Summa Technologiae (Electronic Mediations) Stanis aw Lem (Author), Joanna Zylinska (Translator)
New!: $34.95 $22.61 (as of 02/27/2013 08:33 PST)
20 Used! | New! from $21.08 (as of 02/27/2013 08:33 PST)
Criticism & Theory
The Polish writer StanisAaw Lem is best known to English-speaking readers as the author of the 1961 science fiction novel Solaris, adapted into a meditative film by Andrei Tarkovsky in 1972 and remade in 2002 by Steven Soderbergh. Throughout his writings, comprising dozens of science fiction novels and short stories, Lem offered deeply philosophical and bitingly satirical reflections on the limitations of both science and humanity.
In
Summa Technologiae—his major work of nonfiction, first published in 1964 and now available in English for the first time—Lem produced an engaging and caustically logical philosophical treatise about human and nonhuman life in its past, present, and future forms. After five decades
Summa Technologiae has lost none of its intellectual or critical significance. Indeed, many of Lem’s conjectures about future technologies have now come true: from artificial intelligence, bionics, and nanotechnology to the dangers of information overload, the concept underlying Internet search engines, and the idea of virtual reality. More important for its continued relevance, however, is Lem’s rigorous investigation into the parallel development of biological and technical evolution and his conclusion that technology will outlive humanity.
Preceding Richard Dawkins’s understanding of evolution as a blind watchmaker by more than two decades, Lem posits evolution as opportunistic, shortsighted, extravagant, and illogical. Strikingly original and still timely,
Summa Technologiae resonates with a wide range of contemporary debates about information and new media, the life sciences, and the emerging relationship between technology and humanity.
- Rank: #121030 in Books
- Published on: 2013-02-12
- Original language:
Polish
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 1.62 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 448 pages
Description #1 by Target:
The Polish writer Stanislaw Lem is best known to English-speaking readers as the author of the 1961 science fiction novel Solaris , adapted into a meditative film by Andrei Tarkovsky in 1972 and remade in 2002 by Steven Soderbergh. Throughout his writings, comprising dozens of science fiction novels and short stories, Lem offered deeply philosophical and bitingly satirical reflections on the limitations of both science and humanity. In Summa Technologiae ?his major work of nonfiction, first published in 1964 and now available in English for the first time?Lem produced an engaging and caustically logical philosophical treatise about...
Description #2 by eBay:
author stanis aw lem format hardback language english publication year 01 03 2013 series electronic mediations subject literature poetry criticism subject 2 literary theory title summa technologiae author lem stanis aw zylinska joanna translator publisher univ of minnesota pr publication date mar 01 2013 pages 448 binding hardcover dimensions 6 00 wx 9 00 hx 2 00 d isbn 0816675767 subject social science media studies description in summa technologiae stanislaw lem produced an engaging and caus
Description #3 by Overstock.com:
Description not available.
(751)