Old Email Archive

digest 1997-03-16 #001


11:27 PM 3/15/97 -0800
From: "Society for Literature & Science" 

Daily SLS Email Digest
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 15 Mar 1997 07:19:01 -0800
From: Lillian Porten 
Subject: sf & cloning
> > On Thu, 13 Mar 1997 "Dr. Cynthia J. Hallett" 
> > commented:
> > Unfortunately, given the quite natural human tendency for
making
> > mistakes, at some point, someone, somewhere will probably
consider it
> > useful to have specifically-designed 'employees' with
specific
> > task-oriented characteristics for specific roles. This is, of
course the
> > sci-fi scenario where we would flick through the genetic
catalogue and
> > select the characteristics we need for our purposes. The
combat model?
> > The Olympic model? The pleasure model? The Einstein model? The
Woody
> > Allen model?
There's a gripping sf/detective novel that came out in 1989 by
Jean-Michel
Truong called *Reproduction interdite* (in French--I don't think it's
been
translated)  that plays with ramifications of cloning technology,
including the possibility of genetically designed "employee"
slaves.  It's
a great read!
Lili Porten
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Date: 15 Mar 1997 08:17:11 -0800
From: DNEHL@mail.utexas.edu (Linda D. Henderson)
Subject: Energy to Info. conference update
To update SLS members on the upcoming conference co-organized by Bruce
Clarke ad myself, here's the press release that's just been produced. 
More
importantly, the Web site (see below for address) now has abstracts and
speaker bios.  A number of SLS members are either speaking or coming to
the
conference--and we'd love to see anyone else who can join us.
Linda Henderson
>From Energy to Information: Representation in Science, Art, and
Literature
Symposium to be held on UT campus
AUSTIN, TX   The symposium "From Energy to Information:
Representation in Science, Art, and Literature" will be held on
The
University of Texas at Austin campus, April 3-5, 1997 at the Thompson
Conference Center.  Registration is required.
"From Energy to Information: Representation in Science, Art, and
Literature" is the first-ever symposium to bring together scholars
from the
history of science, art, and literature to examine specific moments of
interaction among the the three disciplines.  Major scholars will speak
on
five panels, investigating the cultural impact of a succession of
issues:
thermodynamics, electromagnetic waves and the ether, scientific
diagrams
and the notion of inscription, electronic information, and virtual
reality.
By examining the various ways in which artists, writers, and scientists
themselves attempted to represent changing scientific paradigms, the
conference will provide a new view of the impact of science and
technology
on late 19th and 20th-century culture.
The opening lecture will be given by noted critic and scholar W. J.
T. Mitchell of the University of Chicago, who will discuss his recent
work
on dinosaurs as cultural icons in "Dinosaurs Decoded."  Nobel
prize winning
UT Professor Ilya Prigogine (Dept.of Physics) will give the second
keynote
address, considering the impact of such new ideas in physics as chaos
theory
in a talk entitled "Nature as Construction."  Saturday
afternoon's panel on
"Virtual Spaces/Virtual Bodies" will feature a presentation of
some of the
latest activity in virtual reality, including groundbreaking advances
being
made at Stanford University in the area of "virtual surgery."
Invited speakers include Charles Altieri, Wayne Andersen, Ian F. A.
Bell, Robert Brain, Bruce Clarke, Charlotte Douglas, N. Katherine
Hayles,
Douglas Kahn, Timothy Lenoir, Kristine Stiles, David Tomas, Greg Ulmer,
and
Norton Wise.  University of Texas faculty who will be speaking or
moderating panels include Bruce J. Hunt (Dept. of History), Marcos
Novak
and Michael Benedikt (School of Architecture), and Linda Henderson and
Richard Shiff (Dept. of Art and Art History).
(more)
Page 2
The conference is also intended to function as a workshop, with
extensive time allotted for group discussion following each panel's
presentations.  In addition, speakers will anchor "focus
groups" for the
Friday lunch.  The topics of focus groups range from "Science and
Empire"
and "Modernism's Tactics for Science" to "Sound, Voice,
and technology in
Avant-Garde and Experimental Arts," and "The Posthuman
Body,"
"Transarchitecture--The Convergence of Information and Space."
 Conference
participants should register for focus groups on Thursday evening and
Friday
morning.
"From Energy to Information" has been co-organized by Linda
Dalrymple
Henderson, Dept. of Art and Art History, UT, and Bruce Clarke, Dept. of
English, Texas Tech University, with the assistance of Richard Shiff,
Director of the Center for the Study of Modernism in the Dept. of Art
and
Art History.  Co-sponsors for the event are the Center for the Study of
Modernism and the new Center for Techology in the Arts in the College
of
Fine Arts (Director, Richard Lawn).  Additional support has been
provided
by the Departments of English, History, Radio-Television-Film, and
French 
and Italian, the Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery, and the College of
Fine
Arts Dean's Office.
The conference will be held at the Thompson Conference Center on the
campus of the University of Texas at Austin, with the the opening
Thursday
lecture presented in the Art Building auditorium at 7:00 p.m.
The deadline for registration through the Thompson Conference
Center has been extended from March 15 to March 21, after which an
additional late fee of $5 will be charged.   Basic registration costs
are
$15 for UT faculty and students, $35 for those outside the University.
Meal tickets for the Friday and Saturday lunches and the Friday dinner
should be ordered at the time of registration, and cannot be purchased
after March 31 because of catering arrangements.
Single-admission tickets ($2) to the W. J. T. Mitchell lecture on
Thursday evening at 7:00 p.m. will be for sale at the door.  Similarly,
a
Saturday-only pass for the electronic information and virtual reality
panels ($10) will be available Saturday morning at the Thompson Center,
if
space is available.
To obtain registration materials, contact the Art History office at
471-7757, or e-mail requests to nrgy2inf@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu.  The
symposium
program and registration information are also available at the
conference
Web site .
Linda Dalrymple Henderson
Dept. of Art and Art History
University of Texas at Austin
Austin, TX  78712-1104