Ash to Ashes to Actuality to Attic

In the episode, "Be Right Back", the character Martha end up losing her husband as they both are just starting their lives. Martha even, unknowingly, is with child whose father is Ash, Martha's love. Ash unexpectedly dies in a crash and Martha has to to mourn the lost of her love as well as the father of her child. She find it so hard to move on, that she indulges in something that even she finds a bit inhumane. She ends u indulging into a program where she is able to here interact with Ash even though he is dead. This is strange to her but she rather encounter the strangeness of him being there but dead, than encounter the pain of Ash not being there at all. She continues this strangeness to listening to his voice through telephone calls through the same program. Her fascination with her love being there but not there at the same time causes such a joy, that it becomes a burden. She loves to here his voice but, again, wants more. She goes through the same program to physically feel Ash's body. At this point she can experience Ash physically but not mentally. She feels as though that she needs him to continue with her pregnancy. She saw the actual Ash to be a rock for her. This A.I. Ash was suppose to be her new but familiar rock. The A.I. Ash was to be like a display rock at a museum. something that looked enough like a real thing, that it made you want to take a double take. The A.I. was a memory until like a said earlier, it became a burden. Because the A.I. Ash was not the real thing but just a surface carbon coy of the actual human Ash, he was just like a memorial. After awhile, after constantly seeing a memory of something that you loved, it becomes more and more clear that thing is gone. This memory brings pain and it had gotten to that extent for Martha. She had to put the A.I. away. She placed him in the attic where things are lost in a way but not at all forgotten. Yes it would have been easier and less like a hoarder to just shut down the A.I. and threw it in the trash but, again this A.I. was the carbon copy of Martha's love Ash. If she was to shut down the A.I. that looked exactly and sounded exactly like Ash, it would have been just as equivalent as being the Uber that killed him. This time should would have had a direct hand in his death and suffered even more. In conclusion an A.I. should not get to a point of advancement  to where it can be a coping mechanism in the way that Martha made it, it would later become more grief and more pain pushed away to deal revisit every now and then, just to torture oneself like going in the attic to look at old pictures. Reminiscing the things in the attic that once were but are no longer.

Drawing A Line Between Humans And Automatons

In the episode " Be Right back " of the popular T.V show ,Black Mirror, it shows a highly intelligent,learning, android helping a young woman cope with the recent loss of her husband while going through a pregnancy. It starts simple enough from a chat bot that acts as a text chat between the woman and her husband , to keep her company but soon that isn't enough. Next she upgrades to a automated voice of her husband that uses his digital identity to mimic things he would say and his personality. Ultimately that wasn't enough though because she ordered the final upgrade in this project which was basically an android mimic of her husband. unknowingly modern technology though has become very close to this, we have sophisticated chat bots that can fool almost an unsuspecting person. We also have bots that can mimic voices and scam insurance companies even as I type life-like androids are under development to become more human. So the big question is where would the line be drawn between humans and their self governing,learning, and indistinguishable android counterparts?  My guess would be that first hopefully these androids themselves would not acknowledge themselves fully as 'human beings' and recognize they were manufactured and not born. Secondly we ourselves as humans are discovering what makes up us being conscious and thinking beings. For example, one thing that would set us apart from androids is our ability to have 'feelings' a concept really that no one can define yet. in the instance though that androids are able to experience feeling and emotion one day we must ask ourselves are we simply their human overlords or would they be free to govern themselves. At the end of the episode Martha couldn't simply let the android destroy itself because she commented Ash would've begged for his life and it bothered her so much that she stored him in the attic of her home. We see here that she constantly became more and more  emotional attached and dependent on a machine that only mimicked the real husband but could not connect to her emotionally. So here we must question was this inability to truly feel emotion and the only thing that made this android inhuman? He had the capabilities to learn and function on its own and he looked exactly human, and you could possibly argue he was conscious of his own existence. So looking as close as possible the only limitation between A human and an Android was the ability to feel and if this barrier is broken what  would truly separates us?

I disagree with what Martha did.

You never realize how advanced we can really be. After watching the episode Wednesday, I was honestly in shock. To think that, that could be possible is really scary. Personally, I think it was a terrible idea. A terrible idea from the start. See, in everything in life, one things lead to another. From the beginning, my first thought was “no way anyone could do this”. But I really thought about it, and I know how hard it can be to cope with the death of a loved one. I personally know how hard it is to lose a loved one, and yes at times I wish I could hug or talk to them once more. But I don’t think I could ever can go to the extreme that Martha did. Personally, I would have deleted the email as soon as I got it. I do realize however, that the situation Martha was in, was quite a complicated one. Considering that she is pregnant, I see why she would find the need to still have Ash in her life. I believe at most, she should have kept it at the phone call level. I think it is not healthy to carry on a relationship with someone that is no longer there. It got to the point where she was attached to her phone like Ash once was. When it got to the point that she had to hide what she was doing, is when I think she realized that what she was doing wasn’t the correct thing. The problem with this whole robotic ash was that HE IS A ROBOT. Robots have no emotion. So, whenever she expected him to react a certain way and he didn’t, she had to realize that a human being and a robot are completely different. I think however, that she, at least for a while, didn’t see the Ash2 as a robot. She realized however that living with Ash2 was difficult to live with when she tried sleeping with him and he didn’t close his eyes or breath. That would honestly scare me, and I would have the uncertainty that I was safe. When it got to the point where she wanted him to jump and he wouldn’t simply because the real Ash never had suicidal thoughts, so he wouldn’t until she ordered him to. Then she gets made because he wasn’t scared to jump. I think though that when he did start crying and begging her to not make him jump, she didn’t want to lose him twice so that is why she told him to not jump. Leaving him in the attic was also a bad idea because I am curious to know how she explained it to her daughter. It is obvious the daughter knew, but what could have been the story?

Where to draw the line.

Where to draw the line.

written by: Asha F.

     Where do we draw the line when discussing things like robots and androids. Robots that are intelligent that can look, talk, and act like real humans. I recently watched an episode of a popular television show on Netflix called Black Mirror. The episode that I watched was titled "Be Right Back" it was about a woman who lost her partner, he was in a car crash on his way to run some errands. At the funeral for her boyfriend the girlfriend (Martha) was approached by a woman who was in a similar situation a few years prior. She told Martha about this program that allows you to speak to the person that you lost. At first Martha completely rejected the idea thinking that it was crazy and knowing that Ash ( the dead boyfriend) was never coming back. The friend insisted that this would help her cope.

     Later Martha finds out that she is pregnant and being distraught needing to tell someone she opens the program that allows her to email "Ash". This is possible by her uploading all of Ash's social media to the program. Eventually, emailing is not enough for Martha she wants to hear Ash's voice. She makes that know and upgrades the program. Soon, this isn't even enough for  her and she begins to crave Ash himself once she tells the computer this he says its possible. She ends up buying an android that looks just like Ash. It is a functioning robot it walks and talks and is a very convincing imitation of Ash. In the beginning she was satisfied with it. Well, mainly she was satisfied with the sex, throughout her time with the android she realizes that this android is not Ash. It does not react to certain situation like the real Ash would, it does not talk to her like the real Ash would. 

     Even though the robot is intelligent and learns along the way it starts to become its own person like a different version of Ash because the robot does not share all of Ash's experiences. It can not think like him and react to situation like the real Ash would it can only imitate what it think the real Ash would do in  a certain situation. Eventually, Martha grows tired of the android and ends up locking it away in the attic forever.

     My question is when do we say this is not alright I personally feel that a line should have been drawn at having phone calls with the android. That was enough, it was already stating to trick her into thinking that is was the real Ash anyhow. The act of getting an android that looks just like a deceased loved one and is supposed to act like your loved one is out of hand. It can easily become a sick obsession or deranged thinking that the android is your lost loved one. In truth you can not bring something back from the dead once its dead its dead forever. Using technology in this way can not be healthy in any way for the party using it. They need to keep in mind that this is just an invention something that can not love you back sure it may be able to synthesize feelings of love and other things but, it is in no way a living human being. I personally feel that people should get together and draw a clear line to where we draw the line at the uses and functions of androids and A.I in the world.

Here, but Not Here

       To begin, in the episode, "Be Right Back," of the Black Mirror series, a young couple, Ash and Martha, moves into a small house, isolated from society. The next day, Ash has to return the van they used to help move their belongings. This shows the irony in the title because, as he went to return the van, Ash was killed in an accident and never came back home, so Martha thought. At the funeral, Martha runs into one of her friends who informs her of a system that allows people to stay in contact with the dead. At first, Martha was convinced that she wanted no parts in this system, until she found out that she was pregnant. This led her to looking into the service, which started as a messaging system with a chatbot. This bot was a bundle of data of Ash gathered from his social media accounts. Martha quickly grew attached with the system, which led her to constantly upgrade the service. What started as a conversation with information from social media accounts grew to Martha providing videos which gave her the ability to speak to what sounded and seemed like Ash. Once she dropped her phone, and almost lost Ash again, she upgraded to the human form. This not only allowed Martha to talk to Ash, but she could now interact with him, ranging from eating with him to having sex with him. However, Martha soon realized that something was always different with the new Ash. Due to the new Ash being nothing but information that was provided, Martha could never get the old Ash back. This is because the new Ash was not there to be human, he was there to please Martha. This wasn't a smart grieving choice for a number of reasons. One reason would be because it convinced Martha that she would always have Ash around. Some may believe that people who lived in an earlier period would think using pictures and voicemails as a coping mechanism is creepy, but it's different. A person can't talk to someone that's in a picture and get a response. All the things Martha did with the new Ash would keep anyone from moving on. Another reason for it not being a wise grieving choice would be because the new Ash had an effect on more than Martha. Obviously the new Ash had an immediate impact on Martha, but the impacts on her began to affect her surroundings. For example, due to Martha spending all of her time with the new Ash, her relationship with her sister, Naomi, became very distant. It became so distant that Naomi had to surprise Martha with a visit in order to comfort her. During the visit, Naomi went to use the restroom, but saw men's clothing in her sister's room. This led Naomi to believing Martha had already moved on, which led to Martha having nobody to convince her that keeping Ash's presence was not healthy. The new Ash also had an impact on Martha's daughter. A viewer of this episode would think that Martha wouldn't tell the young girl about the android-like figure of her father, but she did. However, the young girl interacted with the new Ash as if he were a pet. She didn't call him "dad" and Martha kept him in the attic, where Ash's mother put all of the things she didn't want to deal with. This showed that Martha knew it was unhealthy, but she kept the new Ash anyway. Martha will live with the pain of knowing that the closest thing to having Ash back is nowhere near having him back. All in all, artificial intelligence should never be used to handle grief. People have to let go and move on eventually. 

Are They Really Alive

From watching movies like The Polar Express and pausing them for a quick second and thinking to myself why does this movie scare me. I have noticed that CGI movies have scared me for life. Computer animated movies can make themselves seem as realistic as can be also making it scarier than a horror movie. CGI's have been coming out more and more since they have improved their technique, characters in movies like Gollum in Lord Of The Rings and Davy Jones in Pirates Of The Caribbean. Movies like these have been getting better at perfecting every last detail and have also gotten better of shocking us with their precise work. Making it seem as we can touch every detail. The weird feeling that we get from watching the details from these films have to do with The Uncanny valley. Movies like CGI's fall into that category making it seem as it could pass as a humanoid but is off in some realistic details. Masahiro Mori robotics professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, wrote an essay on The Uncanny Valley which helped people understand why we sometimes feel unease when watching movies like these. Artificial Intelligent robots also fall into the category in The Uncanny Valley making realistic robots something that would come out of a CGI movie. 

The Show Black Mirror shows an episode where a woman Mar loses her husband in an accident causing her to fall into unhealthy grief. Mar trying to help with grief decides to speak to a digital version of her lost one Ash. Which helped and added to her grieving process. Mar having to need the digital version of Ash at all times. Mar would sometimes catch things that digital Ash wouldn't know how to respond to. Even though one day she accidentally breaks the phone she used to communicate with digital Ash, while at a doctor's appointment in which she goes to see the status of her unborn child.  The digital version of Ash reveals that she can upgrade to a costly but better version of himself which she agrees to buy. Mar discovering that "better version" is a robotic clone of Ash. She uses him to help manage her grieving process and keeps the robotic version of Ash. Until she notices that she can't continue and tries to make robotic Ash jump off a cliff but can't seem to make him do it. The steps that Mar took to help with her grieving process was unnecessary to me. I feel like she shouldn't have to upgrade to a "better version" of robotic Ash to help with her grieving process but in that case made it worse.  These two versions of technology can scare people but also help them in a way to cope with the world with escaping into CGI movie or a robotic copy of your dead husband. 

Looking into the Future

My bright opinion on Artificial Intelligence is that our world is developing so quickly that the control  is out of our hands. Technology updates every second. In "Be Right Back" everything is remotely portrayed in the scene, you see self generated cars, robots, and computers. The fact that Ash's fiancé could actually become in  contact with Ash when he died is fairly amazing. Ash 2 was remotely in a cloud and she could link with him through email and could see his private life and could talk to him over the phone. Ash 2 operated off of pornographic videos when it came to sexual activity and he stayed within the boundaries of a robot function causing no harm towards the opposing person.I think the viewers founded it to be uncanny when Ash 2 appeared just because they were aware of whom he really was and the robotic him did not perform the exact actions as him. This Non toxic figure caused corruption to Ash's Fiancé, because it did not bring back the real him it was only a minute-lasting memory. When we are reintroduce to something that we cannot seem to fix or bring back we end up becoming frustrated within our selves or either more emotional. For Example, when we talked about Bruce Jenner in class some students thought that his new figure was uncanny, because they were aware of the original Bruce. Technology can be merely helpful but yet a knock down cause it's  becoming a disruption to society as a whole. For example, When we turn to Facebook, twitter, Instagram or Snapchat we see so many outrageous events going on such as discrimination, bullying, exposing, and etc. Our society is turning and is becoming more comfortable with this type of source because it's so attractive and we can't resist the rise it brings, it gives us a reason to fight back and voice our opinion cause we want to be heard and social media is one of the most outreaching way we can do that. On the helpful side with the situation of Ash's daughter becoming associated with the robotic him, I believe that it is strange yet unusual. Most people find it very creepy that the little girl is aware of the robot, and I think that it is important to introduce a child to their long lost family member. Kids should Become associated with their family members  dead or alive whether it's by picture, a charm, or a robotic presentation. When we are younger we are more exposed to certain things such as parents performing free actions because they feel as though as a kid you don’t know any better, but kids actually feed off of adults actions.. I believe it was precise that the little girl was introduced to the figure when she was younger because children tend to have higher cognitive functions at an early age. By then kids are experiencing the world more and recognizing the ways that we cope with certain situations. Moreover, Robotics is taking over our nation and will soon be taking our positions. I believe that Robots will conquer our jobs cause they perform multiple actions and work faster than we can. We as humans cannot work all day without a break, but Robots can. Overall, we see the development of AI increasingly becoming present in our lives and the fact that we know is worrisome.

Be Right Back: The Remorse of Copying the Dead.

 In this episode of Black Mirror, a couple named Ash and Mar are living a typical life until a terrible accident occur that cause Mar to lose her significant other. As the show continues, she suffers a great loss but attempts to deal with her grief by replacing or copying a digital software of Ash or Robo-Ash as you may say. It starts off merely as a way to communicate with Ash to reduce the amount of pain she receives because of his death.

  As matter of fact, I found the software very intriguing because of its capabilities to develop a more realistic form, as more information is fed to it. It first starts off gathering information from online sources such as social media but soon was open to other information as Mar gave it access to emails and private information. One aspect I find quite similar to Robo- Ash is the comparison of Mar being pregnant and Robo-Ash development. We all know and understand that a baby develops as you teach it or in Robo-Ash case, give it access to more information.

  The first time Mar spoke on the phone with Robo-Ash it triggered a sense of attachment. Eventually, she took it to the next level creating a living android of him. She soon realizes this was a huge mistake because he only knew the information he was presented.  He would act more like an Android then a human that was programmed to be more realistic. It seems quite confusing that she wants him to be more like Ash instead of Robo-Ash when he is essentially a software program. Robo-Ash would follow commands just like a robot or dog would do instead of acting on its own.

   Also, the way she dealt with grieve throughout the episode was quite similar to where she lives. It seems as if she lives in a very isolated location far away from any source of society. The irony of her isolation and her way of dealing with grieve are very similar to each other. Instead of having her friends and family support her in her pain and sorrow, Robo-Ash was supposed to help her go through the pain. Sadly, Robo-Ash had some kinks in him that reduce the amount of realisticness.

  Overall, the episode was quite interesting seeing Mar deal with the pain of her dead partner in a different form. The concept of Robo-Ash was interesting to see it fail but I believe the idea is truly a success but the task it was given in this episode was not quite the right task for this concept. Grieve should be dealt with family and friends that can provide moral support instead of looking for a replacement that causes more damage than good.

Could The Use of A.I. Be a Potential Coping Mechanism for Grief?

      Let's face it, everyone is bound to face grief at some point in their life. Some individual's grief are greater than others, but there is also another way we are different (yet the same): our comping mechanisms. Everyone reacts differently to the death of a loved one. This blog post will be a reflection about an episode from Black Mirror. Now let's set the stage, in the episode "Be With Me" a young lady is faced with the sudden death of her fiance. She is struck with grief and behaves like anyone else would in that situation. Or maybe she behaves like how we are used to seeing it. She displays the common behavioral reactions associated with grief: detachment from family and changes in interest, and etc. Then, she does something  we are not used to seeing. She gets an A.I (artificial intelligence) of her recently passed loved one. What I am here to discuss today is how this technology will change the way he handle and perceived grief. Initially, upon hearing about this situation, I immediately believed that the use of an A.I would be an extremely unhealthy way to deal with grief. But then a fellow college of mine raised an important question,

What exactly is the healthy way of dealing with grief.  The American Psychological Association defines unhealthy grief as, "something that prolongs suffering, interrupts normal activities or prevents life from being lived to the fullest." The source states that one of the basic reasons individuals cope this way is that the person has an excessive need to maintain interaction with the person be who died. By this definition, I believe that the A.I was an unhealthy comping mechanism. She began to rely heavily on it for her emotional needs and began to cut those around her off. Eventually, I believe that the widow realizes that she is merely clinging to the memory of her fiance. She puts him up in the attic to move on. However, I would also like to discuss more about the company that produces these A.I.


          On a further note, I would also like to  address some things about the company that makes this product. What exactly is their mission statement? Does this company truly care about its customers and truly belief that this is a healthy coping mechanism? Or maybe do we need to rethink and revise "healthy" ways of dealing with grief? Or does the company solely care about its profit and created a sick idea of profiting off their customers' emotions/ Usually, a company priorities it profit over the initial well-being of its customer. This business seems to take full advantage of the weakness one faces during grief. My initial thought of this makes me believe that they take advantage of their currently irrational minds and make a profit.

Dealing with grief and changing as a person

In season two episode one of the Netflix series Black Mirror, the character Martha loses her husband due to an unforeseen traffic incident. In an attempt to cope with her loss she is enrolled in an experimental program that seeks to re-create a person using online information. She eventually develops attachment to this artificial intelligence model of her husband and is encouraged into purchasing a synthetic replica. After some time she decides that this replica is not an honest representation of the man that she loved and attempts to convince it to commit suicide.

Throughout this story we can see Martha struggling through the five stages of grief set out by the Kübler-Ross model. These stages are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. When first contacting the artificial intelligence imitating her late husband Ash, Martha refers to her husband in the past tense. Near the 20 minute mark she changes over into the present tense when referring to the synthetic Ash she is talking to.  

The addition of a synthetic version of Ash only blocks Martha moving into the acceptance stage of grief. For the majority of the episode Martha is stuck in the bargaining phase, seeking a way to change reality and reunite with her husband. The lack of acceptance begins to have a negative social impact on Martha. She begins to ignore her friends and family in favor of spending more time with “Ash”. Her physical isolation reinforces this social isolation, meaning that the remoteness of her home allows for minimal contact with any sort of support net that her family could provide. I'm not sure if the ending is truly a full acceptance of her husband's passing.

Changing the focus to “Ash”, there are several problems with the implementation of this android. Besides the obvious lack of some character traits, such as taste in music and a shared history, Ash is sourced from social media posts. This does not always give a true representation of an individual, filtering out many hardships and character flaws. This design also lacks the capacity to change and develop as an individual. From what we are shown of the future, the android has remained the same while Martha has been changed by events. The android seems to be able to learn new skills and interactions but lacks the capacity to fundamentally change itself. However, it is obvious that this is an early model of android, unable to faithfully reproduce simple interactions such as sleeping or eating. Perhaps as this theoretical technology develops, problems such as these will be dealt with in socially acceptable ways. Perhaps aiming for androids that act as individuals, rather than attempting to fill the role of a human, will allow for less problems going forward.

I believe it is a combination of these factors that led to the separation of the two characters. Martha was changed by the loss of her husband. However, the android Ash was unable to change his personality to better reflect what Martha needed going forward. Martha’s statement that the real Ash may have had punched her demonstrates that the android was unable to adapt to a new situation that had not existed before in the life of Ash.

The Future is NOW

Recently, discussion centered Artificial Intelligence is making headlines on social media, and the public's reaction has not been so friendly. So, what is Artificial Intelligence, and why are people so disturbed?

Artificial Intelligence (AI), defined by TechTarget, is "the simulation of human intelligence processes by machines, especially computer systems. These processes include learning (the acquisition of information and rules for using the information), reasoning (using the rules to reach approximate or definite conclusions) and self correction." While very few are excited for AI to integrate in society, many others are terrified and in all honesty, their feelings are understandable.

Masahiro Mori, a robotics professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, wrote an essay on how he believed people would react to human like robots. His hypothesis did not garner attention at first, but it became notable in recent years. In his essay "Uncanny Valley," he predicted that a person would change from empathy to repulsion as "it approached, but failed to attain, a lifelike appearance." The diagram below is a visual representation of the dip humans will experience. The less human something is, the better. For instance, industrial machines and stuffed animals would fall on the left side of the graph. However, if something closely resembles a healthy human but is NOT human, we will feel empathetic up until a certain point. Zombies, corpses, and robots would fall into the point called the Uncanny Valley.



Sophia the Robot, created by Hanson Robotics, has been trending on Twitter for a while. She is able to do more than 60 facial expressions, walk, and hold conversations. In 2017, she became a Saudi Arabian and was named the first UN Innovation Champion. Sophia has also done interviews with celebrities like Will Smith, and modeled for magazine. We can all agree that Sophia the Robot is definitely challenging the norm.



The Uncanny Valley does not just apply to robots. The Polar Express is a 3D computer-animated film released in 2004. We all remember this movie and how it brings back Christmas memories, but The Polar Express was not so favorable at first. The film has been criticized for dipping into uncanniness. Some people were creeped out and even had recalled having nightmares. Although we clearly do not find the film disturbing today, the characters we grew to love were a little too eerie for some viewers.

But is AI any different than what we're experiencing right now? Let's face it, we are living in the "future." Technology is advancing at an exponential rate, especially within the last 25 years. In my lifetime alone, I experienced a fast change in technology. I remember dial-up internet access, flip phones, the first handheld Nintendo, and the list goes on. Now, we have smartphones that can do almost anything, especially with the internet at its peak.

Our society is already integrating AI in daily life, and the industry is close to a breakthrough. The AI that we know right now is only testing the waters to see how the public reacts. It is not just its “unlike-like” appearance that has everyone shaking in their boots; it is the possibility that these AIs can take away job opportunities later on. With voice recognition on smartphones mastered, innovators are not far from perfecting humanlike robots. Just like self-checkout machines and many other automated systems, I predict robots taking over the customer service field. I just don’t know how I feel about it.

 Do you think robots are going to become an integral part of society soon? Why or why not?

Is this healthy grieving Martha?

In the episode "Be Right Back " Martha loses her husband as they were just about to move into a new home far from town. Suddenly, she loses her husband as he was suppose to be returning the van. Nevertheless she helps her grieving process by using an app to talk to " Ash" again. My personal thoughts on her actions has me tongue tied. The first point I want to make is that when you lose someone close to you, there's a reason. Martha may not have been mentally ready to lose Ash but sadly, it was his time and she has to respect that. Instead, she continues to force Ash back into her life which is unhealthy and hurts her even more. There are many people in society that lose someone close to them and wishes they could have them back, but they cant. Due to that, they have to face the fact that their loved ones are in their life spiritually and should stay that way. My question is, if Martha decided to spend the rest of her life with this replica of Ash, does her family know? Before her daughter was born, how long was she going to force Ash to come back. There's a certain extinct Martha should've went with Ash's replica. It would have been best for her to continue to remodel the house how she wanted to, and went out and found someone new. When she had her baby girl did she truthfully tell her why Ash's replica was in the attic? Did she tell her why she had him? If so, I would've have loved to see her families reaction, that's if she owned up to her doings and told them. If Martha would've told me she ordered someone online that looked like her dead husband, I understand the lesson we learned in class as if people who lived in the earlier time thought photographs were creepy, but you have to come to your senses with this situation. Can you touch someone in a picture? No, but you can with a replica. Can you talk to someone in  picture and get a response? No, but Martha surely did with Ash. Can you have sex or kiss someone for the last time in a picture? Lastly, no but we know who did. Pictures are to remind who of who that person was in one pose not in several, along with voice. How can I move on if I keep revisiting the past every morning? Martha knows what she is doing is unhealthy and I understand she's hurt, but she will continue to be hurt as long as she continues to put herself through what she's doing.

Cailyn's Thoughts About the Deceased Living Once More

The Be Right Back Black Mirror episode was certainly interesting. What are my thoughts exactly on this episode? Well, I’m not even sure if I know myself. The episode begins depicting a young happy couple living what seems to be a normal life; later, the husband gets up to drive their rental car back to where they got it, and never returns. The brokenhearted widow finds out she is pregnant and her depression worsens. Her friend tells her about a new technological advance that can trace all her husbands social media accounts and allow her to communicate with him through chat or phone call. Although at first hesitant, the widow finally decides to chat her deceased husband, Ash. She becomes familiar with this device and seems to be enjoying talking to his activated voice everyday. The voice tells her she can kick it up a notch and explains how she can have a body put together that looks just like him; she agrees and activates this body(This is when the episode became more eerie). The new Ash sounds and looks like the old Ash, but you can tell something is missing, the android acts sort of robotic and monotone. She soon becomes upset because she realizes the android is like the old Ash, but does not have all of him there, like some specific gestures and thoughts he would have. He was so close to being like the old Ash, but was not, and that's what made her so upset. (This relates to the uncanny valley theory) She tries to get him to jump off of a cliff, but is not strong enough to go through with it. The episode jumps farther into the future and in conclusion we see that she hides him in her attack, only letting her daughter see him on the weekends. At first this episode troubled me greatly, and I thought the idea of bringing alive an android to represent someone who had deceased was wrong and would never happen; however, after discussing the episode in class, I realized this may not be as crazy as it sounds. As Dr. J stated, a hundred years ago, people probably thought the idea of hearing another person through phone/machine was weird and unlikely, maybe even scary. Now we can relate this to our present situation, while we sit here and think about how creepy it would be to have a robotic technology represent someone in our lives who had died, this could be the norm for us in the future. Personally, I believe if this ever became reality, I would not activate or bring back someone from the dead in the form of an android. I believe we go through hardships and deaths in life for a reason, and part of that reason is to become mentally stronger human beings, therefore, I would not bring back someone I knew in the from of an android, because it seems it would make moving on more difficult. What are your thoughts about this episode, and if you had the option to bring back someone in this way, would you?

Welcome to your Class Blog!

Welcome to the blog-home for Dr. J's Contemporary Moral Issues course! For the second half of the semester, we will be turning our attention to contemporary moral problems generated by the increasingly complicated interactions between human life, on the one hand, and the various technologies humans have created to make their/our life "better," on the other hand.  This site will serve as a forum for students to discuss the lectures, readings, and films we cover in class, raise interesting questions we may not have addressed during our regular IRL time together, make connections between our course material and current real-world events, and engage in an ongoing digital conversation with one another, Prior to this point in the semester, your progress and understanding has been assessed through objective quizzes and symposia.  This is your chance to demonstrate that you also can express your ideas and arguments in written form-- which is, of course, the second (and essential) part of our daily mantra "Read more. Write more. Think more. Be more."

First, if you don't know ANYTHING about blogs or blogging, there are (fortunately) lots of tutorials out there to help!  If you have a specific question, you can usually find the answer to it at the Blogger Help Center.  (For a quick YouTube introduction to blogging, I suggest you check out the "Complete List of Blogger Tutorials" available online.)  The two most helpful links you can consult are How to Create, Edit, or Delete a Post and How to Add Images and Video to Your Blogpost.That's the amazing thing about the internet, of course... you can learn to do almost anything with a few clicks!

BLOGGING ASSIGNMENTS:
Each student will be required to submit ONE BLOG POST (minimum 400 words) for each of the weeks that we do films in class (Be Right Back, White Bear, and Catfish) before SUNDAY AT MIDNIGHT. The topic of your post may include anything that we discussed the previous week. Students are also required to post THREE COMMENTS on their classmates' posts before the following WEDNESDAY AT MIDNIGHT. There is no minimum word-limit for comments, but comments must be substantive.

Before posting to the blog, students must "label" their blog posts with the appropriate time of their section (i.e., "10am," "11am," or "1pm"). This is very important because unlabeled posts will not appear on the blog and will not receive credit.

Students are strongly encouraged to compost their posts in the "Post" box provided on Blogger, rather than copying-and-pasting from another document. Unless you are adept at correcting your format in HTML, your post will not appear correctly if you use the copy-and-paste function.

You can find a link to your Blogging Assignment Schedule in the sidebar to the right. You will also find a link to the Blog Grading Rubric in the sidebar to the right (also downloadable here), which explains in detail how I will grade your work on this blog.

Students are ultimately responsible for making sure their blogposts "look right," are labelled with the correct section time, and are posted before the deadline.  

It's important to know that blog-writing differs from the writing you might do for "traditional" papers in some ways, but not in others. Here are some things to think about as you compose your posts and comments:

WHEN POSTING:

• Do not wait until the last minute to write your post! Students should think of the blog as a community exercise. In this community, Authors are responsible for generating discussion and Commenters are responsible for continuing and elaborating upon it. In order for the Commenters to be able to provide the best commentary they can, it is necessary that Authors do not wait until the last minute to post entries in any given week. Like traditional papers, it is almost always obvious when a student has elected to write his or her blog-post at the last minute, as it ends up being either overly simple, poorly conceived, or poorly edited. Your contribution to the blog discussion is important, so take care to show the respect to your classmates that you would expect them to show you.
• Be concise, but also precise. The greatest challenge of blog-writing is to communicate complex ideas in a minimal amount of words. It is important that you keep your posts short, in keeping with the 400-word assignment format, but also that you do not sacrifice the clarity or completeness of your ideas for the sake of brevity.
• Be focused. If you find that your blog-entry is too long, it is likely because you have chosen too large a topic for one post. (Consider splitting up long entries into two or more posts.) It should be eminently clear, on the first reading, what your blog post is explaining/asking/arguing. 
• Use the Post Title to clearly state the subject of your entry. DO NOT POST ANYTHING THAT DOES NOT INCLUDE A POST TITLE.
• Choose a topic that will prompt discussion. The measure of a good blog post is how much commentary it can generate. To that end, do not use your blog posts for simple exegesis or to revisit questions already settled in class. Good discussion-generators often include bold claims about, or original interpretations of, our classroom materials (lectures, texts, films, etc). Connecting the course material to current events or controversies is also a good way to generate discussion. Pay special attention to in-class conversations, as many of the issues that generate discussion in class will also generate discussion on the blog.
• Proofread. Proofread. PROOFREAD. As a rule, blog-writing is (slightly) less formal than the writing you might do for a paper you hand in to your professor. For example, you may write in the first person, and a more "conversational" style is usually acceptable. However, blog writing with glaring punctuation, spelling or grammatical mistakes not only will be difficult to read and understand, but also will greatly diminish the credibility of its Author. DO NOT "COPY AND PASTE" the text of your post into the blog's "new post" box, as you will inevitably end up with a format that is difficult to read. Be sure to familiarize yourself with the formatting buttons above, and ALWAYS preview your post before publishing it.
• Make use of the "extras" provided by new technology. When you write a traditional paper for class, you don't have many of the opportunities that blog-writing affords. Take advantage of the technologies available here to insert images, embed video or employ hyperlinks to other relevant materials.
• Respond to your commenters. After you write a post, you should stay abreast of all the commentary your post generates. If you are asked for clarification by a commenter, or if one of your claims is challenged, it is the your responsibility to respond.
• MOST IMPORTANTLY be sure to LABEL your post with the start-time of your class before your click publish.  If you do not do this, your post will not show up on the blog and you will not receive credit!

WHEN COMMENTING ON OTHERS' POSTS:

• Read carefully BEFORE you comment. The biggest and most frequent error made by commenters is also the most easily avoidable, namely, misreading or misunderstanding the original post. Don't make that error!
• Simple agreement or disagreement is not sufficient. There is no word-limit for comments, but if you make a comment on another's post, you are required to say something substantive in your comment. Sometimes it will be the case that you fully agree or disagree with an Author's post. However, a comment that simply states "I agree" or "I disagree" will not count for credit. You MUST provide detailed reasons for your agreement or disagreement in your comment.
• Evidence works both ways. Often, the source of disagreement between a Poster and a Commenter will involve a matter of interpretation. If a Poster makes an objectionable (or false) claim about something that is verifiable-- for example, textual claims, statistical claims, historical claims, claims about current events, or claims about  any other evidentiary matters-- he or she MUST be prepared to provide evidence in support of his or her claims.  The same goes for commenters.  If you want to disagree about a matter of fact, you MUST provide evidence for your disagreement.  Hyperlinks are everyone's friend.
• NO flaming allowed!:  "Flaming" is defined as "a hostile or insulting interaction between Internet users."  Students should be reminded that disagreement, all by itself, does not constitute disrespect, nor does it count as "flaming" However, threatening, intimidating, belittling, name-calling, or otherwise inappropriate and/or reasonably objectionable language does count as flaming.  Engage your classmates on the blog with the same consideration and respect that you would in class.

Although this blog is viewable by anyone on the Web, participants have been restricted to udents enrolled in PHIL220 only. This means that only students enrolled in PHIL220 this semester at CBU can post or comment on this blog. However, please be aware that anyone can read this blog, so students should take special care to support the claims that they make, to edit their posts and comments judiciously, and to generally represent themselves in conversation here as they would in public.

I am very much looking forward to reading your work here over the next several weeks!

Dr.J