Vector politics and the aesthetics of disappearance
Vector politics and the aesthetics of disappearance
Virilio's critique of accident and disappearance might recall Adorno’s praise of disappointment, and perhaps also signal the danger attendant on construing the future not as risk management but as unknowable other. In other words, Virilio points us towards an aesthetics of failure: of the inherent risk that any object – and phenomenologically therefore any subject – runs of failing to continue to be. It comes down then to a duty of care, for the planet, and consequently therefore also for the people who inhabit it. It seems then that Virilio is correct: a putative vectoral network, one that is not self-identical, that evolves without notice, that plunges into accident and disappointment, and in which machines have as much say as humans is a terrifying risk. But it may also be the only way to escape the stifling grid of destruction which is the military, economic, political and cultural stand-off of a present which denies hope to the mass of humanity and the planet itself.
978-0-7456-4877-4
68-91
Cubitt, Sean
aad644d3-3b69-4ca8-a999-9b0f809eb729
July 2011
Cubitt, Sean
aad644d3-3b69-4ca8-a999-9b0f809eb729
Cubitt, Sean
(2011)
Vector politics and the aesthetics of disappearance.
In,
Armitage, John
(ed.)
Virilio Now.
Chichester, GB.
Polity, .
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Book Section
Abstract
Virilio's critique of accident and disappearance might recall Adorno’s praise of disappointment, and perhaps also signal the danger attendant on construing the future not as risk management but as unknowable other. In other words, Virilio points us towards an aesthetics of failure: of the inherent risk that any object – and phenomenologically therefore any subject – runs of failing to continue to be. It comes down then to a duty of care, for the planet, and consequently therefore also for the people who inhabit it. It seems then that Virilio is correct: a putative vectoral network, one that is not self-identical, that evolves without notice, that plunges into accident and disappointment, and in which machines have as much say as humans is a terrifying risk. But it may also be the only way to escape the stifling grid of destruction which is the military, economic, political and cultural stand-off of a present which denies hope to the mass of humanity and the planet itself.
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Published date: July 2011
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Local EPrints ID: 191685
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/191685
ISBN: 978-0-7456-4877-4
PURE UUID: 6479d3f0-6284-4514-9561-c3dcef9263da
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Date deposited: 24 Jun 2011 07:38
Last modified: 10 Dec 2021 19:26
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Contributors
Author:
Sean Cubitt
Editor:
John Armitage
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