Philosophy, Technology, and Mortality

"This APA Blog series has broadly explored philosophy and technology with a throughline on the influence of technology and AI on well-being. This month's post brings those themes into focus recounting a vital Washington Post Opinion piece by friend of the APA Blog, Samuel Kimbriel. Samuel is the founding director of the Aspen Institute's Philosophy and Society Initiative and Editor at Large for Wisdom of Crowds. We collaborated on a Substack Newsletter about intellectual ambition, building on his essay, Thinking is Risky."

"To set the context for the intersection of philosophy, technology, and well-being, one of the earliest posts in this series explored how current bioethics is unduly rooted in the cultural ascension of materialism. I talked with Christopher Tollefsen about his book, The Way of Medicine, making a holistic case for healthcare and genuine human flourishing, where physicians are engaged in a kind of common good community fostering health-not merely technicians satisfying patient desires."

Chatbot-driven suicides illustrate how unfettered technological development can threaten well-being and create urgent questions of liability and legal remedies. AI and technology exert growing influence on mental health, requiring ethical and legal frameworks to address harms and accountability. Current bioethics remains unduly rooted in the cultural ascension of materialism, privileging technological control over broader human goods. A technological mindset in medicine treats physicians as technicians and supports dominion over life at the expense of other goods. An alternative approach frames medicine as a practice aimed at human flourishing, with physicians participating in common-good communities that foster health instead of merely satisfying patient desires.

Read at Apaonline