We're experiencing a time when digital technologies and advances in artificial intelligence, robotics, and big data are redefining what it means to be human. How do these advancements affect contemporary media and music? This collection traces how media, with a focus on sound and image, engages with these new technologies. It bridges the gap between science and the humanities by pairing humanists' close readings of contemporary media with scientists' discussions of the science and math that inform them. This text includes contributions by established and emerging scholars performing across-the-aisle research on new technologies, exploring topics such as facial and gait recognition; EEG and audiovisual materials; surveillance; and sound and images in relation to questions of sexual identity, race, ethnicity, disability, and class and includes examples from a range of films and TV shows including Blade Runner, Black Mirror, Mr. Robot, Morgan, Ex Machina, and Westworld. Through a variety of critical, theoretical, proprioceptive, and speculative lenses, the collection facilitates interdisciplinary thinking and collaboration and provides readers with ways of responding to these new technologies.

AcknowledgmentsContributorsIntroductionJonathan Leal and Carol VernallisPart I: AI and Robotics1. Could the AI of Our Dreams Ever Become Reality?Jay McClelland2. Director Alex Garland Converses with Cybermedia's Scientists and Media ScholarsJonathan Leal and Carol Vernallis3. (S)Ex Machina and the Cartesian Theater of the AbsurdSimon D. Levy and Charles W. Lowney4. Epiphany, Infinity and Transcendent AIZachary MasonPart II: Big Data, Sentience, and the Universe5. A MASSIVE Swirl of Pixels: Algorithms in Radiohead's 'Go to Sleep'Steen Ledet Christiansen6. The Rise of the Machine: Body-Knowing, Neural Nets, and Emergent FreedomCharles W. Lowney7. The Quantum Computer as Sci-Fi's Favorite CharacterLeonardo P. G. De Assis 8. Composer Ben Salisbury Discusses Scoring Science for Alex GarlandHolly Rogers, John McGrath, Carol Vernallis, and Dale Chapman9. Ex Machina and the Question of ConsciousnessMurray Shanahan Part III: The Neuroscience of Affect and Event Perception10. 'A Solid Popularity Arc': Affective Economies in Black Mirror's 'Nosedive'Dale Chapman11. Cognitive Boundaries, 'Nosedive' and Under the Skin: Interview with Jeffrey ZacksCarol Vernallis, Jonathan Leal, and Dale Chapman12. Toward an AI Future of Comics Study and Creation: A Cognitive-Affective ApproachFrederick Aldama and Laura WagnerPart IV: The Digital West13. The Philosophy of WestworldPaul Skokowski14. New Visions of the Old West: A.I., Self, and Other in WestworldChristopher Minz15. Scoring Music for Westworld Then and Now: A Cognitive PerspectiveAnnabel J. CohenPart V: Interface, Desire, Collectivity16. Director Terence Nance Discusses Random Acts of FlynessCarol Vernallis, Jonathan Leal, Holly Rogers, Liz Reich and the contributors of Cybermedia17. The Gift of Black Sonics: Interface and Ontology in Sorry to Bother You and Random Acts of FlynessLiz Reich 18. Technology, Chaos, and the Nimble Subversion of Random Acts of FlynessEric Lyon19. Expecting the Twist: How Media Navigate the Intersections Among Different Sources of Prior KnowledgeNoah Fram20. Face ColorBevil ConwayPart VI: Productive Neuropathologies21. Digital VitalismMarta Figlerowicz22. Neuroplasticity: From Experience to HealingSara Ferrando Colomer23. Where is My Mind? Mr. Robot and the Digital NeuropolisPatricia Pisters24. Dopamine Circuits: Wanting, Liking, Habits, and Goals. An Interview about Mr. Robot with Neuroscientist Talia LernerJonathan Leal, Carol Vernallis, and Patricia Pisters25. The Taste of Cybermedia: An Interview with Hojoon Lee, The Lee Lab at Northwestern UniversityJulia Peres Guimaraes, Selmin Kara, and Carol Vernallis Index