The Technically Human Podcast

Welcome back to Season 2 of the "Technically Human" podcast! In the first episode of this season, I talk to Dr. Morgan Ames about the concept of utopia and Silicon Valley's moral vision. We discuss the ideas and frictions at the heart of Silicon Valley's growth, we talk about the inequalities at the heart of technological culture, and Morgan describes how Silicon Valley became THE Valley.

Dr. Ames is an assistant adjunct professor in the School of Information at the University of California, Berkeley, where she teaches in Data Science and administers the Designated Emphasis in Science and Technology Studies in affiliation with the Center for Science, Technology, Medicine and Society. She is also affiliated with the Algorithmic Fairness and Opacity Working Group, the Center for Science, Technology, Society and Policy, and the Berkeley Institute of Data Science. Her research has been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), Intel, and other organizations, and she has been invited to present her work at conferences around the world, including South by Southwest (SXSW).

Her next project explores the role that utopianism plays in discourses around childhood, education, and 'development' in two geographically overlapping but culturally divided worlds: developer culture of Silicon Valley and the working-class and immigrant communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

This week's episode was produced and edited by Emily Bowden and Erin Jeffs.

In this episode, I speak with three Cal Poly undergraduates from my class on ethical tech. We discuss their vision for ethical technology, we talk about their concerns about the present and future of human values and tech, and they tell me about their quarter of distant learning, and what it has meant for them to live in the time of COVID.

Erin Jeffs, Nick Bell, and Geoff Sanhueza are undergraduate students at Cal Poly, working in different majors across campus, from architecture to computer science to Animal Science. We spent the last quarter getting to know each other in my class on ethical technology, where we thought together about how we might envision a more ethical, more equitable future of technological production and ideation.

They join me in this episode to share their insights about, and their vision for, ethical technology as they navigate the move from student to practitioner.

In this episode of "Technically Human," I speak with Carl Zimmer, who reports from the frontiers of biology, where scientists are expanding our understanding of life.

Drawing from his experience hosting the popular podcast "What is Life?" Carl explains the meaning of life to me, and he talks about what it means to write about it. We talk about the challenges of writing and reading about science, and how we should read articles about the most urgent scientific concern of our moment: Coronavirus.

Zimmer is a popular speaker at universities, medical schools, museums, and festivals, and he teaches workshops and seminars at Yale. His column Matter appears weekly in The New York Times, and he is the author of thirteen books about science, including his newest book is She Has Her Mother’s Laugh: The Power, Perversions, and Potential of Heredity.  

He is, to his knowledge, the only writer after whom a species of tapeworm has been named.

In this episode of "Technically Human," I speak to Professor De Kai at Hong Kong University. De Kai is one of eight members of Google's AI Ethics Council and is listed as one of Hong Kong's 100 most influential figures. We debate whether laptops and lapdogs have souls, De Kai tells us why President Obama is retweeting his recent work on mask simulations in the context of the coronavirus epidemic, and we discuss the possibility that an AI encoded with human biases will drive extremism to the point of civilization's collapse.

In this episode, I speak with Professor Arthur L. Caplan, the Drs. William F and Virginia Connolly Mitty Professor at the NYU School of Medicine in New York City and the founding head of NYU’s Division of Medical Ethics. 

We talk about brain death, moral worth, the ethics of the non-human, and the concept of the "self" as humans increasingly turn our bodies and biology over to technological interventions. Dr. Caplan discusses medical privacy as the right to know becomes increasingly in tension with the right to privacy, how the practice of medicine interacts with humanist practices, and what is keeping him up at night.

In this episode of "Technically Human," I speak with Chris Ategeka, the CEO of UCOT, the Center for the Unintended Consequences of Technology. Chris talks about what led him to build UCOT, what drives unethical tech, and how the destructive consequences in technological culture and products may be less unintended than willfully ignored. Chris and I talk about the relationship between diversity in tech culture on the one hand, and equity in tech products and outcomes on the other. Finally, Chris makes a case for why staying optimistic in this moment is not a choice--for him, it is an ethical mandate. 

In this episode of "Technically Human," I talk to author Dave Eggers about his novel The Circle. We discuss the growth of digital tracking, the evolution of Silicon Valley culture, and the idea that people under surveillance are not free. Dave discusses the role and of and possibilities for art, literature, and satire in creating change, and he tells me why he is optimistic about the next generation of students creating powerful, lasting change.

Dave Eggers is the author of The Circle, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, What is the What, A Hologram for the King, and The Lifters, among many other books.

He is the founder of McSweeney’s, which publishes literature, satire, and "Voice of Witness," a nonprofit book series that uses oral history to illuminate human rights crises around the world.

Eggers is the co-founder of 826 National, a network of youth writing and tutoring centers around the United States. Realizing the need for greater college access for low-income students, Eggers founded ScholarMatch, a nonprofit organization designed to connect students with resources, schools and donors to make college possible.

McSweeneys: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/pages/about-dave-eggers

ScholarMatch:https://scholarmatch.org/

826National: https://826national.org/

In this episode, I speak to Aaron Samuels, the COO of Blavity, one of the largest digital communities for Black Millennials. We talk about the importance of diversifying perspectives in and outside of the tech sphere, the importance of narrative in establishing identity, and how Aaron negotiates the boundaries between multiple identities--Black/Jewish, Humanist/Technologist, and Digital/Embodied existence. 

In this episode of Technically Human, I speak with Dr. Matthew Harsh, an associate professor of science, technology, and society studies at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. We talk about Matt's vision for creating a new curriculum for ethical technology on college campuses, the importance of addressing deep issues of social equity in tech, and Matt tells me why he's optimistic about the next generation of technologists.

In this episode of Technically Human, I speak with Dr. Ryan Jenkins, an associate professor of philosophy and a senior fellow at the Ethics + Emerging Sciences Group at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. We talk about the value of philosophy, we debate deontological vs consequentialist ethics, and Ryan answers the age-old question of whether Google is making us stupid.