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Are we 'born obsolete'? How technology makes us feel ashamed

4/20/202654 min

Günther Anders predicted the exact technological crises we’re facing today... but 70 years ago. In his research he pointed to humans as suffering from something he called "Promethean Shame," the shame we feel when compared to our technological creations. IDEAS explores the uncanny relevance of Anders’ thoughts about technology — from the atomic bomb to artificial intelligence. *This episode originally aired on Sept. 4, 2025.

Clips

From Shame To Totalitarianism
Limits And The Tech Oligarchs
Inverted Utopians Explained
Ashamed Before Dishwashers
MacArthur Overruled By Machine
Writing Ourselves Out Of The Story
Exaggeration As A Moral Microscope
“You Were So Right”

Transcript preview

First 90 seconds

  1. Mattea Roach0:00

    Who's your favorite writer of all time? And if you could sit down and have dinner with them, what would you ask? It might be tough to get a dinner date, but I can try to give you the next best thing. I'm Mattea Roach. On my podcast, Book Ends, I sit down for honest conversations with some of today's literary stars, people like Zadie Smith, Ken Follett, RF Kuang, and Louise Penny. Whether you love books or just want a new perspective on your every day, check out Book Ends with Mattea Roach wherever you get your podcasts.

  2. Speaker 1· Soundbite0:31

    [upbeat jingle] This is a CBC podcast.

  3. Nahlah Ayed· Host0:36

    Welcome to Ideas. I'm Nahlah Ayed.

  4. Harold Marcuse· Guest0:40

    March 11, 1942, California. [gentle music] "Believe I have found the signs of an entirely new form of shame that did not exist in the past."

  5. Nahlah Ayed· Host0:51

    Günther Anders, maybe the most prophetic philosopher you've never heard of.

  6. Harold Marcuse· Guest0:57

    "I will provisionally call it Promethean shame for myself. I understand this to mean the shame when confronted by the humiliatingly high quality of fabricated things."

  7. Nahlah Ayed· Host1:08

    Anders has been called the most neglected German philosopher of the 20th century.

  8. Chris Muller· Guest1:14

    Günther Anders has kind of slipped through the cracks, so the discovery of his work for me was like a lightning bolt.

  9. Nahlah Ayed· Host1:20

    And yet, despite his obscurity, he also anticipated the exact technological crises we're facing today.

  10. Chris Muller· Guest1:29

    He's really

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