L. M. Sacasas

1 month ago | theconvivialsociety.substack.com | L. M. Sacasas

Welcome to the Convivial Society, a newsletter about technology and culture. I once again find myself with two or three post in the works, so while it has been quiet for a month, the pace may pick up a bit now. In this post, I’m thinking about memory (a perennial concern) while following an associational thread that might illuminate the meaning of our experience and help us navigate life with a measure of wisdom.

2 months ago | juliangirdham.substack.com | Laura Hilliger |Julian Girdham |Josh Brake |L. M. Sacasas

Neil Postman died in 2003 at the age of 73. Probably his best-known book is Amusing Ourselves to Death. Recently I picked out my copy of Technopoly: the surrender of culture to technology, which was first published in 1992, and re-read it. Postman is being cited a lot these days, in the context of the development of AI and the dominance of our tech over-lords (see for example on Postman’s Prophetic Provocations).

Jan 2, 2025 | theconvivialsociety.substack.com | L. M. Sacasas

Welcome to the first installment of the Convivial Society for the year 2025. Most of you know the drill: this is a newsletter exploring the intersection of technology, culture, and human flourishing. I’m glad to have kept up a decent pace of writing over the last couple of months, and hopefully that will continue. This post comes just a few days after the last, which is a bit unusual, but I’ve also learned that I need to write the thought quickly or else it will take leave of me.

Dec 29, 2024 | theconvivialsociety.substack.com | L. M. Sacasas

Welcome to the last installment of the Convivial Society for 2024. Come January, this iteration of the newsletter will celebrate its fifth year. It’s been a joy to write, and a pleasure to connect with readers over the past five years. Thank you all. In this short installment, I offer you a principle which might guide our thinking about technology in the coming year, along with a couple of year-end traditions tagged on at the end.

Dec 11, 2024 | theconvivialsociety.substack.com | L. M. Sacasas

Welcome to the Convivial Society, a newsletter about technology, culture, and the moral life. The newsletter takes its name from the work of the late 20th-century social critic, Ivan Illich. He features prominently in my writing, and in this essay I’m revisiting a talk he gave in the late 1960s and reapplying it to the current drive to deploy AI for good. I trust the provocation will be useful, especially to those among you who might professionally identify with this imperative.