Episodes

Technology and the Mind, A Podcast

Partial funding has been provided by the American Psychoanalytic Foundation through the American Psychoanalytic Association.

8. Critical Sexuality Studies and SexTech with Dr. Michelle Marzullo

In this episode, Dr. Michelle Marzullo, chair of the Department of Critical Sexuality Studies at CIIS discusses her work and the importance of technology in sexuality studies. She provides a queer, intersectional and critical lens and shares a few projects she and her students are working on at the intersection of sexuality studies and technology.

July 5, 2024

7. Human Virtuality and Digital Life: Philosophical and Psychoanalytic Investigations

In this episode long time friends and collaborators, Drs. Richard Frankel and Victor Krebs carry on a decade long conversation in person and in google docs resulting in the book, Human Virtuality and Digital Life, a delightful and rich discussion of the philosophical understandings of virtuality as well as implications for the psyche. Their discussions are far reaching and deep leveraging myths, critical thought, important philosophers and psychoanalytic theorists. In the end we discuss AI, thinking, dreaming, and the generational divide and post-truth political landscape that is fueled by technology.

For additional resources please see:
Dreaming in the Digital Age, Thoughts on the Technological Pharmakon. POLIGRAFI , 28 (109/110), pp. 59-82.: http://ojs.zrs-kp.si/index.php/poligrafi/article/view/404

Digital Animism. Towards a New Materialism, Religions 2023, 14(2), 264; https://www.mdpi.com/2140582

The Power of Ghosts, Jung Journal Culture and Psyche September 2013 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/272120809_The_Power_of_Ghosts

May 20, 2024

6. The Importance of Professional Advocacy for Mental Health Treatment Choice in the Times of Ubiquitous Technology

In this episode Dr. Linda Michaels, Chair and Co-Founder of the Psychotherapy Action Network (PsiAn) discusses grassroots efforts to provide public information and advocacy for therapies of depth, insight and relationship. She discusses the role of marketing as a major source of information to the public about treatment options for mental health. Further she emphasizes that psychoanalysts and psychodynamically-oriented clinicians should advocate and educate the public, particularly while there are significant strategic interests in among tech apps, investors and insurance companies in shaping the marketplace for consumers.

April 2, 2024

5. Are the Kids Alright? Motivations, Decisions and Values Embedded in Educational and Consumer Technologies

In this episode Catherine Saldutti, founder of EduChange, an innovative EdTech firm that is re-engineering formal secondary academic systems for increased equity describes the values and motivations that drive her team’s design of The Integrated Science Program. This program creates the conditions for expert STEM learning. She discusses the power of systems thinking, circular economic principles, sustainable practices and the value of the unknown, creativity and a focus on process. In this episode we philosophize about what technology is, how it is impacting us, we discuss its implications for teaching and learning and for adolescent development and we draw connections to psychoanalytic theory.

For additional reading please see:
Study on Social Media ad revenue earned from teens in 2022: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0295337

How to ban phones effectively [in schools]: https://fordhaminstitute.org/national/commentary/how-ban-phones-effectively

The 2024 National Educational Technology Plan: https://tech.ed.gov/files/2024/01/NETP24.pdf

By Sarah Lewis: The Rise: Creativity, The Gift of Failure and the Search for Mastery: https://www.amazon.com/Rise-Creativity-Failure-Search-Mastery/dp/1451629249

Common Sense Media’s Impact of AI on Kids: https://www.commonsensemedia.org/ai

EDSAFE AI Alliance: https://www.edsafeai.org/

EduChange on Assessment
https://educhange.com/functional-assessment/

March 11, 2024

4. Dr. Alexander Stein on Psychoanalysis as a Technology for Positive Change and Influence at Scale

Dr. Stein discusses his work consulting with executives and teams as a psychodynamic strategy consultant. He discusses the impact psychoanalysis can have on people and dynamics between people within business contexts. He centers decision making and caring in his work and muses about AI and the future from the perspective of the C-suite advisor role. His work is ultimately about how psychodynamic strategy consulting can be used as an intervention for social good and business success at scale.<iframe src=”https://player.resonaterecordings.com/embed?uuid=0dab40cf-3aa6-4fd2-8bc1-54853d0c5184&accentColor=13,180,206&backgroundColor=242,242,242″ width=”100%” height=”155″ frameborder=”0″ allowtransparency=”true” allow=”encrypted-media”></iframe>

January 24, 2024

3. Morgan Venable on big tech, its consequences and the future

Morgan Venable, inventor, product developer and former Ideo, Google, Microsoft and Amazon senior tech product developer discusses his current projects including his work on the Datahand, an ergonomic keyboard that prevents and heals repetitive stress injuries from keyboarding and the future of tech including its impact on our mental health and social landscape.

December 5, 2023

2. Dr. Paul Slovic on Risk, Judgment, Feelings and Compassion, Technology and Social and Political Applications

Dr. Paul Slovic, decision scientist and accomplished academic and researcher discusses human decision making, judgements, and risk with an emphasis on the role of feelings as applied to genocide, war, smoking, advertising, addiction and nuclear arms.

November 16, 2023

1. Stephen Cognetta on working in tech and the future

In this episode we interview Stephen Cognetta, CEO of Exponent, a firm that helps tech workers land their dream job. We discuss his career development including running HackMentalHealth, the world’s largest mental health hackathon, his thoughts on the future of tech and the role psychoanalysis might play in helping tech workers to develop.

October 11, 2023

Second Season Trailer Episode

This is a short trailer describing the focus of season 2 of Technology and the Mind. In this season we broaden our discussions by interviewing leaders in the tech sector, techno ethicists, business consultants, venture capitalists, politicians, philosophers and academics in dialogue with psychoanalysts about consumer tech products and services and the impacts these may have on our minds, relationships and society. We will consider the unconscious dynamics we may be participating in individually and socially via technology and whether or not these are important to analyze.

July 28, 2023

12. Dr. Kimberlyn Leary on Race, Bias, Belonging, and Consumer Technology

In this episode Dr. Leary discusses psychoanalytic ideas about race, bias, equity and belonging and how technology may play a role in how people and our communities experience race and belonging.

June 10, 2023

11. Dr. Jeremy Soh on Creativity, Dreams and Technology

Dr. Jeremy Soh discusses creativity and dreams – what they are, why we should care about them and how technology may impact our capacity to be creative and to dream.

June 5, 2023

10. Dr. Isabel Millar on AI, Consciousness and Sex

Dr. Millar shifts the question of is AI conscious to the question of does AI enjoy. She explores areas of sexuality, consent and suffering in AI and suggests that Kantian ethics and Lacanian notions of jouissance may be helpful in understanding how we might secure freedom and privacy as we relate to AI.

May 4, 2023