Image
Timandra Harkness by Paul Clarke
Image: Paul Clarke
Wed 9 Oct 2024
Technology is Not the Problem – We Are
Discussion
Talk
Event organiser:
The Leeds Salon

For the first of two satellite events as part of Battle of Ideas 2024*,  we welcome back author and broadcaster Timandra Harkness to discuss her new book, Technology is Not the Problem

We all know that our every move is tracked online, while data about every aspect of our lives is used to profile and target us. Why, despite this knowledge, do we willingly yield up intimate details about ourselves in return for personalised services?

In her new book, Technology is Not the Problem,  Timandra Harkness argues that the problem is us. It’s not the all-powerful algorithms that seduce us, but contemporary culture’s obsession with identity that drives our engagement with technology. Our insatiable need to be reassured that we are the person we want others to see keeps us coming back to the platforms that claim to recognise our unique qualities. We don’t have a shrinking sense of ourselves because of technology: we lean so heavily on technology because of our diminished sense of ourselves.

Tracing the historical and social currents that brought us here, Timandra challenges us to question what might be missing from our personalised menus, to defy the temptations of technology, and rescue our humanity from this dehumanising, data-driven world. To do this, we need to turn our energy away from the digital mirror of Narcissus, forge new social bonds, and turn our energies outwards to the world.

Speaker: Timandra Harkness is a writer and broadcaster.  She's a regular on the BBC and her Radio 4 documentaries include Data, Data Everywhere  and What Has Sat-Nav Done To Our Brains. Timandra writes about data and our relationship with technology, and is author of Big Data: Does Size Matter? (2016)

*Battle of Ideas 2024 is two days of high-level, thought-provoking festival of debate organised by the Academy of Ideas, and held on Saturday 19th & Sunday 20th October at Church House, Westminster, London. 

The Adelphi

3-5 Hunslet Road
Leeds
LS10 1JQ
United Kingdom

53.792984, -1.540601

    Date
    Wed 9 Oct 2024
    Show all dates/times

    Ticket price

    £
    5

    Admission: £5 (Cash Only) to pay on the door to the upstairs room. Or pay in advance via the ‘Donate & Pay’ button on our website. 

    Reserve your place by e-mail to: contact@leedssalon.org.uk

    The Leeds Salon

    You may also like
    Hunslet Community Hub & Library
    Talk
    Pay what you can
    City Varieties
    Show Talk
    Paid
    City Varieties
    Heritage Talk
    Paid
    City Varieties
    Gig Talk
    Paid