Dr Margaret Heffernan asks: Where has human agency gone - and can we get it back?

We warmly invite you to the inaugural lecture of our newest Bynum Tudor Fellow, Dr Margaret Heffernan (https://www.kellogg.ox.ac.uk/our-people/margaret-heffernan/), an author, entrepreneur, former CEO and influential thinker on leadership, uncertainty and human agency.

Where has the domineering theme of human fallibility come from? Why, at the same moment that humans have a greater capacity to invent and discover than ever before, are we so easily persuaded of our fragility and failure? We used to build cathedrals; today we don’t even seem to be able to build houses.

At a time when algorithms promise answers, technology increasingly shapes our choices, and complex problems are readily presented as beyond our control, have we become too willing to accept that the future is something that simply happens to us?

Drawing on themes explored in her recent work on uncertainty, prediction and human creativity, Margaret Heffernan challenges the assumptions that encourage passivity and dependence. If uncertainty is not a weakness to be eliminated, but the starting point for curiosity, experimentation and invention, what might that mean for how we approach the future?

Where has human agency gone – and can we get it back?

Tea and coffee will be offered from 5pm, with the lecture starting at 5.30pm.

Attendees are warmly invited to stay on for a drinks reception immediately following the event.

View full details on the Kellogg College website (https://www.kellogg.ox.ac.uk/events/beyond-determinism-and-submission/).

Description supplied by the event organiser.