The Use of Tools in a Technocratic Age: the Death of Wisdom? - Sr. Anna Wray, O.P.

Sr. Anna Wray, O.P. explores whether our reliance on efficiency-driven technology is hastening the death of wisdom by taking the place of human deliberation and agency. This lecture was given on February 20th, 2025, at Carnegie Mellon/University of Pittsburgh. For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events About the Speaker: Sister Anna Wray is a native of Connecticut and a member of the Dominican Sisters of Saint Cecilia of Nashville, TN. Sister received her PhD in philosophy from The Catholic University of America, having written her dissertation on Aristotle’s account of the activity of contemplation. Sister is an assistant professor on the faculty of CUA's School of Philosophy in Washington, DC, where she regularly teaches courses in rhetoric, philosophy of religion, and philosophical psychology. She is also an adjunct professor for Aquinas College, where she teaches metaphysics and epistemology to her sisters in formation. Her research and conversational interests include imagination and attention in human agency and speech, the effects of technology on human agency, and form as function and unifying activity. Keywords: Technocratic, Wisdom, Prudence, Philosophy of Technology, Aristotelian Ethics, Digital Minimalism, Prayer