In short, both in our relationship with extraterrestrials and with God—however conceived—human destiny would be quite different in a universe full of biologicals or postbiologicals than if we were alone. If extraterrestrial intelligence is …5. Michael J. Crowe, The Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750–1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), pp. 224–225, 274–277, 464–465. Simon Schaffer has shown the place of the nebular hypothesis in a general “science of progress” i…
David DeVorkin
historian · 2 mentions across 1 reading
In this course
David DeVorkin appears only as a passing reference in the course readings, cited alongside scholarship on the history of extraterrestrial life debates and cosmological thinking. His work contributes to the broader intellectual genealogy that the course traces—how scientific and philosophical frameworks about alien intelligence have shaped human self-conception and technological aspiration. For a seminar on AI and cybernetics, DeVorkin's historical perspective helps contextualize contemporary posthuman and postbiological imaginaries within longer traditions of speculating about non-human intelligence.
Mentioned in 1 reading
Appears alongside
People mentioned in the same passages — sorted by co-occurrence weight.
George Ellery Hale 2Percival Lowell 2Alfred Russel Wallace 1Charles Darwin 1Charles H. Smith 1David Strauss 1George Beccaloni 1Helge Kragh 1Herbert Spencer 1John Fiske 1June Goodfield 1Michael Shermer 1Stephen Toulmin 1Steven J. Dick 1William Wallace Campbell 1Ann Druyan 1Carl Sagan 1David Morrison 1Freeman Dyson 1