Science, Technology, and Utopian Visions (STUV) was started in 2004 by Bonnie Kaplan as a working group at Yale University’s Whitney Humanities Center. STUV takes an interdisciplinary approach to examining people's relationships with and reactions to new technologies and scientific developments. We examine humanistic issues related to advances in science and technology through historical, sociological, cultural, policy, anthropological, scientific, philosophical, and utopian/dystopian texts. The group brings together ideas from different disciplines by including current thinking about these issues as well as their historical background. Through readings, workshops, films, art, and discussion, we focus on enthusiasms and concerns about our relationships with technological and scientific progress. In the process, we also explore what is meant by “progress,” what it means to be human, and how reflecting on these issues sheds light on significant themes in international thought. Group activities include invited speakers (from both Yale and off-campus), viewing and discussing films or other art works, and reading and discussing relevant articles, papers, and books.

Many of the current participants of the group have connections with Yale, however STUV is no longer formally affiliated with Yale or the Whitney Humanities Center. Meetings are held periodically either via Zoom or in person. Participation is open to all. If you are interested, please contact us.

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Future Meeting:

Topic: How Life Works: The New Biology and Biotech

Date and location: TBD via Zoom (link will be forthcoming)

Main Readings:

Philip Ball, How Life Works: A User's Guide to the New Biology. 2023

Siddhartha Mukherjee. The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human. 2022

Related Readings:

Jacques Monod. Chance and Necessity. 1970

Erwin Schrödinger. What is Life?1944 (PDF here)

Erwin Schrödinger. Mind and Matter. 1958 (PDF here)

Anil Seth. The Mythology Of Conscious AI. Why consciousness is more likely a property of life than of computation and why creating conscious, or even conscious-seeming AI, is a bad idea. Noema Magazine, Jan. 14, 2026.

Rodney Brooks. Why Today’s Humanoids Won’t Learn Dexterity. Rodney Brooks Blog, Sep. 26, 2025.

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Most Recent Meeting:

Topic: Where we want the group to go — what we like and what we wish to change.

Date and location: 25 May 2026, 7:30 PM, Eastern Time, via Zoom

Reading:

George Lee, Ken Keyserling.  “When AI Learns How the World Works”.  Goldman Sachs, 23 April 2026.  https://www.goldmansachs.com/insights/articles/when-ai-learns-how-the-world-works

Video: A YouTube video of Daniel Markovits Meritocracy Debate Propositon 3 8 Oxford Union - YouTube. It's just under 11 minutes long, and it touches on many of the issues that this group is concerned with.