The story is old. An object is animated with artificial intelligence to become a thorn that pricks at human obsessions and fears. Sound familiar?
For thousands of years, this uncanny object was crafted from clay, stone, wood, wax, or sometimes even dough. When the crafting was done, someone would perform the ritual. You know – that arcane ritual we are forbidden to use, under threat of terrible, unspeakable consequences.
The story is ancient, but also constantly evolving with new modes of creation. A monster is stitched together from human body parts and brought to life by electricity. Robots replace us. Androids trick us. Invisible surveillance ‘protects’ us from ourselves. And our anxieties keep multiplying. Globalisation. The attention economy. Neo-fascist nonsense. Ecologies in collapse.
Electric Baa tips-the-hat to Philip K Dick’s iconic 1968 AI story, Do androids dream electric sheep, and then goes on to explore AI themes in storytelling more broadly, in books and film, past and present, through the 21st century eyes of Shannon Baa.
About Shannon Baa
Shannon Baa was born in a country town, in south-eastern Australia, at a time when moon missions were thrilling, groceries were packed in paper bags and all the science fiction paperbacks at the local library were written by white men. Things have changed since then. Shannon writes, dreams and reads on the land of the Wurundjeri people, in the city known as Melbourne.
Electric Baa 