In the image and likeness: machine, man, and imaginaries in circulation 229 For Ruin, fantasy in movies and the scenes previously mentioned have not diminished with the enhancement of me- diatization logics in our lives. On the contrary, it is increasingly intensified, maintaining both a threatening and an apologetic tone. “People flock to these fantasies, which are often driven by financial incentives and whose attraction power comes from the aesthetic and theological concepts found deep in our collective consciousness” (2022, p. 34). The author goes further by consid- ering that the way to escape this mystified view of technology is to understand it “from a holistic humanist perspective, one which can also weigh in the question of justice, agency, and over- arching aims” (Ruin, 2022, p. 44). Inspired by the thematic challenge proposed by the V International Seminar on Research on Mediatization and Social Processes and the observations made by Hans Ruin, this work at- tempts to ponder the relationship between machines, humans, and circulating imaginaries within the mediatization ambiance. It happens because the relationships between man and machine have been ingrained in the social imaginary for a long time. On the one hand, there is the increasingly frequent need to live with devices and machines that invite us to experience other relation- ships. On the other hand, there is a media imaginary strongly fueled by the fear of the unknown, by the dystopian idea that ma- chines will be as or more human in a distant future, capable of feeling, living, and replacing. Considering mediatization as a long journey, not delimited by the devices and the simple technologi- cal dimension of the devices, this work aims to reflect on a) the relationship between the machine and its material dimension; b) man and their imaginative, inventive, and sensitive dimension; and c) the intersection between machine and man in a complex game of meaning production. It is important to emphasize that our goal is not to raise a dichotomous or dualistic debate between the machine andman but to reflect on the inextricable connection of these two elements, especially in a moment of acceleration of mediatization processes, strongly affected by mediatization logics (Braga, 2015). Thus, it raises an initial thought-provoking ques- tion: how does communication serve as a link between machines (apparatuses) and humans? And what does this imply about us and the ongoing process of mediatization?
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