Valedictory lecture prof. dr. Marcel Barnard
On 16 May 2024, Marcel Barnard will step down as professor of practical theology: worship and formation. His farewell address is entitled God in bits & bytes. A book by Barnard under the same title will be published simultaneously by Skandalon publishers. The speech will start at 15:45 CET in the auditorium of the Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam.
God in bits & bytes contains reflections on a life increasingly dominated by info-technological developments. The author's lens is a theological one. What does information technology mean for our thinking about God? Can the God we were looking for in the Word also eventually be found in digits, in numbers, more precisely in 0 and 1? A God in bits & bytes?
Barnard: "Looking back on my education and career in science, and more broadly on all my life, the info-technological revolution has been a major event, which has happened almost imperceptibly, but at breakneck speed. I live my life in a relentless dynamic with a technology I am now completely dependent on, but which I cannot fathom or even point to, and which I sometimes find frightening. I decided to devote the last two years of my career and my research to that information technology. The book and my speech are the result of it."
