{"product_id":"what-if-twenty-two-scenarios-in-search-of-images-hardback-9781517913656","title":"What If?; Twenty-Two Scenarios in Search of Images (Hardback) 9781517913656","description":"\u003cfont face=\"Georgia\"\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"6\"\u003eWhat If?\u003c\/font\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\r\n\u003cfont size=\"5\"\u003eTwenty-Two Scenarios in Search of Images\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"4\"\u003eVilém Flusser (Author), Anke Finger (Translated by), Kenneth Kronenberg (Translated by)\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e9781517913656\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003eHardback, published 19 April 2022\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e120 pages\u003cbr\u003e21.6 x 14 x 2.5 cm, 0.666 kg\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\"While the universe Flusser created with his previous book, \u003ci\u003eVampyroteuthis Infernalis\u003c\/i\u003e, explores a single alternate lifeworld coherent in its mirroring of the human species by a cephalopod, each scenario in \u003ci\u003eWhat If? \u003c\/i\u003esuggests a variety of new ideas, given the speculative, projecting nature of their setting-in the best and most creative sense of ‘what if’-in the past, the present, or the future.\"-from the Introduction\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eAn imagination of possibilities, of miscalculations, of futures off-kilter\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e“Probability is a chimera, its head is true, its tail a suggestion. Futurologists attempt to compel the head to eat the tail (ouroboros). Here, though, we will try to wag the tail.” -VilÉm Flusser \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwo years after his \u003ci\u003eVampyroteuthis Infernalis\u003c\/i\u003e, the philosopher VilÉm Flusser engaged in another thought experiment: a collection of twenty-two “scenarios for the future” to be produced as computer-generated media, or technical images, that would break the imaginative logjam in conceiving the social, political, and economic future of the universe. \u003ci\u003eWhat If?\u003c\/i\u003e is not just an “impossible journey” to which Flusser invites us in the first scenario; it functions also as a distorting mirror held up to humanity. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFlusser’s disarming scenarios of an Anthropocene fraught with nightmares offer new visions that range from the scientific to the fantastic to the playful and whimsical. Each essay reflects our present sense of understanding the world, considering the exploitation of nature and the dangers of global warming, overpopulation, and blind reliance on the promises of scientific knowledge and invention. \u003ci\u003eWhat If? \u003c\/i\u003eoffers insight into the radical futures of a slipstream Anthropocene that have much to do with speculative fiction, with Flusser’s concept of design as “crafty” or slippery, and with art and the immense creative potential of failure versus reasonable, “good” computing or calculability. As such, the book is both a warning and a nudge to imagine what we may yet become and be.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cp\u003eIntroduction: What If? Into the Slipstream of Flusser’s “Field of Possibilities”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAnke Finger\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFirst Scenario: What If . . .\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePart I. Scenes from Family Life\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSecond Scenario: Grandmother\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThird Scenario: Grandfather\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFourth Scenario: Great Uncle\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFifth Scenario: Brothers\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSixth Scenario: Son\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSeventh Scenario: Grandchildren\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEighth Scenario: Great-Grandchildren\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePart II. Scenes from Economic Life\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNinth Scenario: Economic Miracle\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTenth Scenario: Foreign Aid\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEleventh Scenario: Mechanical Engineering\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwelfth Scenario: Agriculture\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThirteenth Scenario: Chemical Industry\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFourteenth Scenario: Animal Husbandry\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePart III. Scenes from Politics\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFifteenth Scenario: War\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSixteenth Scenario: Aural Obedience\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSeventeenth Scenario: Perpetual Peace\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEighteenth Scenario: Revolution\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNineteenth Scenario: Parliamentary Democracy\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwentieth Scenario: Aryan Imperialism\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwenty-First Scenario: Black Is Beautiful\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePart IV. Showdown\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwenty-Second Scenario: A Breather\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAfterword\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eKenneth Goldsmith\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAcknowledgments\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNotes\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003c\/font\u003e","brand":"Univ Of Minnesota Press","offers":[{"title":"Brand New","offer_id":52735295226136,"sku":"9781517913656","price":63.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/freshlyprintedbooks.co.uk\/products\/what-if-twenty-two-scenarios-in-search-of-images-hardback-9781517913656","provider":"Freshly Printed Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}