IHMC Lecture Series: Andrew Taggart

Reception Starts at 5:30 PM Talk Begins at 6:00 PM
The human species is now facing existential threats brought on–just to name a few–by climate change, technical disruption, hijacking AI, and bioterrorism. It is ordinarily believed that such threats stem from political and economic causes alone. In this talk, I’ll be arguing that their chief source is spiritual in nature, provided, in this case, that the word “spiritual” be understood in a very wide sense.

After tracing back the spiritual crisis back to its source, I’ll suggest that the human species, at its current stage of cultural development, is simply not up to snuff and, what’s more, that our educational institutions are only equipped to train our powers of intellection and competency. For these reasons, if the human species is to survive, let alone flourish, we’ll need to engage in “psychotechnologies of self-transformation”: that is, in practices intending, at a more than cognitive level, to profoundly alter our felt understanding as well as the ways we conduct ourselves. At the center of this transformation should be the cultivation of living wisdom
~ Andrew Taggart

Andrew Taggart is a founder of Askole and a Ph.D.-trained practical philosopher. In both capacities, he speaks with executives, founders, and technologists about matters of ultimate concern. Together he and his conversation partners ask and seek to answer the most basic questions of human existence. According to Quartz and Forbes, he could be regarded as a kind of Chief Philosophy Officer for Silicon Valley executives, someone who helps them to examine what they’re taking for granted and, by this means, to become wiser leaders.