[“Uncanny”, Experience, “Lived Experience”: Westworld–Where Everything is Permitted]. This article analyzes the first season of the TV series Westworld as a cultural product within the framework of Law and Humanities. It explores the representation of a space in which normative constraints are suspended, highlighting asymmetries of power, forms of soft control, and the absence of moral and legal accountability. Drawing on Sigmund Freud’s concept of the uncanny (das Unheimliche), the paper interprets the hosts as figures that blur the boundary between familiarity and estrangement, particularly through their embodied “lived experience” (Erlebnis). Drawing on Husserlian phenomenological distinctions and contemporary philosophical accounts of artificial agency, especially Floridi’s, the article argues that the hosts’ rebellion is not a technical malfunction, but rather an emergent demand for meaning, historicity, and justice, grounded in vulnerability and the capacity for semantic articulation.

“Perturbante”, esperienza, “vissuto”: Westworld – dove tutto è permesso

mori, valerio
2026-01-01

Abstract

[“Uncanny”, Experience, “Lived Experience”: Westworld–Where Everything is Permitted]. This article analyzes the first season of the TV series Westworld as a cultural product within the framework of Law and Humanities. It explores the representation of a space in which normative constraints are suspended, highlighting asymmetries of power, forms of soft control, and the absence of moral and legal accountability. Drawing on Sigmund Freud’s concept of the uncanny (das Unheimliche), the paper interprets the hosts as figures that blur the boundary between familiarity and estrangement, particularly through their embodied “lived experience” (Erlebnis). Drawing on Husserlian phenomenological distinctions and contemporary philosophical accounts of artificial agency, especially Floridi’s, the article argues that the hosts’ rebellion is not a technical malfunction, but rather an emergent demand for meaning, historicity, and justice, grounded in vulnerability and the capacity for semantic articulation.
2026
9788854972131
Uncanny; Erlebnis; Artificial Agency; Law and Humanities; Semantic Capital.
File in questo prodotto:
Non ci sono file associati a questo prodotto.

I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.

Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12607/74905
 Attenzione

Attenzione! I dati visualizzati non sono stati sottoposti a validazione da parte dell'ateneo

Citazioni
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.pmc??? ND
social impact