Fall 2026 Colloquium - Jennifer Alexander

Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and in the Program for History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Minnesota

Title: Channeling the divine? Technology and the cultural chasm between evangelical/conservative and liberal Christianity

Abstract: With AI we have “slipped into the language and habits of mind we normally reserve for deities,” wrote NYT reporter Joseph Bernstein Society turning technologies into gods is not new; it happened with the telegraph long before AI. This talk draws from my book manuscript Two Worlds, One God, and shows how the history of the relationship between technology and religion can contribute to current assessments of technological power. It examines the historical role of technology in the international and often acrimonious religious divide between liberal/mainline and conservative Protestants that developed after the Second World War. Read more.