Zombies and Ontology
Over at Un-canny Ontology, Nathan Gale writes a post that responds to and extends both mine on Harman’s conception of cuteness and Bryant’s on the unheimlich. The uncanny valley rears its head, a concept originally developed by Masahiro Mori about the moment when robots cease to seem realistic and begin to seem creepy. It’s an often-cited concept in videogames, and… read more
On shuttering Water Cooler Games
I’ve just closed Water Cooler Games, the blog about “videogames with an agenda” that Gonzalo Frasca and I started in 2003. I have also archived the site in its entirety here on Bogost.com, and all existing links to pages on watercoolergames.org will forward correctly in perpetuity. When Gonzalo and I first started Water Cooler Games, the very idea of “videogames… read more
Videogames with an Agenda - website archive
From 2003-2009, Water Cooler Games served as the web’s primary forum for “videogames with an agenda” — coverage of the uses of video games in advertising, politics, education, and other everyday activities, outside the sphere of entertainment. The site was maintained at watercoolergames.org, where it was edited by myself and Gonzalo Frasca from 2003-2006, and by me alone from 2006-2009.… read more
Graham Harman and a Tiny Horse
Today John Sharp showed me this insanely cute dwarf miniature horse, named Koda. He’s about as big as a cat, so noticeably smaller than a normal miniature horse because he is, well, a dwarf. Click for a bigger image, or see more pics here. One of my favorite sidetrips in Graham Harman’s Guerilla Metaphysics (back in print soon) is his… read more
Interview with Paul Ennis
Paul Ennis has been publishing interviews with a number of contemporary thinkers working in and around the area of speculative realism, on his website Another Heidegger Blog. So far, participants have included Lee Braver, Graham Harman, Levi Bryant, Adrian Ivakhiv, with Jeffrey Malpas to come this week. I was honored to be included among the group, and Ennis has just… read more
Part 2: What Kind of Videogame?
In part 1 of this series, I introduced the idea of a metaphysics videogame and described why such a thing might be a good idea for philosophy. That was the easy part. In this post I’m going to explore what such a game might look like, in the abstract. The idea is not to suggest only the most viable approach,… read more
Part 1: Why a Videogame?
A brief history. Back in the late summer of 2006, a few months after the publication of Unit Operations, I exchanged a few emails with Graham Harman, whose book Tool-Being I had cited in the early pages of mine. We talked about a few things, including Leibniz, Badiou, Heidegger, Meillassoux, D.W. Griffith, and McLuhan. Sometime in early 2007, over a… read more
A response to Levi Bryant
In a lengthy comment on my pragmatic speculative realism post, philosopher Levi Bryant asks what issues in technology and media studies prompted my interest in object-oriented ontology. I’d like to try to answer the question for the benefit of readers finding their way here from sources in philosophy rather than game studies. In some ways, I think I was doing… read more
Speculative Realism and Digital Media
Last week I had the opportunity to visit in Cairo with philosopher Graham Harman, someone whose work I’ve known and admired for some time now. It was nice to meet him in person for the first time, not to mention having a local guide for getting around this enormous, insane city. I also got to deliver Graham’s first copy of… read more
I'm sure you've been biting your nails in anticipation
A week ago or so, I mentioned a trivia contest I was running on the Touch Arcade forums, with correct answers winning Guru Meditation redemption codes or a signed copy of Racing the Beam. I’ve given away all the codes and the book, so now it’s time to share the correct answers. (1) The Fairchild Channel F, an interchangeable cartridge… read more