烏托邦與機器：從烏托邦文學到後人類

Abstract

如何改善人類社會是數百年來許多哲學家及學者關心的議題。湯瑪斯•摩爾在其《烏托邦》中以虛構的旅行經驗呈現了理想社會形貌的敘述，這部作品開啟了作家們對於更好的人類社會的想望也成了烏托邦文學的開始。儘管許多烏托邦作家已呈現各式各樣更好的社會的想像，然而，人們似乎對這些理想社會的模式永遠都不滿意。究竟烏托邦的本質為何？烏托邦的功能又為何？ 本論文旨在探索烏托邦文學的後人類潛能。烏托邦文學之濫觴在於期待填補社會中不足之處，此期待透過設計理想社會的形式呈現。大部分傳統烏托邦的故事焦點在於建構完美的人類社會，為了建立一個理性的社會，這些烏托邦作家排除他們眼中人性中不理性的部分以維持其理想社會的完美性。因此他們選擇他們認為最好的方式建構完美的社會而排除其他的方式。傳統烏托邦文本中描述的理想世界較為僵硬及封閉，問題在於其依賴人文主義式的思想架構，以穩定、理性、同質性為基礎，排斥不穩定性、不理性或異質性。受限於人文主義的架構，傳統烏托邦成為排他性極高的人類社會的想像。傳統烏托邦在其完美人類社會模式中所嘗試設立的一體適用的標準犧牲了其他種想像社會的可能性，而非提出改善社會的希望。烏托邦寫作在此遇到其瓶頸。烏托邦寫作必須打破人文主義的架構以克服此難題。事實上，傳統烏托邦創造的具體完美社會的意象並非如其所欲達成的極具理性與同質性。在這些具體意象中有一些裂縫干擾或試圖瓦解其人文主義式的架構。這些裂縫成為驅使烏托邦寫作轉變的動力。本論文認為烏托邦寫作具有後人類潛能，在本論文中後人類指的是烏托邦文學具有探索異質性、不確定性、及流動性的潛能。而在此後人類的概念則由德勒茲與拉康的對話為基礎思考如何從去疆界化再疆界化。烏托邦為機器的概念在於烏托邦不僅具有去疆界化的潛能，同時也是再疆界化的實體。

How to improve human society has been an unceasing concern of many scholars and philosophers for centuries. After Thomas More presented a fictional narrative of the traveling experience in an ideal society in his Utopia, utopian literature became an attempt to offer alternative ways to improve human society. Although many utopian writers have contributed their imagination of what a better society should be, people seem not satisfied with these ideal models of society. What is utopia and what is it for? This dissertation intends to explore the posthuman potential of utopian literature Utopian literature began with its expectation to fill in the lack in the society. The expectation is presented via the form of the contrivance of an ideal model of society. Most of traditional utopian stories focus on the construction of perfect human society. In order to build a rational society, these utopian stories exclude what they think as the irrational part of human nature to maintain the perfection of the alternative society. Therefore, they choose what they assume as the best choice among many possibilities and abandon other possibilities. The utopian worlds depicted in traditional writing are rigid, enclosed ones. The problem of traditional utopian writing lies in its reliance on the humanist framework which is based on stable, rational, and homogeneous mode of thinking. It rejects the uncertainty, irrationality, or heterogeneity. Confined to the humanist framework, traditional utopia turns to highly exclusive imagination of human society. The universal standard that traditional utopia strives to set in its perfect model of human society sacrifices many other possibilities, rather than offering the hope to improve the society. Utopian writing confronts its deadlock here. To overcome the predicament, utopian writing has to break the humanist framework. In fact, the concrete images created by traditional utopia are not so stable, rational and homogeneous as traditional utopia strives to become. There are some crevices in these concrete images which disturb or disrupt the humanist framework. These crevices turn to the force which drive the transformations of utopian writing. I will argue that utopian writing has the posthuman potential. The posthuman potential here refers to the potential of exploring heterogeneity, uncertainty, and fluidity in utopian literature. The concept of the posthuman consists in the dialogue between Deleuze and Lacan to consider how to re-territorialize the de-territorialized. Utopias are machines in the sense that utopias not only have the potential of deterritorialization but are reterritorialized entities.