihyazımsal üstkurmaca ve metinlerarasılık tekniklerinin yanı sıra simülasyon tarafından üretilen bir ortamda sorgulandığı retro-fütüristik bir evren sunar. Bunun yanı sıra, yapay zekanın hayatımıza girmesi ile gerçeğin ve gerçekliğin temsili arasındaki ince çizgilerin bulanıklaştığı çağdaş bireylerin ve koşulların postmodern bir resmini gösterir.
Bu makale, gerçeklik ile yanılsama arasındaki farkı ayırt etmeye çalışan postmodern bireyin, yapay zeka insansı robotlar olan Adem ve Havvaların varlığı ve insan yaşamına müdahil olmalarından doğan karmaşık durumu hakkında sorulara yanıt ararken, postmodern simülasyon, tarihsellik ve bilgi üretimi gibi teorik kavramlardan yararlanarak, yapay zekanın fütüristik bir dünyasının yansıması ve tasvirini ele alır.

Keywords

Anlamın oluşturulması, Yapay Zeka, Ian McEwan, Benim Gibi Makineler., Simülasyon

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