Virtual Dystopias: Westworld and Technology’s Potential to Save or Enslave the World

Abstract

After the two World Wars and the rise of totalitarian regimes, dystopian narratives have begun to spread within the literary and social imaginary in an attempt to warn against the grim future of such socio-political realities. Lately, considering its continuous developments, technology has also become the subject of very heated debates: will it contribute to the qualitative enhancement of human life? Or, on the contrary, will it become another factor that will threaten humanity’s existence (and maybe even its dominance) on earth? The aim of this paper is to answer these questions by closely examining Westworld (Jonathan Nolan, Lisa Joy, HBO Entertainment, 2016 – present), one of the series that has addressed the relationship between humans and artificial intelligence in a very complex manner during the past few years.

Keywords

• westworld
• dystopia
• violence
• artificial intelligence
• technology
• alterity
• free will
• conquest