Westworld and Philosophy

JAMES B. SOUTH is Professor of Philosophy and Associate Dean for Faculty in the Klingler College of Arts and Sciences at Marquette University. KIMBERLY S. ENGELS is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Molloy College in Rockville Centre, New York where she teaches courses in ethics, biomedical ethics, and contemporary philosophy.

• Contributors: Hosts and Guests viiiAcknowledgments: “Figuring Out How It All Works” xvIntroduction: Taking Sides in Westworld 1Part I “You Said This Place Was a Game” 31 On Playing Cowboys and Indians 5Don Fallis2 A Special Kind of Game: The Portrayal of Role‐play in Westworld 15Nicholas Moll3 Humans and Hosts in Westworld: What’s the Difference? 26Marcus ArvanPart II “You’re Only Human, After All” 394 Crossing the Uncanny Valley: What it Means to be Human in Westworld 41Siobhan Lyons5 Revealing Your Deepest Self: Can Westworld Create or Corrupt Virtue? 50Jason T. Eberl6 Westworld: From Androids to Persons 61Onni HirvonenPart III “We Can’t Define Consciousness Because Consciousness Does Not Exist” 717 Turing’s Dream and Searle’s Nightmare in Westworld 73Lucía Carrillo González8 What Is It Like to Be a Host? 79Bradley Richards9 Does the Piano Play Itself? Consciousness and the Eliminativism of Robert Ford 90Michael Versteeg and Adam BarkmanPart IV “Choices Hanging in the Air Like Ghosts” 10310 Maeve’s Dilemma: What Does it Mean to Be Free? 105Marco Antonio Azevedo and Ana Azevedo11 A Place to Be Free: Writing Your Own Story in Westworld 114Joshua D. Crabill12 From William to the Man in Black: Sartrean Existentialism and the Power of Freedom 125Kimberly S. EngelsPart V “I’ve Always Loved a Great Story…Lies That Told a Deeper Truth” 13713 Hideous Fictions and Horrific Fates 139Madeline Muntersbjorn14 Narrating Gender, Gendering Narrative, and Engendering Wittgenstein’s “Rough Ground” in Westworld 150Lizzie Finnegan15 The Observer(s) System and the Semiotics of Virtuality in Westworld’s Characters: Jonathan Nolan’s Fictions as a Conceptual Unity 162Patricia Trapero‐Llobera16 What Does Bernard Dream About When He Dreams About His Son? 173Oliver LeanPart VI “I Choose to See the Beauty” 18317 The Dueling Productions of Westworld: Self‐Referential Art or Meta‐Kitsch? 185Michael Forest and Thomas Beckley‐Forest18 Beauty, Dominance, Humanity: Three Takes on Nudity in Westworld 196Matthew Meyer19 Sci‐Fi Western or Ancient Greek Tragedy? 206Caterina Ludovica BaldiniPart VII “You Can’t Play God Without Being Acquainted With the Devil” 21720 Of Hosts and Men: Westworld and Speciesism 219François Jaquet and Florian Cova21 Violent Births: Fanon, Westworld, and Humanity 229Anthony Petros Spanakos22 The Wretched of Westworld: Scientific Totalitarianism and Revolutionary Violence 239Dan DinelloIndex 252

"Westworld doesn't endorse eliminativism but rather imagines a world in which it is a very consequential idea for the lives of people not involved in the philosophical profession . . . [T]he concepts and questions explored were clearly things already on the minds of Westworld's writers. The contributors fleshed out the background and the logic of an imagined world in which, as in a car's rearview mirror, objects may be closer than they appear."—Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed