Caroline Ashcroft
@carolineashcroft.bsky.social
20th century political thought at Harris Manchester College and Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. Author of Catastrophic Technology in Cold War Political Thought (EUP, 2024)
Pinned
Very pleased and excited that Catastrophic Technology is NOW OUT! (And just in time for Christmas 😉) edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-catastr...
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
Now online: Eric Loefflad (University of Kent) reviews "Catastrophic Technology in Cold War Political Thought (@edinburghup.bsky.social, 2024) by @carolineashcroft.bsky.social www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
October 31, 2025 at 7:37 AM
Now online: Eric Loefflad (University of Kent) reviews "Catastrophic Technology in Cold War Political Thought (@edinburghup.bsky.social, 2024) by @carolineashcroft.bsky.social www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Fantastic conference in the gorgeous town of Freiburg yesterday - thank you @martinbaesler.bsky.social for the invitation to come and speak!
September 20, 2025 at 7:24 AM
Fantastic conference in the gorgeous town of Freiburg yesterday - thank you @martinbaesler.bsky.social for the invitation to come and speak!
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
Long been of the opinion that child development is a missing piece in creating a machine that can truly think. (Maybe the only way to replicate a human mind is replicate how human minds are made.)
More thought-through analysis here 👇
luciantruscott.substack.com/p/why-artifi...
More thought-through analysis here 👇
luciantruscott.substack.com/p/why-artifi...
Why artificial intelligence will not take over the world
There is an easy answer to this question, and a hard one.
luciantruscott.substack.com
September 11, 2025 at 9:03 AM
Long been of the opinion that child development is a missing piece in creating a machine that can truly think. (Maybe the only way to replicate a human mind is replicate how human minds are made.)
More thought-through analysis here 👇
luciantruscott.substack.com/p/why-artifi...
More thought-through analysis here 👇
luciantruscott.substack.com/p/why-artifi...
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
"The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil."
- Hannah Arendt
- Hannah Arendt
August 22, 2025 at 7:54 PM
"The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil."
- Hannah Arendt
- Hannah Arendt
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
"I like to dream about a people who have the wits and the strength of character to choose what they like and want from complex technology, and just leave what they don't need aside - instead of letting everything become a need and then an obligation and then a mess..." - Ursula K. Le Guin
Poisoning the air of a Black community for a fucking chatbot.
'How come I can’t breathe?': Musk's data company draws a backlash in Memphis
The company’s turbines — enough to power 280,000 homes — run without emission controls in an area that leads Tennessee in asthma hospitalizations.
www.politico.com
May 11, 2025 at 4:35 AM
"I like to dream about a people who have the wits and the strength of character to choose what they like and want from complex technology, and just leave what they don't need aside - instead of letting everything become a need and then an obligation and then a mess..." - Ursula K. Le Guin
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
...Musk might go/be sacrificed before too long (after declaring victory/bogus figures about fraud eliminated, of course)...
...but we might still be stuck with a unitary executive, with far too much power concentrated in the president's hands:...
...but we might still be stuck with a unitary executive, with far too much power concentrated in the president's hands:...
Trump is concentrating power. A key faction of judges supports the idea | Jan-Werner Müller
The ‘unitary executive’ theory – backed by some conservative lawyers – is largely bogus. But it could wreak havoc on democracy
www.theguardian.com
March 11, 2025 at 3:45 PM
...Musk might go/be sacrificed before too long (after declaring victory/bogus figures about fraud eliminated, of course)...
...but we might still be stuck with a unitary executive, with far too much power concentrated in the president's hands:...
...but we might still be stuck with a unitary executive, with far too much power concentrated in the president's hands:...
I'll be speaking (online) about technology and nature at the LUPS Research Institute for Politics and Government this Wednesday at 1pm UK time. Please do join! ripg.uni-nke.hu/hirek/2025/0...
Research seminar 10/2025
ripg.uni-nke.hu
March 11, 2025 at 11:56 AM
I'll be speaking (online) about technology and nature at the LUPS Research Institute for Politics and Government this Wednesday at 1pm UK time. Please do join! ripg.uni-nke.hu/hirek/2025/0...
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
Two salaried 4-year PhD positions open at the Department of History of Science and Ideas in Uppsala, one in idéhistoria (intellectual/cultural history, broadly speaking), the other in history of science:
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
PhD student in the history of science - Uppsala University
PhD student in the history of science, Department of History of Science and Ideas, Uppsala University
www.uu.se
March 5, 2025 at 10:32 AM
Two salaried 4-year PhD positions open at the Department of History of Science and Ideas in Uppsala, one in idéhistoria (intellectual/cultural history, broadly speaking), the other in history of science:
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
📚 New on the blog!
From nuclear war to climate breakdown, how do we make sense of the catastrophic potential of technology? @carolineashcroft.bsky.social explores perspectives on the place of technology in the end of the world.
Read now 👉 edin.ac/4h0Hi65
From nuclear war to climate breakdown, how do we make sense of the catastrophic potential of technology? @carolineashcroft.bsky.social explores perspectives on the place of technology in the end of the world.
Read now 👉 edin.ac/4h0Hi65
Catastrophic Technology | Edinburgh University Press
Caroline Ashcroft explores the connections between current and mid-twentieth-century thought on the catastrophic potential of technology
edin.ac
February 21, 2025 at 2:16 PM
📚 New on the blog!
From nuclear war to climate breakdown, how do we make sense of the catastrophic potential of technology? @carolineashcroft.bsky.social explores perspectives on the place of technology in the end of the world.
Read now 👉 edin.ac/4h0Hi65
From nuclear war to climate breakdown, how do we make sense of the catastrophic potential of technology? @carolineashcroft.bsky.social explores perspectives on the place of technology in the end of the world.
Read now 👉 edin.ac/4h0Hi65
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
For people who need villains to wear shirts saying “I’m the villain,” here you go.
Top AI Investor Says Goal Is to Crash Human Wages
AI totally "crashing" everyone's wages is a necessary stepping stone towards a better future, argues billionaire Marcus Andreessen.
futurism.com
January 28, 2025 at 12:45 AM
For people who need villains to wear shirts saying “I’m the villain,” here you go.
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
I wrote about Catastrophic Technology for the page 99 test: page99test.blogspot.com/2024/12/caro...
Caroline Ashcroft's "Catastrophic Technology in Cold War Political Thought"
Caroline Ashcroft is Stipendiary Lecturer in Politics at Harris Manchester College, University of Oxford. She works in twentieth century p...
page99test.blogspot.com
December 19, 2024 at 10:27 AM
I wrote about Catastrophic Technology for the page 99 test: page99test.blogspot.com/2024/12/caro...
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
Just out: my latest for the ICRC Humanitarian Law & Policy Blog, in which I highlight some persistent tensions that complicate the notion of 'Responsible AI' for the military domain. #civmilsky #milsky blogs.icrc.org/law-and-poli...
The (im)possibility of responsible military AI governance
Professor Elke Schwarz argues that AI governance is complicated by factors which are intrinsic to AI systems themselves.
blogs.icrc.org
December 13, 2024 at 6:12 AM
Just out: my latest for the ICRC Humanitarian Law & Policy Blog, in which I highlight some persistent tensions that complicate the notion of 'Responsible AI' for the military domain. #civmilsky #milsky blogs.icrc.org/law-and-poli...
Very pleased and excited that Catastrophic Technology is NOW OUT! (And just in time for Christmas 😉) edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-catastr...
December 2, 2024 at 7:50 AM
Very pleased and excited that Catastrophic Technology is NOW OUT! (And just in time for Christmas 😉) edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-catastr...
Reposted by Caroline Ashcroft
"In 1977, Ivan Illich, an Austrian-born philosopher, vagabond priest, and ruthless critic of metastatic bureaucracies, declared that we had entered 'the age of Disabling Professions.'"
Interesting to see Illich appear again in the news!
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
Interesting to see Illich appear again in the news!
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
The Big AI Risk Not Enough People Are Seeing
Beware technology that makes us less human.
www.theatlantic.com
June 21, 2024 at 9:33 PM
"In 1977, Ivan Illich, an Austrian-born philosopher, vagabond priest, and ruthless critic of metastatic bureaucracies, declared that we had entered 'the age of Disabling Professions.'"
Interesting to see Illich appear again in the news!
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
Interesting to see Illich appear again in the news!
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
Very pleased to have a new paper out in Journal of the Philosophy of History (open access!) on Foucault and Arendt on technology and history. brill.com/view/journal...
brill.com
November 20, 2024 at 8:08 PM
Very pleased to have a new paper out in Journal of the Philosophy of History (open access!) on Foucault and Arendt on technology and history. brill.com/view/journal...