Adam Dorr, the Director of Research at the RethinkX think tank, visited Utah Tech for a day of small group interactions on Tuesday, September 20, 2022. His public talk, Rethinking Humanity: Reasons for Optimism Amidst the Disruptions explored many of the issues that he discusses in his new book, Brighter: Optimism, Progress, and the Future of Environmentalism (2022).

Dorr is an environmental social scientist and technology theorist whose recent RethinkX publications have focused on the disruption of the global energy sector by new energy generation and storage technologies, as well as the implications of the energy, transportation, and food disruptions for climate change.

Dorr regularly presents RethinkX's work on stage, radio, podcasts, and television and has more than a decade of teaching, lecturing, and public speaking experience. He completed his MS at the University of Michigan's School for Environment and Sustainability and his PhD at UCLA's Luskin School of Public Affairs.

RethinkX is an independent think tank that analyzes and forecasts the speed and scale of technology-driven disruption and its implications across society. The organization produces impartial, data-driven analyses that identify pivotal choices to be made by investors, business, policy and civic leaders. The organization's book, Rethinking Humanity, is available for free download here.  Watch his talk here.

The Human <–> Tech Project

The interactions--and tensions--between humans and technology date back to the first time a human used a rock as a tool. These tensions, in other words, are as old as the species. Today, however, with virtually every aspect of our lives as humans intertwined with technology, the nature and implications of the human-tech relationship are more profound.

Utah Tech's move to a polytechnic mission makes these questions especially important. How will we define the relationship between the human and the technological? How will we as a university explore and enable what we learn?

The Human <–> Tech speaker series began in November 2021 as a way to reflect on the intersections of technology and society. The series seeks to foreground the  "human-centered approach to problem-solving" that is a centerpiece of Utah Tech's new open, inclusive, comprehensive, polytechnic model.

Join us as we explore these big questions.