Article/Publication Details
Views: 2147

TECHNO-TELEPATHY & SILENT SUBVOCAL SPEECH-RECOGNITION ROBOTICS: DO ANDROIDS READ OF ELECTRIC THOUGHTS?

Abstract
The primary focus of this project is the silent and subvocal speech-recognition interface unveiled in 2018 as an ambulatory device wearable on the neck that detects a myoelectrical signature by electrodes worn on the surface of the face, throat, and neck. These emerge from an alleged “intending to speak” by the wearer silently-saying-something-to-oneself. This inner voice is believed to occur while one reads in silence or mentally talks to oneself. The artifice does not require spoken sounds, opening the mouth, or any explicit or external movement of the lips. The essay then considers such subvocal “speech” as a mode of writing or saying and the interior of the mouth or oral cavity as its writing surface. It briefly revisits discussions of telepathy to recontextualize Heidegger’s warning against enframing language exclusively within calculative technics and physiology, which he suggests is detrimental to Mundarten (mouth-modes of regional dialects). It closes in reconsideration of Husserl’s phenomenology of language and meaning in Ideas as it might apply to subvocal speech-recognition interfaces. It suggests ways by which the electrophysiology that the device detects and deciphers (as an alleged intention of a presumed natural language unspoken vocally or aloud) might supplement Husserl’s insinuation of the Leiblichkeit of language through a self-stamping extraction of an extension of meaning.

Keywords
intention, meaning, language, telepathy, cybernetics, logic, embodiment, orality.

References

• Abercrombie, D. (1965). Studies in Phonetics and Linguistics. London: Oxford University Press.
• Ableman, P. (1969). The Mouth and Oral Sex. London: Running Man Press.
• Agamben, G. (2015). The Use of Bodies. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Ankersen, C., & Zbrînea, A. (2019). Pink Pong. Bucureşti: frACTalia.
• Arai, M., Tsumita, M., Sato, Y., Kitagaa, N., Sugiyama, I., & Sugiyama, M. (2004). Clear Visualization of Palatography with an Indelible Felt-Tip Pen. The Journal of the Showa University Dental School, 24 (4), 381-386.
• Beadnell, C. M. (1942). The Origin of the Kiss. London: Watts & Co.
• Bostrom, N. (2014). Superintelligence. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Brower, V. (2011). Speech and Oral Phenomena. French Literature Series, 38, 209-230. doi: 10.1163/9789401207591_014
• Brower, V. (2020). Genealogy of Algorithms. Le Foucaldien, 6 (2). doi: 10. 10.16995/lefou.74
• Chardin, P. T. (1960). Oeuvres de Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Vol. 1. Paris: Editions de Seuil.
• Chardin, P. T. (2008). The Phenomenon of Man. New York: Harper Perrenial.
• Chrétien, J-L. (2014). The Ark of Speech. London: Routledge.
• Christian, B., & Griffiths, T. (2016). Algorithms to Live By. New York: Henry Holt & Co.
• Cixous, H. (1987). The Parting of the Cake. In J. Derrida & M. Tlili (Eds.), For Nelson Mandela (201-217). New York: Seaver Books.
• Cixous, H. (1998). Stigmata: Escaping Texts. New York: Routledge.
• Cixous, H. (2004). Portrait of Jacques Derrida as a Young Jewish Saint. New York: Columbia University Press.
• Cixous, H. (2007). Insister of Jacques Derrida. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007.
• Cixous, H. (2009). Hyperdream. Malden: Polity.
• Cixous, H. (2011). Philippines. Malden: Polity Press.
• Deleuze, G. (1990). The Logic of Sense. New York: Columbia University Press.
• Deleuze, G. (1994). Difference and Repetition. New York: Columbia University Press.
• Deleuze, G. (2003). Francis Bacon. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
• Deleuze G., & Guattari, F. (1972). L’anti-oedipe. Pairs: Les Éditions de Minuit.
• Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1983). Anti-Oedipus. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
• Derrida, J. (1973). Speech and Phenomena. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.
• Derrida, J. (1974). Of Grammatology. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Derrida, J. (1978). Writing and Difference. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Derrida, J. (1998). Psyché: Inventions de l’autre. Nouvelle édition. Paris: Éditions Galilée.
• Derrida, J. (2005a). Justices. Critical Inquiry, 31 (3), 689-721. doi:10.1086/430991
• Derrida, J. (2005b). On Touching—Jean-Luc Nancy. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Derrida, J. (2007). Pysche: Inventions of the Other, Vol. 1. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Derrida, J. (2009). The Beast and the Sovereign, Vol. 1. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Dick, P. K. (2017). Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Filmed as Blade Runner. London: Orion Publishing.
• Eckhart, M. (2009). The Complete Mystical Works of Meister Eckhart. New York: Crossroad.
• Freud, S. (1955). The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Vol. 18. London: Hogarth Press and the Institute of Psycho-Analysis.
• Freud, S. (1998). Totem and Taboo. Mineola, New York: Dover.
• Gibson, W. (1988). Mona Lisa Overdrive. London: Orion Publishing Group.
• Haden, E. F. (1938). The Physiology of French Consonant Changes. New Haven: Yale University Press.
• Hegel, G. W. F. (1969a). Wissenschaft der Logik I. Werke, Band 5. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
• Hegel, G. W. F. (1969b). Wissenschaft der Logik II. Werke, Band 6. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
• Hegel, G. W. F. (2007). Philosophy of Mind [Encyclopedia, 3]. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Hegel, G. W. F. (2010). The Science of Logic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Heidegger, M. (1971). On the Way to Language. New York: Harper & Row.
• Heidegger, M. (1985). Gesamtausgabe, Band 12. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann.
• Heidegger, M. (1999). Contributions to Philosophy (From Enowning). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
• Henry, M. (1973). The Essence of Manifestation. The Hague: Martius Nijhoff.
• Henry, M. (1975). Philosophy and Phenomenology of the Body. The Hague: Martius Nijhoff.
• Hueber T, Chollet, G., Denby, B., & Stone, M. (2008). Acquisition of Ultrasound, Video, and Acoustic Speech Data for Silent-Speech Interface Application. Proceedings of IISP, 365-369.
• Husserl, E. (1976). Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie und phänomenologischen Philosophie, Erstes Buch. Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff.
• Husserl, E. (1999). Cartesian Meditations. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic.
• Husserl, E. (2012). Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy. First Book: General Introduction to a Pure Phenomenology. London: Routledge Classics.
• Ingarden, R. (1983). Man and Value. Wien: Philosophia Verlag.
• Jorgenson, C., & Binsted, K. (2005). Web Browser Control Using EMG Based Sub Vocal Speech Recognition. In HICSS’05: Proceedings of the 38th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (294a-294c). doi: 10.1109/HICSS.2005.683
• Kant, I. (1905). Gesammelte Schriften, Band 2. Berlin: Druck und Verlag von Georg Reimer.
• Kant, I. (1974). Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft. Stuttgart: Reclam.
• Kant, I. (1996). The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant: Religion and Rational Theology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Kant, I. (2002). The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant: Theoretical Philosophy, 1755-1770. New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Kapur, A., Kapur, S., & Maes, P. (2018). Alter Ego: A Personalized Wearable Silent Speech Interface. IUI 2018 [Intelligent User Interfaces] (7-11 March), 43-53. doi: 10.1145/3172944.3172977
• Keynes, J. M. (2017). A Treatise on Probability. Lexington: Wildside Press.
• Kirby, V. (1997). Telling Flesh: The Substance of the Corporeal. New York: Routledge.
• Kittler, F. (1999). Gramophone, Film, Typewriter. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Kristeva, J. (1989). Language—The Unknown. New York: Columbia University Press.
• Levinas, E. (1961). Totality and Infinity. Pittsburgh: Duquense University Press.
• Mackey, A. (1958). Discernment of Taste Substances as Affected by Solvent Medium. Journal of Food Science, 23 (6), 580-583.
• Marion, J-L. (2002). Being Given. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Marion, J-L. (2003). Le phénomène érotique. Paris: Éditions Bernard Grasset & Fasquelle.
• Marion, J-L. (2007). The Erotic Phenomenon. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Marion, J-L. (2016). Givenness and Revelation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Moravec, H. (1999). Robot. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Moses, E. R. (1940). Interpretations of a New Method in Palatography. Ann Arbor: Edwards Brothers, Inc.
• Moses, E. R. (1964). Phonetics: History and Interpretation. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall.
• Nancy, J-L. (2008). Corpus. New York: Fordham University Press.
• Pascal, B. (1963). Œuvres complètes. Paris: Éditions du Soleil.
• Pynchon, T. (2013). Bleeding Edge. New York: Penguin.
• Serres, M. (1985). Les cinq sens: Philosophie des corps mêlés, 1. Paris: Grasset.
• Serres, M. (2008). The Five Senses. London: Continuum.
• Solymosi, T. (2011). Neuropragmatism, Old and New. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, 10 (3), 347-368. doi: 10.1007/s11097-011-9202-6
• Tseng, A., & Levin, M. (2013). Cracking the Bioelectrical Code. Communicative and Integrative Biology, 6 (1), e22595, 1-8. doi: 10.4161/cib.22595
• Uexküll, J. (1957). A Stroll through the Worlds of Animals and Men: A Picture Book of Invisible Worlds. In C.H. Schiller (Ed.), Instinctive Behavior: The Development of a Modern Concept (5-80). New York: International Universities Press, Inc.
• Whitehead, A. N. (1957). Process and Reality. New York: Harper & Row.
• Wiener, N. (2013). Cybernetics (2nd edition). Mansfield, CT: Martino Publishing.
• Winterson, J. (1992). Written on the Body. New York: Vintage.
• Zellini, P. (2020). The Mathematics of the Gods and the Algorithms of Men. London: Allen Lane.
• Zsiga, E. C. (2013). The Sounds of Language. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell.