Life-as-Machine

In rewatching Alien, I couldn't help but be struck by the themes of life-as-technology.On the surface, it's an easy enough observation to make - the Alien, like many designs of H.R. Giger, evokes both the organic and the mechanical, and the way the creature was able to blend seamlessly into the tangle of pipes in the walls was even a plot point. The more I think about it, though, the more the interaction between organic and machine becomes central to the plot - and to a degree, the horror.

Consider the Nostromo,  the titanic ship that they're on. The thing is - cargo included - the size of several skyscrapers, a twisting tangle of corridors, ventilation shafts, and subsystems. However, within this massive vessel, here are only seven people to man it. The obvious implication is that the vast majority of the ships systems are automated, leaving the characters as mice scurrying around a massive, incomprehensible mechanism at best, and possibly mere components in that machine. Mother, the computer that runs most of the ships systems, is named as a nurturing figure, but is ultimately sending the crew to their deaths, and happily lets the self-destruct sequence roll along right over Ripley's desperate and furious screams.

Similarly, the role of the company is decidedly machine-like. They pass down orders, and they are to be followed with the minimum of fuss and no questions asked. Dallas talks several times about how they're just supposed to do what the company tells them, and it's evident form the way that he speaks that  he's seen what happens when people step out of line with the company's desires. It's never clear exactly how harshly their employers deal with unruly employees, but considering the callous way that it discounted the lives of the crew, I can't imagine it was with a generous severance package. If the Nostromo reduces the characters to components, the company reduces them to resources to be spent.

And Ash, as the only member of the crew who knows the company's plan, is literally a robot. Specifically, a machine that was indistinguishable from a human, yet acting completely for the sake of the company that built him. Ash, then, is a person who has embraced the idea of "The Machine." hat is to say, he believes in the importance and beauty of perfect utility, without "delusions of morality." He says this regarding the Alien, but the same could be said of himself, the Nostromo, or the company. All of them are constructs built for singular purposes without regard for morals or compassion, and all of them are, in some way or another, forces working against the humans.

Of course, there is more to be said about the Alien itself. Its visual design and role as a "perfect" predator-machine aside, Its means of reproduction delves into some horrific territory that as before relates to the boundary between life and machine. The way that the face-hugger exploits the human body's biological systems reduces that person into nothing but a biological machine for reproduction. It's no accident that it covers the face as it gestates, because the loss of autonomy comes with a loss of individual identity. I've heard it said that a chicken is just an egg's way of making more eggs, and this strikes me as a horrific extension of that idea: in the face of supreme utility, individuality, compassion, and humanity itself, can't survive.