Communion After Dark. Play Episode It's free! Given the advancements in technology and AI, how have humans learned to navigate the ever-shifting boundaries of morality in an increasingly complex world? Webb Keane is a professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan. Webb joins Greg to discuss how different cultures navigate ethical boundaries, the complexities of human-animal relationships, the growing phenomenon of anthropomorphizing AI, and the challenges of understanding what it means to be human.
As I said, our most valuable tool is just knowing how to be a person and how to get along with other people.
And that, I mean, in principle, anyone can learn a new language. You're never going to learn it as well as you learn your first language, but it's something that's available to you. And so, in some sense, that goes for learning to eat differently, to walk differently, to wear different kinds of [clothes], to interact with people differently, even to imagine yourself into a different kind of metaphysical system.
Like, hang out with shamans long enough, and you're going to start to think that, yes, they do turn into jaguars and roam the forest at night. Key difference between anthropologists and other social scientists One of the key differences between what we do and what other social scientists do is we actually live with them and take part in their lives.
And so, that way, you catch not just what people say, but what they doβand not just what they put into words, but what they hint at and imply. Moral propositions must be livable to matter If you're looking for inhabitable, feasible, ethical worldsβmoral ways of livingβyou can't just sit back and think, "Well, how should this be?
