Tech & Humanity / Jaron Lanier, Computer Scientist, Writer, & Musician

“Making things ‘easy’ always has a downside...To pretend that you can make something easy without losing some of your focus and discipline is always a fallacy. There's always going to be a tradeoff.” -Jaron Lanier This week’s guest is Jaron Lanier, who I’ve been fortunate to become friends with over the last number of years. He’s a technologist, computer scientist, musician, writer, and artist who is perhaps most well known for being one of the pioneers of virtual reality. My first exposure to Jaron was through his books, which I highly recommend you check out. I’ve listed where you can find them in the bottom of the description. Jaron is incredibly funny and just an extraordinary conversationalist, who I honestly could have talked with for days. His combination of an incredibly creative mind with a technological, computer-scientist mind made him perfect to answer this week’s question from Chrissy Regler from Dorset, England. Chrissy asked, “How do you feel the digital era has changed our creative process?” Jaron and I talked about the influence digital tools have had on creativity, how technology has impacted moviemaking, the effect that algorithms have had on anxiety and artistic engagement, and wrapped it all up with whether its best to believe things or doubt things. If you have a question about the creative process, that you think would spawn a good conversation on this show, ask me on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter tagged #creativeprocessing, or by emailing [email protected]. New episodes are coming out every Tuesday through October 22, 2019. ------ ABOUT THE GUESTS: A Renaissance Man for the 21st century, Jaron Lanier is a computer scientist, composer, artist, and author who writes on numerous topics, including high-technology business, the social impact of technology, the philosophy of consciousness and information, Internet politics, and the future of humanism. Jaron Lanier has been on the cusp of technological innovation from its infancy to the present. A pioneer in virtual reality (a term he coined), Lanier founded VPL Research, the first company to sell VR products, and led teams originating VR applications for medicine, design, and numerous other fields. He is currently the “octopus” (which stands for Office of the Chief Technology Officer Prime Unifying Scientist) at Microsoft.  In 2018, Lanier was named one of the 25 most influential people in the previous 25 years of tech history by Wired Magazine. He’s also been named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time Magazine, top one hundred public intellectuals in the world by Foreign Policy magazine, top 50 World Thinkers by Prospect magazine, and one of history’s 300 or so greatest inventors in the Encyclopedia Britannica. In 2009 Jaron Lanier received a Lifetime Career Award from the IEEE, the preeminent international engineering society. ------ SELECTED LINKS FOR EPISODE: Books by Jaron Lanier:You Are Not A GadgetWho Owns The FutureDawn of the New Everything: Encounters with Reality and Virtual RealityTen Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right NowOther Books Mentions: Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria RilkePeople Mentioned:Stanley Kubrik (Director)Howard Hawks (Director)Gene Kelly (Director)B.F. Skinner (Psychologist)Steve Jobs (Co-Founder of Apple)Daniel Kottke (One of Apple’s First Employees)Andy Herzfeld (Computer Scientist)Abraham Maslow (Psychologist)Pierce Brosnan (Actor)M. (Computer Scientist) Movies Mentions: 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)A Clockwork Orange (1971) The Lawnmower Man (1992)Other Mentions: Oud (Musical Instrument)Lute (Musical Instrument)Fight or Flight Response MIDI (Digital Interface) Tibetan Throat SingingGarageBand (Software) Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs  Bolsheviks (Political Party)Stalinists (Political Party)Google TranslateBing TranslateiPodBurning Man Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices