[Research Lecture] Molecular Media: Between Science and Entertainment
Wednesday, 4 Feb 2021
12.30pm to 1.30pm
Virtual
In this lecture, Adam Nocek examines the central thesis of his latest book, Molecular Capture: The Animation of Biology: that popular media consumption and biological knowledge production have converged in molecular animations—computer simulations of molecular and cellular processes that immerse viewers in the temporal unfolding of molecular worlds—to produce new regimes of seeing and knowing. Situating the development of this technology within an evolving field of historical, epistemological, and political negotiations, Nocek contends that molecular animations not only represent a key transformation in the visual knowledge practices of life scientists but also bring into sharp focus fundamental mutations in power within neoliberal capitalism. Drawing on Alfred North Whitehead’s speculative metaphysics and Michel Foucault’s genealogy of governmentality, Nocek reflects on the unique coordination of media cultures in this undertheorized form of scientific media. In particular, he examines how the convergence of the visual economies of science and entertainment in molecular animations extends neoliberal modes of governance to the perceptual practices of scientific subjects.
Adam James Nocek
Assistant Professor, Philosophy of Technology and Science and Technology Studies, School of Arts, Media and Engineering, Arizona State University
Adam Nocek is an Assistant Professor in the Philosophy of Technology and Science and Technology Studies in the School of Arts, Media and Engineering at Arizona State University. He is also the Founding Director of ASU’s Center for Philosophical Technologies. Nocek has published widely on the philosophy of media and science; speculative philosophy (especially Whitehead); design philosophy, history, and practice; and critical and speculative theories of computational media. He recently published Molecular Capture: The Animation of Biology (Minnesota, 2021), and is working on his next monograph, Governmental Design: On Algorithmic Autonomy. Nocek is the co-editor (with Tony Fry) of Design in Crisis: New Worlds, Philosophies and Practices, The Lure of Whitehead (with Nicholas Gaskill), along with several other collections and special issues, including a special issue of Angelaki: Journal of the Theoretical Humanities (with Cary Wolfe) titled, “Ontogenesis Beyond Complexity.” He is a visiting researcher at the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis at the University of Amsterdam and previously held the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Visiting Professorship.