About the event
Loneliness was on the rise well before COVID-19 increased isolation for many people. A decade ago, people reported that they had three or four strong friendships, but in more recent surveys it has dropped to two. And many now report that they have no close friends. Depression among 14–17-year-olds has gone up dramatically since 2009 suggesting a causal relation with the rise of social media culture. The promise of online life was greater connection, but the reality seems otherwise.
There is a rising “doom and gloom” narrative emerging about the future of human social bonds and there is indeed reason to worry. Now that AI chatbots and social robots are integrating into our daily lives, many people despair about the future of friendship and love.
In this workshop Dr. Stephen Asma will discuss the dangers of digital life for human social connection, but also assess the many underappreciated values of online friendship. He will include discussion of some of the latest social psychology and emotional neuroscience of human bonding. Striking revelations from parasocial research suggest for example that we may forge meaningful “relationships” with non-reciprocating AI, robots, celebrities, inanimate objects, and other non-agents. Asma will discuss how (a) language-based remote interactions (e.g., texting, memes, email, video chat, etc.) and (b) imaginative ruminations (e.g., mind-wandering, literature, mythopoetic media, etc.) still provide the kinds of embodied interactions necessary for love and friendship to flourish.
Asma’s talk will be followed by a discussion where everyone is invited to participate. The discussion will start off from a previously distributed text. So, if you would like to participate in this workshop, please contact Mats Haraldsen to receive the text in question before the workshop.
About Stephen Asma
Stephen Asma is Professor of Philosophy at Columbia College Chicago, and co-founder of the Research Group in Mind, Science and Culture.
He is author of ten books, including The Evolution of Imagination (University of Chicago Press), The Emotional Mind (Harvard University Press), On Monsters (Oxford University Press), as well as several books on Buddhism.
He has lectured at Harvard, Oxford, the Smithsonian, University of Chicago, Fudan University, and many more. He writes regularly for the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, and Aeon magazine.
Together with actor Paul Giamatti, Asma is the executive producer and co-host of the podcast “Chinwag.”
Asma has lived and taught in Phnom Penh (Cambodia), Beijing, and Shanghai (China).
As a musician Stephen has played live music with Buddy Guy, B.B. King, Bo Diddley, and many more blues and jazz artists. He has also been a part-time professional illustrator for several books, and an award winning plein air painter.