NYAS Lecture, Dec. 2nd: Elon Magazine: Anthropology, Satire, and Collaborative Hallucination with Sentient Machines
Abstract
This presentation explores Elon Magazine, a work of design anthropology that uses parody to explore the celebrity and cultural milieu of Elon Musk. While the magazine is comprised of writing based on research and fieldwork, many of the visuals were produced via extensive collaboration with the generative artificial intelligence model, Midjourney. The talk will bring this project into dialogue with Salter and Saunier’s recent work (2023) on material encounters between humans and sentient machines. It will also include an interactive activity exploring human-AI collaboration. Dr. Campbell and his collaborators describe Elon as a “hype(r)ethnography of brometheanism in the time of mass-extinction.” The lecture sets the stage for a lively discussion about design anthropology, fame, and artificial intelligence.
When and Where
6:00 -7:00 PM—Join us for dinner ($20 suggested, free for students)
7:00 – 8:30 PM—Presentation and Q&A
New York Academy of Sciences
115 Broadway, 8th Floor
New York, NY 10006
(just south of Zuccotti Park)
or you can attend virtually on Zoom