In this talk, titled “Literature Versus the AI Industry: Techno-Monarchists and the Drive to Reduce the World to Numbers,” delivered on February 23 2026 at the Jackman Humanities Institute (University of Toronto), Teresa Heffernan considers how discussions of a technological future change in the context of the AI industry’s co-optation of fiction. From Alan Turing to Douglas Adams to Demis Hassabis, the fiction and science of artificial intelligence have long been entangled and conflated in the cultural imaginary. The recording of the talk is available on YouTube.
Heffernan is a professor of English language and literature at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax. She teaches courses in literary theory, critical posthumanism, feminist theory and the novel, with current research focusing on how the field of robotics and artificial intelligence is shaped by fiction.
The Wiegand Lecture Series was established in memory of William B. Wiegand. The purpose of the lecture is to advance the dialogue between science and the non-rational in the modern world. The Jackman Humanities Institute arranges and hosts this event annually.