What We Owe the Present

Abstract: Many tech elites subscribe to a philosophy that looks far into the future and demands that decisions be made to ensure that their vision of the far-future comes to fruition.  This set of philosophies has been termed the TESCREAL bundle—an acronym that traces the history of these ideas from transhumanism (the ‘T’) to longtermism (the ‘L’).  For these believers, achieving the best future possible requires threading the needle of artificial intelligence carefully—so that we can develop super-human intelligence that will both be our servant and produce technological solutions for every problem that ails humankind.  Much of their philosophy sounds alright, but is this future even achievable?  What is happening while a focus on populating galaxies with post-humans thousands of years from now takes priority over current-day issues?  This talk will discuss the TESCREAL set of philosophies that influence current thinking among technology leaders and propose that this focus on the far-future results in a dehumanization of those who live in the world today.

Bio: Jacquelyn Huff is an associate teaching professor in the School of Engineering Design & Innovation at Penn State. She earned a B.S. and M.S. in Electromagnetics from the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign. After working in industry for a few years, she decided to pursue a teaching degree and became a secondary math teacher in Texas public schools. This is where she found a passion for teaching, and when an opportunity to teach introductory engineering courses at Texas A&M came along, she was thrilled to bring together her passion for teaching and her passion for engineering. In 2018 Huff relocated with her family to Penn State. As a teacher of future engineers, she takes seriously her charge to create thoughtful engineers that are excellent stewards of technology.