Cybernetics and Therapy

From my experience with the Eliza program in class, I found it to be very unhelpful. It is meant to be used as a tool for pyschotherapy. However, from what I got - the program seemed to give very general responses for the problems that the user brings up. You could say something along the lines like "I feel depressed because I can't do Spanish." The program would reply with "Why do you feel depressed?" and then it would continue to answer the user in a very general and cold manner. There is no personal experience that the program could offer to the patient or user. The program sometimes gives strange responses that aren't helpful but just gives more questions for the user to think about as opposed to solutions. I was not impressed by the program whatsoever.

With the Cyborg Manifesto article, I felt that there was some interesting ideas that Haraway brought up. I found it somewhat ironic as she calls the cyborg a cybernetic organism that could have us "imagine a world without gender. She seems to talk a lot about social feminism and from what I take she thinks that cybernetics could be the solution this this issue. I wonder how cybernetics could be a solution to some of the social feminist issues? Perhaps it is giving people despite their gender more power through technology? I remember discussing in class that cyborgs could be considered of anyone using technology as an extension of themselves or as implants of themselves. Like with the Who are We? article talks about MUDS players who can assimilate themselves into a virtual reality. This makes them experience a digital world where they can even choose their gender and marry their characters. In some sense I found this to be a strange illusion of real life but in some sense I feel like it gives people the freedom to escape the boundaries of their bodies, mental states, and lifestyles.