Digitizing the psyche: Human/nature in the age of intelligent machines

This project is a first attempt to systematically explicate and examine a deep psychological and cultural process I have come to term the digitization of the psyche, also referred to as the production of digitized subjectivities. The digitization of the psyche refers to an internal and relational mirroring of our larger discursive interaction with progressively digitized culture. Employing both theoretical and case study methodologies, the project examines the myriad aspects of this process.;After examining the social and academic significance of the work, I turn to a short theoretical exposition and through a comprehensive literature review, I identify the major currents of thought that inform the analysis in order to construct an overall theory of the process of digitization. The fourth chapter illustrates this theory through a case study analysis of the National Security Agency's Novel Intelligence in Massive Data research project. The fifth chapter examines various contemporary cultural responses to this process of digitization, including ecopsychology, ecotherapy, rewilding, and cyber and viral warfare.;In the sixth chapter, I use Stanley Kubrick's landmark film, 2001: A Space Odyssey, to illustrate how the process of digitization could conceivably lead to the machinic colonization of the cosmos. The seventh chapter uses the work of French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan to examine popular culture representations of the process of digitization and hypermodern productions of psychopathology, particularly what I refer to as digital hysteria. In the eight and final chapter, I summarize the entire work and discuss future avenues for research.