Nicholas Carr | The Glass Cage: Automation and Us (Talks at Google)

Technology writer Nicholas Carr has a new book out, The Glass Cage: Automation and Us, that both celebrates technology and offers more warnings about the impact of technology of human beings. his previous books include The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google (2008) and The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains (2010).

Here is the publisher's ad copy from Amazon:

At once a celebration of technology and a warning about its misuse, The Glass Cage will change the way you think about the tools you use every day.

In The Glass Cage, best-selling author Nicholas Carr digs behind the headlines about factory robots and self-driving cars, wearable computers and digitized medicine, as he explores the hidden costs of granting software dominion over our work and our leisure. Even as they bring ease to our lives, these programs are stealing something essential from us. 

Drawing on psychological and neurological studies that underscore how tightly people’s happiness and satisfaction are tied to performing hard work in the real world, Carr reveals something we already suspect: shifting our attention to computer screens can leave us disengaged and discontented.

From nineteenth-century textile mills to the cockpits of modern jets, from the frozen hunting grounds of Inuit tribes to the sterile landscapes of GPS maps, The Glass Cage explores the impact of automation from a deeply human perspective, examining the personal as well as the economic consequences of our growing dependence on computers.

With a characteristic blend of history and philosophy, poetry and science, Carr takes us on a journey from the work and early theory of Adam Smith and Alfred North Whitehead to the latest research into human attention, memory, and happiness, culminating in a moving meditation on how we can use technology to expand the human experience.

Carr stopped by Google recently to discuss his new book, which seems kind of like stepping into a Hell's Angels chapter meeting to discuss the perils of drugs and violence (he is also the author of Is Google Making Us Stupid?).

Nicholas Carr | The Glass Cage: Automation and Us

Talks at Google
Published on Oct 14, 2014


Nicholas Carr writes about technology and culture. His latest book, The Glass Cage: Automation and Us, asks:

What kind of world are we building for ourselves? That’s the question bestselling author Nicholas Carr tackles in this urgent, absorbing book on the human consequences of automation. At once a celebration of technology and a warning about its misuse, The Glass Cage will change the way you think about the tools you use every day.

With a characteristic blend of history and philosophy, poetry and science, Carr takes us on a journey from the work and early theory of Adam Smith and Alfred North Whitehead to the latest research into human attention, memory, and happiness, culminating in a moving meditation on how we can use technology to expand the human experience.