BBC news:
A Japanese man has made a robot woman:
Here she is with her Pygmalion:
Apparently she responds to sounds — and even looks in the direction of someone speaking. Blinks her eyes. Note that she’s demure — she’s no anime heroine, no big eyes and humongous breasts — she’s the kind of girl you’d bring home to mama.
Here is the Greek version (Bullfinch):
Pygmalion saw so much to blame in women that he came at last to abhor the sex, and resolved to live unmarried. He was a sculptor, and had made with wonderful skill a statue of ivory, so beautiful that no living woman came anywhere near it. It was indeed the perfect semblance of a maiden that seemed to be alive, and only prevented from moving by modesty. His art was so perfect that it concealed itself and its product looked like the workmanship of nature. Pygmalion admired his own work, and at last fell in love with the counterfeit creation. Oftentimes he laid his hand upon it as if to assure himself whether it were living or not, and could not even then believe that it was only ivory. He caressed it, and gave it presents such as young girls love, — bright shells and polished stones, little birds and flowers of various hues, beads and amber. He put raiment on its limbs, and jewels on its fingers, and a necklace about its neck. To the ears he hung earrings and strings of pearls upon the breast. Her dress became her, and she looked not less charming than when unattired. He laid her on a couch spread with cloths of Tyrian dye, and called her his wife, and put her head upon a pillow of the softest feathers, as if she could enjoy their softness.
The festival of Aphrodite was at hand — a festival celebrated with great pomp at Cyprus. Victims were offered, the altars smoked, and the odor of incense filled the air. When Pygmalion had performed his part in the solemnities, he stood before the altar and timidly said, "Ye gods, who can do all things, give me, I pray you, for my wife" — he dared not say "my ivory virgin," but said instead — "one like my ivory virgin." Aphrodite, who was present at the festival, heard him and knew the thought he would have uttered; and as an omen of her favor, caused the flame on the altar to shoot up thrice in a fiery point into the air. When he returned home, he went to see his statue, and leaning over the couch, gave a kiss to the mouth. It seemed to be warm. He pressed its lips gain, he laid his hand upon the limbs; the ivory felt soft to his touch and yielded to his fingers like the wax of Hymettus. While he stands astonished and glad, though doubting, and fears he may be mistaken, again and again with a lover's ardor he touches the object of his hopes. It was indeed alive! The veins when pressed yielded to the finger and again resumed their roundness. Then at last the votary of Aphrodite found words to thank the goddess, and pressed his lips upon lips as real as his own. The virgin felt the kisses and blushed, and opening her timid eyes to the light, fixed them at the same moment on her lover. Aphrodite blessed the nuptials she had formed, and from this union Paphos was born, from whom the city, sacred to Aphrodite, received its name.
Saw The Century of the Self, a 4-hour documentary that draws a line from Freud to consumerism to self-actualization movements and finally to politics through polling.
It’s a 4-part epic that ties together a hell of a lot of ideas —
• Public relations is wartime propaganda morphed into a form (and phrase) acceptable to the public in order to create a nation of consumers. Manufacturers needed to create constant demand. Goebbels admired the American science of public relations.
• Freud’s idea that the nasty instincts repressed in the human unconscious are only waiting to be tapped by Nazis or whomever has the wherewithal to turn on the spigot. Therefore, democracy is not the best form of government, as people are A) easily manipulated B) don’t know what they want C) will often vote and make choices based on irrational desires.
• The frustrated and derailed political and cultural movements of the sixties found new outlets in self-actualization cults, which led to the Me decades. A Nation of One.
• Psychology-based polling techniques in the 60s and 70s identified people based on their desires and self-perceptions rather than by class, as they had previously been identified — they could then be marketed to more effectively as individuals.
• The New Politics has abandoned issues and replaced them with buttons and buzzwords. These are then used to play on people’s desires and fears. Abortion, gay marriage, the pledge of allegiance, teaching evolution — all symbolic details that hook voters and allow the politicians to avoid having to deal with larger issues like health care, the economy, education or justice. “Democracy” becomes a matter of pandering to what people say they want, desires that are often conflicting, like wanting both better schools and lower taxes.
