Where are the realistic threats from Artificial Intelligence? How is information technology and the internet transforming job markets, human psychology, medicine, and education? How does the digital world, expressed as weapons of mass distraction, affect the state of popular culture and the generational divide? When does technology become technopoly? This course reflects on the serious directions in which technology enhances and distorts the qualities which make us human. From character to consciousness, to the ties that bind us together as families, communities and nations, the unprecedented proliferation of consumer technology is molding our future in ways we can barely fathom. This book emphasizes the importance of balancing technology and humanistic values.
About the Author: Paul Weinzweig was born in 1943 and grew up in Toronto, Canada, where he earned a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Toronto (1970) and went on to do volunteer research work in West Africa at a community mental health project. He has taught in the social sciences at several Canadian universities and helped to pioneer and present televised distance education. Paul served as Associate Director of the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations where he managed negotiations between university teachers and the new provincial distance education authority (TV Ontario) that laid the ground rules for the participation of university teachers in the new electronic educational media. Paul has conducted research in many areas including private school education, the role of international nongovernmental organizations in peace and disarmament, the plight of Canada's indigenous peoples migrating from rural to urban areas, and cultural programming for Toronto's Harborfront development. In 1987, during the advent of Perestroika, Paul was invited to the Soviet Union, where his book on creativity and self-realization was published in Russian. The book became a best-seller and he was encouraged to make a television series for Soviet Central Television based on the book's themes. The 14-part TV series ("To the Promised Land..."), blending Russian performing arts with talks on social and psychological change, became part of a fund-raising effort by Paul and his wife Paulina to support the renowned but struggling Natalya Sats Musical Theater. Paul and Paulina live in the Caledon Hills north of Toronto. They are semi-retired, dedicating their time to writing and publishing.