Beatrice Institute’s Winter Salon asks the question: are smartphones a path to human flourishing or collapsing?

At this point in their technological development and user ubiquity, smartphones have been deemed just as essential as our wallets and keys. At this point, it seems anachronistic to even call them "phones:" they are computers with a phone app. Social media, banking, navigation, communications, sports, news — you name it, and that feature of life has an app. But is all this technological development and increasing reliance on smartphones (a) inevitable or (b) good? At what cost have we attained a maximally "frictionless" lifestyle? What benefits have made smartphones as essential as washing machines to flourishing life in the 21st century? 

Four panelists — representing different mediums, fields, traditions, and historical epochs — will investigate these questions and discuss how smartphones have created new challenges and opportunities for human flourishing.

Our panelists will be Dr. Grant Martsolf (University of Pittsburgh), Dr. Marta Peciña (University of Pittsburgh), Dr. Elizabeth Cochran (Duquesne University), and Dr. Cecile Ladouceur (University of Pittsburgh).

We will meet in the John Knox Room at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, which is in building 7 on the map below.

Food and wine will be provided!