When Tom Werder became executive director of Morris Arts six years ago, he wondered how much longer Great Conversations could continue.
After Thursday’s sold-out 10th anniversary gala, the answer appears to be: A long time.
“There doesn’t seem to be a shortage of interesting people in our community that people want to come and have great conversations with,” Werder said, as guests headed home from the ballroom of the Madison Hotel in Morris Township.
Some 260 of them had paid $250 a head to spend the evening in small clusters, dining at tables featuring experts and celebrities from the arts, business, media and sports.
There were Grammy-winning musicians (Mark Gross), Medal of Honor recipients (Col. Jack Jacobs, retired), best-selling authors (Christina Baker Kline), climate research scientists (Lisa Goddard) and Stanley Cup champions (Bruce Driver).
In all some 29 luminaries held forth. The annual event, spearheaded by Gina Moran of Morris Arts, is the largest fundraiser for the Morristown-based nonprofit, which promotes the arts across Morris County.
Slideshow photos by Kevin Coughlin:
Trustee Joen Ferrari, a retired Bell Labs engineer whose lengthy volunteer résumé also includes the Morris Museum and the Mayo Performing Arts Center, was honored for suggesting Great Conversations in the first place. A similar event in Atlanta had impressed her.
“In the nine years that we have run this event, the gross take has been a little over a million dollars. So that’s pretty good, I think,” Ferrari told the guests.
Video: Joen Ferrari is honored for starting the Conversation
The conversation was animated at Table 7, where PwC consultant Michael Engel led a free-wheeling discussion about the future of robotics and artificial intelligence.
Engel assured his dinner partners that humans still enjoy a huge advantage over computers — the ability to reason — and he expressed optimism that, despite inevitable job disruptions, automation and AI will benefit society over time.
Did that make Mariae Caballero feel better about the future?
“I’m not sure,” said the Madison resident, who works for a pharmacy chain.
Andrew Lewis, an architect in Morristown, said he enjoyed talking tech. “It was pretty cool. It’s good to engage with people from other walks of life.”
It was Vanessa Johnson’s first time at Great Conversations, and she hopes to return. The discussion got her thinking about how a world of self-driving cars, computer-printed houses and robo-nurses might look.
“So far, humans have dealt with scary technology in fairly responsible ways. It will be interesting to so how we do it this time,” said Johnson, who works for a big pharma company.
Great Conversations was a test bed for one technology that guests are likely to embrace: Audio assistance devices to help cut the din created by dozens of simultaneous conversations.
Emcom Audio Directions experimented with a system to help people with hearing aids, Werder said. He said some version of this might be offered more broadly next year.
