by Josef Steiff
Boundary Beings
A central part of posthuman thought is human-machine hybrids known as cyborgs. Cyborg bodies are inherently informational bodies as they are created via technological means. The cyborg figures presented in Ghost in the Shell, most notably the protagonist, Motoko Kusanagi, have to work through a maze of dualisms (see Donna Haraway’s “A Cyborg Manifesto”), which are tied into humanist modes of thought. The film paradoxically highlights both aspects in which the cyborg becomes a boundary creature highlighting the transition from “human” to “posthuman.”5
There are various types of cyborgs represented in the film, ranging from “humans” with only nominal cybernetic upgrades, to full mindware replacements with an “E-Brain” which allow invisible connections to other E-Brains and direct connections to the film’s version of cyberspace, or body modifications that enhance kinesthetic response and musculature. The levels of cybernetic enhancements are based on how much organic material remains in the body; these determine how much a character is considered a cyborg. Motoko’s struggle stems from the marker of a “true” self which is initially an organic, “human” demarcation. She is a full-replacement cyborg because the only trace of organic material remaining is her brainstem and parts of her brain. She possesses a cyborg body and an augmented mind. However, the film is not populated solely by cyborgs; even within her unit, Togusa is only nominally connected to cybernetics, having only a neural implant in order to allow connection to the other members of the team and the databases of information. It is for this reason that Motoko specially selected him to be part of the unit. Because he does not possess an E-Brain, the threat of someone hacking into his mind or possessing his body is minimal, relieving a potential threat. Even in a posthuman world of cyborg bodies and extended minds, there is still a need for unaugmented, at least not augmented to the degree that Motoko and others are, humans. Because they are not augmented, they are not susceptible to the same problems that can plague cyborg existence. Rather than there being a hierarchical divide between posthuman cyborgs and traditional humans, they are both equally needed in order for Section Nine to work effectively.
Cyborgs have become commonplace in the world which Motoko inhabits; it appears that the figure of the cyborg marks a transitional stage into posthumanity. While these machines have made distinctions ambiguous, the film brings to the surface this ambiguity by seeking to present a posthuman world full of humanmachine interaction. Yet, Motoko questions her identity, her “self” as rooted in her body/mind, inhabiting liminal space within humanism and its post. Hence, the film can be interpreted as presenting cyborgs as transitional figures, serving to demarcate the boundaries between an unambiguous humanist world and an ambiguous posthuman one. This is further expressed when Motoko decides to fuse with the Puppet Master and become an entity which transgresses all boundaries of traditional demarcation. She navigates a maze of dualisms.
The title sequence of the film introduces the genesis of Motoko as her body is assembled. This construction highlights a humanist construction but problematizes it because it “dramatizes the cyborg’s concurrently organic and technological assemblage” (Dani Cavallaro, The Cinema of Mamoru Oshii: Fantasy, Technology and Politics, p. 197). The cyborg embodies both the organic and the technological via the circuit of information; the organic becomes technologically mediated. Her body is birthed within a technological framework that raises the issue of linking embodiment within a specifically humanist framework, one in which organic components are the markers of a “human” identity. This question of an organic marker of “human” identity guides Motoko as the narrative of her humanist crisis progresses throughout the film. She is an organic-technological hybrid, struggling to find a “root” or “core” to her identity (linked to consciousness, her “ghost”) yet has a fascination with the Puppet Master as a being which has potential to liberate her from a humanist crisis.
Motoko in Crisis
The film’s core lies within Motoko’s identity crisis as she struggles with two main forms of embodiment. The first form of embodiment, a persistent struggle until the end of the film, is the division between a body and mind in which the body is viewed as a container for the mind. The mind is linked to the “ghost.” Although the “ghost” is not defined, it is linked with the notion of “soul,” however ambiguous as that idea is. Regardless, possessing a “ghost,” as something that is differentiated from the body, becomes the marker of identity.
MOTOKO: Maybe all full-replacement cyborgs like me start wondering this. That perhaps the real me died a long time ago and I’m a replicant made with a cyborg body and a computer brain. Or maybe there never was a real “me” to begin with.
BATOU: You’ve got real brain matter in that titanium skull of yours. And you get treated like a real person, don’t you?
The second form of embodiment is represented through the fusion of Motoko to the Puppet Master at the end of the film. Motoko’s “consciousness” is merged with the Puppet Master to form a new entity of distributed cognition, enabling multiple consciousnesses and multiple bodies to simultaneously emerge, and access to Being (the abstract as is) expands from the purely “human” (or what Heidegger calls Dasein) and into the technological and informational. While this is only implied at the end of the film with the closing statement, “The net is vast,” in Oshii’s sequel, Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence, Motoko’s return heralds this simultaneity, exploring this concept more fully.
However, the cyborg bodies of Batou and Motoko both need regular maintenance. At first, this might strike the viewer as odd, as there may be a preconceived notion that a technological body should not need “human” intervention in the form of regular maintenance, yet it does. By linking their cyborg bodies to an idea of regular maintenance, it affirms that there is not an essential difference between “human” and machine. Both need regular maintenance. While a “human” will go the doctor when the body breaks down, a cyborg will go to a technodoctor when its body is in need of repair. However, the problem with this linkage is that it works within a humanist notion of the body as dysfunctional, the body as weak, the body as “meat,” essentially distinct from the mind. The body becomes a “thing” in need of “repair” as opposed to a more holistic orientation of a posthuman mindbody unification.
Since the body is viewed as merely a shell for the mind, identity is then located within the brain. Yet Motoko’s brain is in fact a cybernetically enhanced E-Brain, so how can she locate a fixed identity within a humanist framework? The simple answer is that she cannot. The location of the “real you,” according to Batou, is found within the human brains cells which exist within Motoko’s vastly expanded mind. Therefore a “real” identity, a humanist self, is not found in a unification of body, mind and environment, but is the privileged condition of the mind, so the body becomes nothing, simply a shell. While this establishes that there is a broken link between mind and body, Motoko’s crisis deepens as she calls into question the existence of her “ghost.”
Did she even have a “ghost” to begin with? Can she even remember a strictly organic existence? “Ghosts” can be hacked and individuals are taken over by the Puppet Master repeatedly throughout the film. In one sequence near the beginning of the film, an interpreter has had her e-brain hacked and Section Nine attempts to trace the source. They realize that she is being hacked through phone lines on a garbage route, and Togusa and Motoko investigate. The person that they find also turns out to be a hacked individual. However, while the garbage man is only nominally cybernetically enhanced, the real target of Section Nine is a cyborg. Batou lucidly sums up these hacked individuals: “There’s nothing sadder than a puppet without a ghost, especially the kind with red blood running through them.”
Batou in a sense represents humanism. As he attempts to sort out Motoko’s crisis by edging her towards the humanist fold an entity appears, which can easily hack into these individuals’ e-brains, or even hack someone’s “ghost.” This causes a profound crisis f
or Motoko, but leaves Batou relatively untouched, even though he is susceptible to the same issues which plague her. Batou is sure of his identity, while Motoko is not. Once Section Nine establishes that there is an entity, simply dubbed the Puppet Master, conducting the hacks, Motoko withdraws into her crisis of identity and throws herself into the search for it. In a posthuman world the “conscious mind can be hijacked, cut off by mutinous cells, absorbed into an artificial consciousness, or back-propagated through flawed memory” (Hayles, How we Became Posthuman, p 279).
After the encounter with the puppets of the Puppet Master, Motoko and Batou have a lengthy conversation on her boat. This dialogue emphasizes the transitional phase with which Motoko is struggling:MOTOKO: We do have the right to resign [from Section Nine] if we choose, provided we give the government back our cyborg shells and the memories they hold. Just as there are many parts needed to make a human a human, there’s a remarkable number of things needed to make an individual what they are. A face to distinguish yourself from others. A voice you aren’t aware of yourself. The hand you see when you awaken. The memories of childhood, the feelings for the future. That’s not all, there’s the expanse of the data net my cyber-brain can access. All of that goes into making me what I am. Giving rise to the consciousness that I call “me.” And simultaneously confining “me” within set limits.
Embedded in this statement is a link to the posthuman. Motoko has realized that there are multiple components which go into creating a “self” or “consciousness.” The body becomes a circuit embodying the physiological, technological, and informational. The seat of posthuman subjectivity is distributed throughout body, mind, and environment. Yet, paradoxically there is still a “consciousness” which defines her as a “me,” an “I.” Even with this expansive notion of identity and self there is a seed of doubt in the limitation imposed. The circuit is not complete. Her questioning of the limitations of her-self works towards something posthuman; her statements here serve as transitional ones. It is not until her ultimate encounter with the Puppet Master in a female torso that she is able to move beyond these limitations. “We can no longer simply assume that consciousness guarantees the existence of the self. In this sense, the posthuman subject is also a postconscious subject” (Hayles, How we Became Posthuman, p. 280).
Transcendence or Expansion
The Puppet Master questions humanist notions of subjectivity and embodiment.
MAJOR MOTOKO KUSANAGI: You talk about redefining my identity. I want a guarantee that I can still be myself.
PUPPET MASTER: There isn’t one. Why would you wish to? All things change in a dynamic environment. Your effort to remain what you are is what limits you.
The Puppet Master is an entity born in a “sea of information” and does not possess a “body” as it would be strictly defined within humanist discourse: an organic biological “human” body. Rather, the “body” of the Puppet Master is the netting that it is enmeshed within: a data body of pure information. However, the face-to-face encounter, which happens between the Puppet Master and the Major, occurs after the Puppet Master has put him/her/itself into a shell. The boundary is broken because the Puppet crosses the threshold from “immaterial” information into a “material” physical body. The reactions of the various people who are present in the interrogation of the Puppet Master are rather telling. Some express disbelief at the Puppet Master’s request for political asylum; it does not really “exist” according to principles inherited from humanism. The Puppet Master is attempting to move away from the initial status as “Project 2501” of Section Six, having gained sentience and able to roam the nets relatively unhindered. As the Puppet Master states, “I am not an AI. . . . I am a living, thinking entity that was created in the sea of information.” Much like the titular Neuromancer of William Gibson’s novel, the Puppet Master is attempting to break the bonds that limit its interaction with the world. The Puppet Master does not want to be limited, as even a “single virus could destroy it.” However, the Puppet Master is limited, much as Motoko is, perhaps even more so, within the confines of the net and humanism. There are still boundaries, which it cannot cross. The Puppet Master explicitly seeks out Section Nine because of its affinity for Motoko and their mutual struggle with the limitations imposed upon them.
While the Puppet Master is an entity that can be seen as distinctly posthuman, it paradoxically works within a framework in which it yearns to be biological. In Motoko and the Puppet Master’s final encounter, the Puppet Master discusses that although it is able to roam the vast nets, it cannot pass its “genes” like biological animals and since “a copy is just a copy,” there is no genetic variance. This is the root of why it desires to merge with Motoko and become a new entity. The Puppet Master seeks to transcend the boundaries imposed on its subjectivity, yet does so within a humanist framework: the Puppet Master seeks to become biological. Motoko, on the other hand, has struggled through her humanist crisis and is already a posthuman subject. She wishes to push this further by having “subjectivity” become “subjectivities.”
Yet, paradoxically, the transformation of the two is filled with angelic imagery of transcendence, a specifically Christian notion of transcendence. The Puppet Master even states, “It is time to move to a higher plane.” This is an example of the problem associated with the idea of transcendence in the various forms of posthumanism. Transcendence continues to be presented as a sharp divide between body and mind, in which the mind becomes disembodied and perfected. The film falls prey to this leaning in its use of angelic imagery despite the posthuman orientation of the film, which is less about transcending the body and more about unifying and expanding the circuit of the mindbody. This is echoed in the final scene, in which despite moving “to a higher plane,” the new entity created has not only a physical body, the body of a little girl, but is also connected to the net in a databody enacting an entirely new form of being, no longer limited to a purely organic physiology. Being-in-the-world becomes expanded. The film closes with the new entity stating, “The net is vast, and limitless.”
The Transforming Body
While Ghost in the Shell does decenter the privileging of the human body as the site of the self, it does so with much difficulty due to its paradoxical presentation of embodiment and subjectivity which simultaneously affirms and denies both humanist and posthumanist conceptions. Two clear forms of embodiment and subjectivity are represented: one showing a clear distinction between body and mind with the “self” being limited to only “humans,” the other presenting a unification between the two via a circuit and an expansion to posthumans. The cyborg body, and by extension embodiment, is an informational circuit of distributed cognition which extends subjectivity or “consciousness” purely from the domain of the mindbrain and into the body, the mind, and the environment (being-in-the-world). Its forms may include the physiological, technological, purely informational, or all three. The film is about the difficulty of the transition, clearly portrayed by Motoko.
She struggles with her humanist crisis, finding difficulty locating a “self” within her “ghost” (mind, consciousness, soul). Yet she also finds difficulty locating her “self” within a unified arrangement of mind, body, and environmental referents for identity. While this forms a posthuman understanding via Hayles notion of distributed cognition, it does not go far enough for Motoko. Motoko is only satisfied after merging with the Puppet Master and becoming an entirely new entity, one which expands to allow for multiple subjectivities. As the newly merged entity, now in the body of a little girl, states in the final sequence, “Here before you is neither the program known as the Puppet Master nor the woman that was called The Major.” The paradoxical representations of embodiment thus reframe the philosophical question of Being in new and unexpected ways.
Mind
4
I Am Tetsuo
BENJAMIN STEVENS
At the very end of Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira, a perfectly white screen is shot through with
grey concentric circles—an after-image recalling Akira’s power—before resolving into the red-hued negative image of an eye, over which we hear a voice intone: “I am Tetsuo.”
At first, this may not seem confusing. After all, we’ve just watched two hours of mind-bending anime featuring a character named Tetsuo. “I” must be that “Tetsuo” indeed, the young man whose unwitting journey into a world of closely guarded military secrets and incredible psychic powers is the movie’s main drama. And the voice certainly sounds like Tetsuo’s. But coming as it does at the end of a movie full of mysteries, not to mention mysterious powers including possession, ventriloquism, and voices in your head, can we take that voice at, er, face value?
Assuming we’re not totally confused, at least we’re right to wonder what to make of this voice proclaiming, “I am Tetsuo.” The last time we saw Tetsuo, his powers had just rampaged out of control, causing a horrible expansion and distortion of his body. That gruesome transformation ended only when he was absorbed into the expanding white sphere of Akira’s apocalyptic power.
In light of that climax, I think we’re right to wonder—at least, I (“I”?) wonder!—three things:1. Who says “I am Tetsuo”? (who is “I”?);
2. How does he (or it?) know, or why does he think he knows?; and
3. What is the thing that does the thinking?
Sure, these questions can be asked about other characters in the film, most of whom are already complicated (neo-Tokyo is no easy place to live!) and many of whom go through—or have gone through—changes, including a few as profound as Tetsuo’s. They can also be asked about us.
