[ONLINE] - Science Fiction/Real Policy Book Club: Autonomous by Annalee Newitz

Science fiction can have real science policy impacts, and comes rife with real-life commentary. And with such a rich cache of science fiction to choose from, we think a book club is in order.

Join us for the first installment of our Science Fiction/Real Policy book club, a partnership with Issues in Science and Technology. Our first read will be Autonomous by Annalee Newitz. Autonomous follows the story of a female pharmaceutical pirate named Jack, an anti-patent scientist who has set out to bring cheap drugs to the poor. Without giving away too many spoilers, Newitz’s tale also includes a military agent-robot love story, a quest for justice, and the danger late capitalist modernity poses to personhood.

Join us for a jam-packed evening where we’ll discuss Autonomous and the questions it raises about labor and power, robot ethics, gender, patent law, the pharmaceutical industry, geopolitics, and much more.

Featured discussants

Joey Eschrich
Editor and Manager, Center for Science and the Imagination at Arizona State University

Tahir Amin
Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director, I-MAK

Moderator

Lisa Margonelli
Senior Editor, Issues in Science and Technology

Follow the conversation online using #FTBookClub and by following @FutureTenseNow.