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Better Worlds Book Club
August 6 @ 6:30 pm – 8:00 pm
The Better Worlds Book Club focuses on books that reenvision the world and our place in it. We will read mostly non-fiction (occasionally speculative fiction) that imagines radical futures and recontextualizes historical narratives.
August Book – “Blood in the Machine – The Origins Of The Rebellion Against Big Tech” – Brian Merchant
The most urgent story in modern tech begins not in Silicon Valley but two hundred years ago in rural England, when workers known as the Luddites rose up rather than starve at the hands of factory owners who were using automated machines to erase their livelihoods.
The Luddites organized guerrilla raids to smash those machines—on punishment of death—and won the support of Lord Byron, enraged the Prince Regent, and inspired the birth of science fiction. This all-but-forgotten class struggle brought nineteenth-century England to its knees.
Today, technology imperils millions of jobs, robots are crowding factory floors, and artificial intelligence will soon pervade every aspect of our economy. How will this change the way we live? And what can we do about it?
The answers lie in Blood in the Machine. Brian Merchant intertwines a lucid examination of our current age with the story of the Luddites, showing how automation changed our world—and is shaping our future. – Hatchet Book Group
We will meet on the first Thursday of the month from 6:30pm – 8:00pm
