Podcasts Education Self-Improvement Conversations with Tyler Audrey Tang on the Technology of Democracy

Audrey Tang on the Technology of Democracy

Published: Oct. 7, 2020, noon

Audrey Tang began reading classical works like the Sh\u016bj\u012bng and Tao Te Ching at the age of 5 and learned the programming language Perl at the age of 12. Now, the autodidact and self-described \u201cconservative anarchist\u201d is a software engineer and the first non-binary digital minister of Taiwan. Their work focuses on how social and digital technologies can foster empathy, democracy, and human progress.

Audrey joined Tyler to discuss how Taiwan approached regulating Chinese tech companies, the inherent extraterritoriality of data norms, how Finnegans Wake has influenced their approach to technology, the benefits of radical transparency in communication, why they appreciate the laziness of Perl, using \u201chumor over rumor\u201d to combat online disinformation, why Taiwan views democracy as a set of social technologies, how their politics have been influenced by Taiwan\u2019s indigenous communities and their oral culture, what Chinese literature teaches about change, how they view Confucianism as a Daoist, how they would improve Taiwanese education, why they view mistakes in the American experiment as inevitable \u2013 but not insurmountable, the role of civic tech in Taiwan\u2019s pandemic response, the most important remnants of Japanese influence remaining in Taiwan, why they love Magic: The Gathering, the transculturalism that makes Taiwan particularly open and accepting of LGBT lifestyles, growing up with parents who were journalists, how being transgender makes them more empathetic, the ways American values still underpin the internet, what they learned from previous Occupy movements, why translation, rotation, and scaling are important skills for becoming a better thinker, and more.

Read a\xa0full transcript\xa0enhanced with helpful links, or watch the\xa0full video.

Recorded September 24th, 2020

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