Lexington Books
Pages: 162
•
Trim: 6¼ x 9¾
978-1-4985-0992-3 • Hardback • October 2016 • $98.00 • (£75.00)
978-1-4985-0993-0 • eBook • October 2016 • $93.00 • (£72.00)
Kimberly Hurd Hale is assistant professor of politics at Coastal Carolina University.
Chapter One: Perfecting the Human
Chapter Two: The City Divided: Fritz Lang’s Metropolis
Chapter Three: Of Gods and Robots: Ridley Scott’s Prometheus
Chapter Four: The Politics of Remembering: Michael Gondry’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Chapter Five: The Price of Immortality: Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go and Natural Rights in a Cloned World
Chapter Six: Shiny People, Happy People: Saving the World from Mankind in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake
The Politics of Perfection shows why and how philosophic thinking need not be confined to formal works of philosophy. Literature and film, when viewed with an eye towards important questions, provide essential fodder to explore life's most challenging unknowns. Hale's analysis helps her readers ask questions about whether or not there is a moral character to science and whether or not there is a human nature. In the end, she explains why it is necessary to ensure the moral character of our society by protecting the rights of the individual to life and liberty.
— Erin A. Dolgoy
Working at the intersection of literature, film, and philosophy, Hale is able to show the ways artifacts of pop culture are imbued with philosophical insights and the ways political philosophy is both art and science. Her lucid prose makes this book accessible to students and teachers alike. By working through film and literature known well among the artifacts of popular culture, this book is likely to reach a conscientious public for whom technology is simultaneously a threat and a solution.
— Eduardo Velasquez, Independent Scholar