Levy Economics Institute Presents

The Machine Age and the Human Condition: Possible Futures

Lord Robert Skidelsky will give a talk centered on his new book, The Machine Age: An Idea, a History, a Warning. Nearly a century ago, in the essay “Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren” (1930), John Maynard Keynes predicted that his grandchildren’s generation would only need to be laboring a mere three hours a day, given the projected pace of technological change. Skidelsky, Keynes’s biographer, explores why that has not come to pass. This leads him to a broader examination of how, with the intrusion of machines into our lives, “every increase in our own freedom to choose our circumstances seems to increase the power of technology to control those circumstances.” The Machine Age is an ambitious survey of the impact of machines on humanity in its various aspects, peaceful and warlike, democratic and Orwellian, yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Watch the Livestream
 

---

For more information, call 845-758-6822, or e-mail [email protected].

Time: 5:00 pm – 6:30 pm EST/GMT-5

Location: Reem-Kayden Center Laszlo Z. Bito '60 Auditorium

Subscribe: Save this Event: Subscribe / .ics File