In this episode, I speak with L.M. Sacasas, who has become a leading voice in examining the ethical, social and cultural consequences of technologies. His prior blog, The Frailest Thing , and current Substack newsletter, The Convivial Society , offer a wealth of insight, encouraging a greater awareness of the ways that technologies shape the conditions within which we live and act.

In this episode of ‘Imperfect World’, I speak with Claire Benn, a philosopher who explores how our growing reliance on digital technologies are impacting our moral landscape, and the ethical challenges that come from a world shaped by machines.

In this episode of ‘Imperfect World’, I speak with PC, a scholar and writer based in Melbourne, who has recently started a substack called, Living together, somehow.

This conversation was already posted on the ‘Imperfect world’ podcast feed, I am cross-posting it here in case this platform is better suited for some audience. For future episodes, I will post them across both platforms simultaneously.

Much of this substack has been trying to make sense of the present moment, and what ethical action looks like in a world that appears to be changing and warping in ways we are struggling to comprehend. I am continuing to work on this, as I think we are in a transitional period, and trying to make sense of what is disappearing, what is altering, and what it all might mean is vitally important. The world is littered with hints and clues;

What to make of what is now unfolding in Ukraine? Like much of the world, this is something I have been wondering over the last week. I must admit, when such major events occur, and so many commentators rush to tell us what it all means, my default position is to step back. The only thing I really feel confident in saying is that this is bad, the world we will inhabit when this is done will most likely be in worse condition.

A year ago, I started this Substack as an experiment for sharing my writing. A major motivation for doing so was a recognition of the role that academics play in marginalising their own voices. Part of this is through getting lost in narrow niches and specialisations; part of this is through being caught in a dysfunctional neoliberal university system;

Sleepwalking is an evocative image, existing in that liminal zone of consciousness, simultaneously present and absent. The dreamworld seeping into the real, or the inverse, with pressures of waking life intruding upon rest. Somnambulism is a condition that captures an odd, unnerving combination of agency without conscious volition. Acting without being fully aware of one’s actions.

Recently I came across a thought provoking entry by Gabriele de Seta on ‘black technology’ ( heikeji 黑科技), a Chinese term used to describe cutting edge and futuristic technologies, so advanced that they defy comprehension. Researching further, I was struck by how commonplace this idea is in Chinese, while it is effectively unknown in English.

‘Imperfect world’ is the canvas on which these notes are painted. This conveys that the world we are part of, and acting in, is one made by people. Insofar as humans are wonderfully and unavoidably flawed, the world we collectively constitute will echo and amplify these limitations. It could not be otherwise. Another reason for this framing comes from the quixotic desire it holds within it, the promise of perfection.

This is the first in a series connecting the themes of ‘imperfect notes’ to thinking about the role of technology in society, supported by a grant from the Toshiba International Foundation. ‘Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made’ is Isaiah Berlin’s famous rendering of a line from Immanuel Kant, reflecting a scepticism in the capacity of imperfect humans to create perfect solutions.