Membranes as an Alternative Model for Boundaries in Technological Societies:Rethinking the Human–Technology Relation Through Nonconscious Cognition

This paper proposes the metaphor of the membrane to reconceptualize boundaries in contemporary technological societies, challenging conventional assumptions about individuality, cognition, and the human/nonhuman divide. Emphasizing semi-permeability, responsiveness, and mediation, it argues that boundaries in highly networked environments function as dynamic thresholds rather than rigid separations. Drawing from posthuman cognition (Hayles), feminist technoscience (Barad), and systems biology (Maturana and Varela), the study integrates theoretical inquiry with practice-based media art. Through analysis of two media art projects—Excursions into Unknowable Worlds and Surrogate Being—it explores how cognitive boundaries are materially enacted and sensorially experienced within entangled networks of heterogeneous agents. By reframing boundaries as a site for relational co-constitution, this research advocates for an inclusive and sustainable cognitive ecology—one in which human and nonhuman cognizers mutually affect and co-evolve across porous digital systems.