Utopia, Dystopia or Ustopia? A New Equations talk with Ruha Benjamin

For “Utopia, Dystopia or Ustopia? Reckoning with the Future of Science, Technology & Society,” Princeton author and professor Ruha Benjamin takes us into the world of biased bots, altruistic algorithms and their many entanglements, while providing conceptual tools to decode tech promises with historical and sociological insight.

Automated decision systems in healthcare, policing, education and more are among the technologies that have the potential to deepen discrimination while appearing neutral and even benevolent when compared to harmful practices of a previous era. When it comes to AI, the focus needs to shift from the dystopian and utopian narratives that are often sold to the public to a sober reckoning with the way these tools are already a part of our lives. 

About the Talk Series

The College of Natural Sciences is a learning community, where people come together to interact and discuss topics among faculty, staff, students, alumni and friends. New Equations, our current series, is offered each long semester. Invited authors and thought leaders come to campus for conversations at the intersection of science and identity about topics relevant to the climate we want to see college-wide, where all of our members feel safe, supported and seen—the essence of belonging.

About Our Fall 2023 Speaker

Ruha Benjamin is Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University, founding director of the Ida B. Wells Just Data Lab, author of the award-winning book Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code (2019) and Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want (2022), 2023 winner of the Stowe Prize, among many other publications. Her work investigates the social dimensions of science, medicine and technology with a focus on the relationship between innovation and inequity, health and justice, knowledge and power. 

Ruha earned her BA in Sociology and Anthropology from Spelman College, MA and Ph.D. in Sociology from UC Berkeley, and completed postdoctoral fellowships at UCLA’s Institute for Society & Genetics and Harvard’s Science, Technology & Society Program. She is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including from the American Council of Learned Societies, National Science Foundation, Marguerite Casey Foundation Freedom Scholar Award and the President’s Award for Distinguished Teaching at Princeton.

Her work is published in numerous journals, including Science, Technology, and Human Values; Policy & Society; Ethnicity & Health; and the Annals of the American Academy of Social and Political Science and reported on in national and international news outlets, including NBC News, Fast Company, WIRED, Slate Magazine, CBC, CNET, The Guardian, National Geographic and Nature.