Chris Colbert Proposes A More Human Future in 'Technology is Dead'

In Technology is Dead: The Path to a More Human Future, former managing director of the Harvard Innovation Labs, author, and global speaker, Chris Colbert, writes an insightful and thought-provoking book centered around humanity’s dependance on technology and how we as a society can use that to produce positive outcomes for us rather than unintended, negative consequences that steer us away from human connection. Problems then arise when those connections become limited and our understanding and consideration of others begin to diminish. As Colbert explained, “I think that the lack of human understanding and/or increasing human understanding is the ultimate lever to increase the odds that the outcome will be beneficial for all… if you look at our politics and what’s happening in the United States, I think it’s a lack of understanding. We gloss over that, but that is fundamentally what is going on, and if we can all just start caring more about understanding what is underneath the issue, what is underneath the realities, I think we’d be much better suited to help solve the problems.”

As for how he came up with the title, Colbert said, “I was invited to speak at… the Singapore FinTech Festival, which is the largest financial technology conference in the world… I said to the gentleman who invited me, I said, ‘I will only speak if I can speak on whatever I want to speak on… I said, ‘The title of my talk will be ‘Technology is Dead,’ and at that point all I really knew was I wanted to talk about was humanity. I wanted to talk about human first technological innovation. Ultimately, as I thought about the title, I came to realize that it’s pretty appropriate that the way technology has insinuated itself into our lives, sometimes it feels like it is part of us, like we are connected to it in a way where, it’s almost as if we’re bionic… what I’m trying to convey is, it’s a tool… It is not part of us. We are not as reliant on it as we think we are… so it’s dead… and the question is, ‘are we using the tool effectively, where effectively is not simply productivity…’ Effective is, is the tool contributing to a more meaningful life, a life of well-being, a life of fulfillment, a life of happiness? Are we using the tool the right way? And I think more and more as I talk around the world on the topic, people are realizing the answer is, ‘not really. No!'”