To compliment his button-pushing novel Crash, J.G. Ballard put forward a mini-manifesto of Scienc... more To compliment his button-pushing novel Crash, J.G. Ballard put forward a mini-manifesto of Science Fiction in which he elaborated what he saw as the role of the author in the modern age. In this short text, which mostly raises questions, he asks: “Has the writer still the moral authority to invent a self-sufficient and self-enclosed world, to preside over his characters like an examiner, knowing all the questions in advance?” (Ballard, Introduction to Crash: 1975)
As an alternative to the omniscient narrator, in Ballard’s novels the narrator is as equally immersed as the reader in a post-modern world, a heightened version of our own, in which “Thermo-nuclear weapons systems and soft-drink commercials coexist in an overlit realm ruled by advertising and pseudo-events, science and pornography”. Unable to extract himself for inspection, Ballard instead “offers the reader the contents of his own head, a set of options and imaginative alternatives”.
In this essay, in order to better understand Ballard’s claims, two phenomena of contemporary society will be explored. These are the absence of moral authority - both in terms of the … of religion, and the modern sceptical philosophy regarding the existence or verifiability of modern properties –and the mistrust of the images and fictions we are surrounded by. These areas of thought are both integral to the postmodern condition which Ballard was one of the first to recognise.
These ideas will be used in order to ask how the philosophical literature concerned with the relationship between artistic and moral value, might be updated. In particular the avenue of thought which advocates the idea that the two spheres overlap because art is useful for our ethical cultivation. I will argue that it needs to be asked how this can be the case, firstly if the verification of ethical claims might not be possible, and then, compounding this, the fact that we might not want to trust the corrupted language and images of art to fulfil this role. The primary aim of this essay is to raise these challenges to the accounts put forward by Matthew Kieran and others, however I will also try to offer some closing remarks as to the continued importance of immersive art like Ballard’s.
To compliment his button-pushing novel Crash, J.G. Ballard put forward a mini-manifesto of Scienc... more To compliment his button-pushing novel Crash, J.G. Ballard put forward a mini-manifesto of Science Fiction in which he elaborated what he saw as the role of the author in the modern age. In this short text, which mostly raises questions, he asks: “Has the writer still the moral authority to invent a self-sufficient and self-enclosed world, to preside over his characters like an examiner, knowing all the questions in advance?” (Ballard, Introduction to Crash: 1975)
As an alternative to the omniscient narrator, in Ballard’s novels the narrator is as equally immersed as the reader in a post-modern world, a heightened version of our own, in which “Thermo-nuclear weapons systems and soft-drink commercials coexist in an overlit realm ruled by advertising and pseudo-events, science and pornography”. Unable to extract himself for inspection, Ballard instead “offers the reader the contents of his own head, a set of options and imaginative alternatives”.
In this essay, in order to better understand Ballard’s claims, two phenomena of contemporary society will be explored. These are the absence of moral authority - both in terms of the … of religion, and the modern sceptical philosophy regarding the existence or verifiability of modern properties –and the mistrust of the images and fictions we are surrounded by. These areas of thought are both integral to the postmodern condition which Ballard was one of the first to recognise.
These ideas will be used in order to ask how the philosophical literature concerned with the relationship between artistic and moral value, might be updated. In particular the avenue of thought which advocates the idea that the two spheres overlap because art is useful for our ethical cultivation. I will argue that it needs to be asked how this can be the case, firstly if the verification of ethical claims might not be possible, and then, compounding this, the fact that we might not want to trust the corrupted language and images of art to fulfil this role. The primary aim of this essay is to raise these challenges to the accounts put forward by Matthew Kieran and others, however I will also try to offer some closing remarks as to the continued importance of immersive art like Ballard’s.
Uploads
Papers by Elise Ashby
As an alternative to the omniscient narrator, in Ballard’s novels the narrator is as equally immersed as the reader in a post-modern world, a heightened version of our own, in which “Thermo-nuclear weapons systems and soft-drink commercials coexist in an overlit realm ruled by advertising and pseudo-events, science and pornography”. Unable to extract himself for inspection, Ballard instead “offers the reader the contents of his own head, a set of options and imaginative alternatives”.
In this essay, in order to better understand Ballard’s claims, two phenomena of contemporary society will be explored. These are the absence of moral authority - both in terms of the … of religion, and the modern sceptical philosophy regarding the existence or verifiability of modern properties –and the mistrust of the images and fictions we are surrounded by. These areas of thought are both integral to the postmodern condition which Ballard was one of the first to recognise.
These ideas will be used in order to ask how the philosophical literature concerned with the relationship between artistic and moral value, might be updated. In particular the avenue of thought which advocates the idea that the two spheres overlap because art is useful for our ethical cultivation. I will argue that it needs to be asked how this can be the case, firstly if the verification of ethical claims might not be possible, and then, compounding this, the fact that we might not want to trust the corrupted language and images of art to fulfil this role. The primary aim of this essay is to raise these challenges to the accounts put forward by Matthew Kieran and others, however I will also try to offer some closing remarks as to the continued importance of immersive art like Ballard’s.
As an alternative to the omniscient narrator, in Ballard’s novels the narrator is as equally immersed as the reader in a post-modern world, a heightened version of our own, in which “Thermo-nuclear weapons systems and soft-drink commercials coexist in an overlit realm ruled by advertising and pseudo-events, science and pornography”. Unable to extract himself for inspection, Ballard instead “offers the reader the contents of his own head, a set of options and imaginative alternatives”.
In this essay, in order to better understand Ballard’s claims, two phenomena of contemporary society will be explored. These are the absence of moral authority - both in terms of the … of religion, and the modern sceptical philosophy regarding the existence or verifiability of modern properties –and the mistrust of the images and fictions we are surrounded by. These areas of thought are both integral to the postmodern condition which Ballard was one of the first to recognise.
These ideas will be used in order to ask how the philosophical literature concerned with the relationship between artistic and moral value, might be updated. In particular the avenue of thought which advocates the idea that the two spheres overlap because art is useful for our ethical cultivation. I will argue that it needs to be asked how this can be the case, firstly if the verification of ethical claims might not be possible, and then, compounding this, the fact that we might not want to trust the corrupted language and images of art to fulfil this role. The primary aim of this essay is to raise these challenges to the accounts put forward by Matthew Kieran and others, however I will also try to offer some closing remarks as to the continued importance of immersive art like Ballard’s.