What universities are about
James Williams worked at Google in a senior role for ten years, but has moved into philosophy at Oxford (for the money obviously….). He has written a wonderful short book, with the title “Stand out of our Light”. The name comes from a humorous account of a meeting between Diogenes and Alexander the Great (no spoilers, here).
His book is a critique of much digital technology that — to use his analogy — does not act as an honest GPS, but instead entices you along paths that make your journay longer. All in the name of capturing your attention, such that you are deflected from your intentions.
He starts chapter 3, with something comical and at the same time profound.
When I told my mother I was moving to the other side of the planet to study technology ethics at a school that’s almost three times as old as my country, she asked, “Why would you go somewhere so old to study something so new? In a way the question contained its own answer.
For me that is the power of the academic ideal.