Self-Portrait
Explained
No
one is certain about their own identity. Someone may have long decided what they
are in their minds, and others might cost one whole life to find out. Self-identities
could have various forms based on what people choose to become. By the help of
modern communicating technologies and various medias, nobody is really “pure”
to themselves. It is not a bad thing at all. More ideas and perspectives can be
shared by nearly anyone around the world. However, it could also affect a
person’s identity dramatically.
The
media I choose to present my self-portrait is, well, not so closely to my outer
appearance or the stereotype-alike kind of visual elements. The mechanic beetle
and modified fighter jet in science-fiction anime are all from my spiritual favorites.
As for the title, each viewer may have different answers. Someone will read it
as “Artificial Life (-) forms”, and others might get the meaning that “Artificial”
is actually “Forms” the “Life”. The first one is pretty easy to understand if
combined to the visual. The Caucasus beetle on the left has been separated in
two different body-parts combination: half is original/ biological, and the
other half is clearly fake/ artificial. Like
I mentioned before in my previous paper, I am a science-fiction fan in a pretty
deep and strict level. In honor to my knowledge to insects and my ethics
professor who always trying to make me brain-storming, I have more tendency to imagining
the possible future of artificial intelligence in almost every subject. So,
what if a beetle had been controlled by a micro-chip and developed itself into
a new species? Is it still a biological animal with “attachments” or a machine
that shared body with the beetle? And what will it think of itself when it becomes
rational beings? I found it very interesting and picked the theme for my piece
of work. By any meanings, both beetles and A.I. are my main hobbies that could clearly
define certain parts of me.
Putting the beetle Frankenstein away for now, the
“Neuron Jet” on the right should also be attractive to someone. The concept of it
is completely opposite to the fake beetle, basically making a non-life fighter
jet into a superior kind of organic A.I. The two ways of changing is different,
but the result could be very similar: we created something that capable to make
rational decisions! I really hope human could find someway non-violent when
first contacting with other intelligent beings. It is those fictions that
altered my way of considering one’s identity and many ethical stuffs around it.
Combining with the knowledge and experiences I have in this course; I am able
to critique the topic in a better way.
The
dark figure in the middle supposed to mean the person who needs to do these decisions
I talked above. But it could also mean another me who is determined to study
these stuffs in the future, and I hope I somewhat become at least some sort of him.
I always loved biology despite of my considerably poor mathematical abilities.
By the time I know that entomology is even harder and deeper under
classification of biology, I just cannot handle all those numbers. But it does
not mean I cannot continue my study in insects and their overall knowledge. Humans
are weird sometimes: they never feel boring for the thing they really love to
do. One more thing in the piece that I did not say is that the Chinese letter
in the under left, it means “Life-form” in English. There is a tiny difference
about the composition of the word. As you may already noticed, it has three
characters. First two is equal to “Life” in English, but can also be used separately.
And the last character means “body” or “form”. I barely have the idea to add Chinese
elements into my works since the environment is just not that suitable. However,
I feel more open to do whatever I want by the time I finished more studies in
college and especially with the help of the cultural courses like CLQM in ACM. I
hope you enjoyed my final project!
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