Project

What Will Life Become?

We have the ability to self-modify through gene editing, AI, and other technological means. These are opportunities but also challenges that will change our nature. Where are we going as we expand and explore who we might become as a species?

Algorithms that can be trained to “learn,” projects that plan for life beyond Earth, and biotechnologies that push the limits of life are among recent technoscientific developments that conjure new futures. They have also unsettled theories of body, mind, and species.

What Will Life Become, the two-day workshop in April 2022, unfolded in collaboration with the USC Dornsife Center on Science, Technology, and Public Life. It brought together path-breaking scholars, scientists, and artists to grapple with forms of life that might emerge in the mid-21st century.