Alan N. Shapiro, Technologist and Futurist

Blog and text archive about media theory, science fiction theory, future design, social choreography, Computer Science 2.0, new media art, robots and androids, Star Trek, The Prisoner, Jean Baudrillard, Albert Camus, Michel Foucault, and Marshall McLuhan

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Three Lectures in Italy, One Lecture in Estonia

February 4th, 2013 in Category: Art and Economics, Art and Science, Future Design, Star Trek

Here is my 15-minute interview on Italian TV, on RAI4, on the program Wonderland. A fantastic show about Star Trek. First broadcast on October 26, 2012. And my lecture in Italian/English at the Share Festival in Turin on Art and the Future City.
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Three Essays on “Star Trek,” by Alan N. Shapiro

May 28th, 2012 in Category: Star Trek

"Alan N. Shapiro's book best explains the meaning of Star Trek and its deep humanist message." -- Gene Roddenberry, Jr.
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Baudrillard und Trek-nologie, von Alan N. Shapiro

November 27th, 2010 in Category: Jean Baudrillard, Star Trek

Beginnen wir mit dem Ende der sechziger Jahre in New York, dem Ort meiner Kindheit. Als guter Jude sollte ich eine jüdische Erziehung bekommen. Stattdessen liebte ich Star Trek. Alles, was ich weiß, habe ich von Star Trek gelernt.
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Star Trek: How the New Comes into the World

November 7th, 2010 in Category: Star Trek

Most scientists and academics who write about Star Trek claim to be fans and lovers of the series. But their customary methodologies deny to Star Trek its true originality as the creator of a reality-shaping "science fiction" that formatively influences culture, ideas, technologies, and even "hard sciences" like physics.
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Star Trek: 20 Basic Principles

November 7th, 2010 in Category: Science Fiction Studies, Star Trek

Radical Uncertainty, The Vital Illusion, The Surprise of Technology, Recognition of Otherness, Boundaries of the Human, Symbolic Exchange, Non-Signifying Language, The Duel / Dual Relationship, Ambivalence Towards Hypermodern Science, The Butterfly Effect, Ambivalence Towards Virtual Reality...
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Baudrillard and Trek-nology (Or Everything I Know I Learned From Watching Star Trek and Reading Jean Baudrillard), by Alan N. Shapiro

October 10th, 2010 in Category: Jean Baudrillard, Star Trek

It was my childhood in New York in the late 1960s. As a good Jew, I was supposed to acquire a Jewish education. But instead I loved Star Trek. Everything I know I learned from watching Star Trek.
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Star Trek: Technologies of Disappearance, by Alan N. Shapiro

July 29th, 2010 in Category: Book Descriptions, Media Studies, Science & Technology, Science Fiction Studies, Star Trek

In his lengthy review-essay of "Star Trek: Technologies of Disappearance" in "Science Fiction Studies", coeditor Istvan Csicsery-Ronay, Jr. remarks: "Shapiro’s study of Star Trek is one of the most original works of sf-theory since Scott Bukatman’s 'Terminal Identity' (1993)."
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Alan N. Shapiro interviewed by Gerry Ryan

July 23rd, 2010 in Category: Star Trek, Teleportation

I was deeply saddened to learn of the death of Gerry Ryan on April 30, 2010, Ireland's premier radio and television broadcaster. On June 1, 2005, I was interviewed for 45 minutes by Gerry on the Gerry Ryan Show - Ireland's most popular FM radio programme - about my book "Star Trek: Technologies of Disappearance."
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Data and Baudrillard, by Franco La Polla

June 25th, 2010 in Category: Android Data, Androids & Artificial Life, Jean Baudrillard, Star Trek, The Next Generation

This is a translation of one chapter of Franco La Polla’s book "Star Trek: Foto di Gruppo con Astronave." Almost all of the books on Star Trek were written in a relatively thoughtless manner, put together in haste to make money. In contrast to them, La Polla’s books on Star Trek are rare precious gems of high intelligence.
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Bayerischer Rundfunk programme on Alan N. Shapiro

June 20th, 2010 in Category: Android Data, Androids & Artificial Life, Baseball, Car of the Future, Casino Gambling, Dance Theory, Hans-Peter Dürr, Humanities Informatics, Rethinking Science, Star Trek

On June 13, 2010, Bayerischer Rundfunk broadcast a 38-minute programme (mostly in German) about the ideas and projects of Alan N. Shapiro. The show was produced by Florian Fricke. It includes a segment on the social choreography ideas and practice of Alan's close friend Steve Valk.
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Star Trek: How the New Comes Into the World

April 15th, 2010 in Category: Star Trek

Most scientists and academics who write about Star Trek claim to be fans of the series. But their customary methodologies function to deny to Star Trek its true originality as the creator of a reality-shaping science fiction that formatively influences culture, ideas, technologies, and even hard sciences like physics.
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The Star Trekking of Physics, by Alan N. Shapiro

April 15th, 2010 in Category: Star Trek, Teleportation

In spite of the proliferation of exhilarated technoculture and its multidisciplinary, wired self-image, there remain some straightlaced, uncool tendencies within the techno-elite which boil over at the thought of all this openness to the humanities and the soft.
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Captain Kirk Was Never the Original, by Alan N. Shapiro

April 15th, 2010 in Category: Captain Kirk, Captain Pike, Real/Virtual Reality, Star Trek

In its prevalent forms, the cottage consumer industry of Star Trek is a classic virtuality of identification where the viewers' senses of self, otherness, and reality are blurred by the contemplation of iconic spectacles.
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The Secrets of Star Trek

April 15th, 2010 in Category: Star Trek

Alan N. Shapiro interviewed by Father Roderick about Star Trek, on Catholic WIFI radio.
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The Klingon Language

April 14th, 2010 in Category: Language, Star Trek

At the same time that many of the world's languages are either disappearing or imploding into deeper uncertainty and complexity, there is one new language which is currently experiencing rapid exponential growth in its number of speakers, and is the object of widespread fascination: the Klingon Language.
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