Content Richer countries must do more to help those already experiencing the climate crisis by Keith Hyams and Morten Fibieger Byskov Data analysis: the dawn of precision agriculture by Naïo Technologies The Future Now ShowEnergy Efficiency with Michael Pachlatko and Anina.net from Beijing talking about Corona The future of zoos News about the Future: Self-healing potassium batteries / UV-Disinfection Robot Green chemistry Recommended Book: Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy by Hazel Henderson BeThe Big Role of Small Business in Dealing with the Climate Crisis by Patrick Crehan Climate Change Success Story: Sahara Forest Project Futurist Portrait: Blake Morgan Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show about Energy Efficiency with Michael Pachlatko “The European Commission’s proposed Green Deal is not lacking in ambition: mobilising 1 trillion Euros over the next decade will lead to a fundamentally different energy infrastructure across the continent. At the same time, the financial industry is increasingly put under scrutiny to disclose environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria in the portfolio reporting. How can we ensure this transition will indeed be to the benefit of all citizens, and what is needed to accelerate capital deployment specifically in critical areas like energy efficiency and renewable energy?” – Michael Pachlatko, VP Finance, Joule Assets Europe, Italy Special Anina.net from Beijing talking about CoronaBeThe Big Role of Small Business in Dealing with the Climate Crisis by Patrick Crehan(…) If you are involved in running a business, you are invited to provide feedback on your awareness and training needs in relation to energy and climate related audits and other measures that you can take to help address the climate crisis. You can do this by responding to this ONLINE SURVEY. You will be informed of the results of the survey in a future edition of the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The focus is on energy efficiency, but the survey provides an opportunity for you to shape the program based on your specific needs. (…) Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman Richer countries must do more to help those already experiencing the climate crisis By Keith Hyams, Reader in Political Theory and Interdisciplinary Ethics, University of Warwick and Morten Fibieger Byskov, Postdoctoral Researcher in International Politics, University of Warwick The climate crisis is not just about the future. It is a reality that many people, especially those living in low-income countries, already have to live with. As is well documented, global heating increases the risks of extreme weather events that threaten human lives and livelihoods. Some of these effects are already being seen. Our research over the past two years, for example, has brought us into contact with indigenous communities in Uganda whose livelihoods are increasingly precarious as a result of unreliable weather. We have also worked in informal settlements in Zambia where disease prevalence is accelerating as a result of climatic factors. Elsewhere, coastal communities are losing income and food due to storm surges that damage crucial infrastructures and homes. And inland agricultural communities are experiencing prolonged droughts. This affects the quality and quantity of crops and leads to water shortages that kill off livestock. That, in turn, causes food insecurity for millions of people, such as in the case of the decade-long drought in Kenya. Droughts similarly create water shortages for poor urban populations, as we have seen in our work in Cape Town. Elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa, increased rainfall is flooding latrines, contaminating drinking water and spreading diseases. A child collects plastic bottles near a house destroyed during cyclone Idai, Beira, Mozambique. EPA-EFE/Karel Prinsloo Meanwhile, among mountain communities the world over, retreating glaciers threaten water supplies that depend on seasonal glacial melt-off. For these communities, adapting to climate breakdown – by, for example, improving water infrastructure and management, and diversifying income sources – is an immediate and pressing concern. To make matters worse, global inequalities have left the global south lacking crucial infrastructural and institutional development necessary to build resilience to climate breakdown. Addressing injustice Not nearly enough action has yet been taken. We can, at least, say that it is increasingly accepted that we must sharply reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But this doesn’t go far enough. We also owe it to those communities already experiencing climate breakdown – often those who have done the least to contribute to the climate crisis but experience the worst of it – to help them adapt to the new reality. Our failure to do so constitutes an injustice that is currently inadequately recognised. A major issue at the recent COP25 climate conference concerned who should pay for this adaptation and for the loss and damage compensation in lower income countries. It was agreed that countries that have benefited from industrialisation should take some responsibility for their historical role in driving climate breakdown. This responsibility, then, falls primarily – if not solely – on the affluent, industrialised nations of the global north. But the adaptation finance that has so far been provided by these countries has been insufficient, and has often failed to reach the most vulnerable communities. Workers inspect a wheat crop following unseasonal storms near Amritsar, India, 17 April 2019. Raminder Pal Singh/EPA-EFE In order to address this, countries that have signed the United Nations Framework Convention for Climate Change (UNFCCC), the main governing body for climate action, must actually uphold the commitments made in the Paris Agreement, which highlights adaptation and loss and damage compensation as equal pillars of climate justice alongside mitigation. Such action might include a closer collaboration with development programmes all over the world to promote development for adaptation, as well as the continued allocation of UNFCCC resources towards adaptation initiatives. Such initiatives should aim to build resilient infrastructures in ways that support socioeconomic equality, addressing both physical and social causes of vulnerability. They should also provide alternative and sustainable livelihoods for poor and climate vulnerable communities, such as those depending on fishing and farming. And they must protect existing ecological knowledge and practices, such as raised fields among indigenous farmers in the Bolivian Amazon, which are key to resilience. Representing the most vulnerable Another key element of this concerns representation. The voices of poor and marginalised communities are too easily lost in a climate debates in the global north. For more well-off countries, significant costs from climate breakdown are still mostly in the future, albeit rapidly approaching. And so that is how the climate crisis is predominantly viewed. Sidelined voices need to be platformed more. Some progress have been made in this regard on an international level, with the creation of the Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples Platform (LCIPPP) as an advisory body to the UNFCCC. But such platforms are lacking at most national and local levels. Building on this, it is necessary to create opportunities for climate vulnerable communities to be actively involved in formulating both global and local visions of climate justice. These visions must give equal consideration to their present experiences of living with climate breakdown and the need to facilitate adaptation not only in the future, but in the here and now. In the case of the Batwa Indigenous Peoples of Uganda, we have found that national adaptation plans largely ignore the interests of marginalised groups like them. Sometimes, they even make their situation worse, or violate basic human rights. In an attempt to help them adapt to climate breakdown, the Batwa, for example, were forcibly relocated from their native lands in the rainforest to areas that, while having some access to infrastructure, lack proper housing and arable land. In many lower income countries, climate breakdown is already bringing very significant costs. But for many in the global north, the worst is still to come, and much of the focus of climate action is still on mitigation. Somehow, perspectives need to change: the climate crisis is an issue of global and social justice. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Data analysis: the dawn of precision agriculture By Naïo Technologies Digital technologies are now part of everyday life for farmers: small and large agricultural businesses, young and not-so-young farmers, almost everyone is using them. The sector is therefore producing a wealth of data, which can be used to improve economic and environmental performance and guide decision-making. However, the digital transition is only just beginning, and questions are still being raised. Transforming data into decision-making tools GPS, drones, robots equipped with sensors, mobile applications and connected devices are all tools that facilitate the everyday lives of farmers, helping them optimise the running of their businesses and make informed decisions. Monitoring fields, herds and buildings, examining weather and market developments and forecasting yields, agriculture as a whole generates a vast amount of valuable data. With the availability of this “agricultural data”, the stakes are high across the entire sector. “There is much to do on traceability, with high societal expectations for greater transparency on food products. The data collected can also be used to increase the competitiveness and productivity of farms, making it possible to enhance both their economic and environmental performance” states Guillaume Joyau,Head of Research & Innovation at the Department for Economy and Sustainable Development of the FNSEA (Fédération Nationale des Syndicats d’Exploitants Agricoles – French Federation of Farmers’ Unions). He also notes the impact of using digital technology and data analysis on the everyday lives of farmers, reducing on-call time and informing them of incidents quickly, and often remotely. “The value for farmers is very real. Being able, for example, to observe the health of crops, via sensors passing very close to the plants, means they can plan targeted actions in case of disease”, concludes Jean Inderchit, Product Manager at Naïo Technologies. Step-by-step digitisation Although the use of data is already relatively widespread on vineyards, farm digitisation is, generally, still in its infancy, and barriers remain. Firstly, the investment costs, equipment renewal cycles being staggered over one, or sometimes even two, decades. Also, the necessary infrastructure deployment for good network coverage, some areas still being largely incompatible with constant connectivity. And there are still no standards for the tools and protocols used, making communication and interoperability between different data collection systems complex. And then, using the data collected in the fields raises yet more questions. “Although it is the farmers who are actually producing this data, through their work, the analyse, aggregation and cross-referencing with other data and then transformation into usable information very often falls to third-party specialists”, explains Guillaume Joyau. This raises questions about how the data is used, its portability and even its storage… The DATA-AGRI charter and label, created by the Conseil de l’Agriculture Française (French Agriculture Council) (of which the FNSEA is a member), aim to establish a code of ethics and fair practices for agricultural digital technology. “Ensuring transparency and guaranteeing that farmers have control of how their data is used, creates favourable conditions for data use right along the chain. These are the key issues in building the emerging ecosystem” sums up Guillaume Joyau. Emergence of “Smart Agriculture” What is more, the analysis and interpretation of “Agricultural Big Data” today represents an opportunity to profoundly revolutionise agricultural practices. “The data collection must have a very precise and useful aim to offer genuine assistance in the running of a farm. If an autonomous robot can, at the same time as weeding lettuce plots, count the plants and determine their location, providing farmers with maps of their fields, the number of heads and the average diameter, this provides farmers with an extremely high level of information to optimise the manner in which they grow their plants”, illustrates Jean Inderchit of Naïo. Yield forecasts, practice improvements and even early detection of disease, making it possible to act locally to prevent the spraying of products that are harmful to the environment and the user, are all areas in which the data can be highly effective, opening the way to precision agriculture. For Guillaume Joyau, it is clear that “digital technology is a means of responding to many of the new issues with which we are faced. Climate change, for example, brings different diseases, different monitoring and new emerging risks, which digital tools can help us manage. And in the same way that mechanisation transformed agriculture in the 60s, these technologies will certainly lead us to change the way we approach production and the agricultural landscape, by designing new models”. Naïo Technologies develops and markets robots for agriculture and viticulture. We also hold a range of electric tools for weeding, hoeing and harvesting to help farmers efficiently collect the fruit of their hard work.Our robots assist farmers in their daily tasks in order to relieve their workload and increase profitability while reducing impact on the environment. The Future Now Show Shape the future now, where near-future impact counts and visions and strategies for preferred futures start. – Club of Amsterdam Do we rise above global challenges? Or do we succumb to them? The Future Now Show explores how we can shape our future now – where near-future impact counts. We showcase strategies and solutions that create futures that work. Every month we roam through current events, discoveries, and challenges – sparking discussion about the connection between today and the futures we’re making – and what we need, from strategy to vision – to make the best ones. April 2020 Energy EfficiencywithMichael Pachlatko “The European Commission’s proposed Green Deal is not lacking in ambition: mobilising 1 trillion Euros over the next decade will lead to a fundamentally different energy infrastructure across the continent. At the same time, the financial industry is increasingly put under scrutiny to disclose environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria in the portfolio reporting. How can we ensure this transition will indeed be to the benefit of all citizens, and what is needed to accelerate capital deployment specifically in critical areas like energy efficiency and renewable energy?” Credits Michael Pachlatko, VP Finance, Joule Assets Europe, Italywwww.eu.jouleassets.comeQuad platformwww.eu.jouleassets.com/about-equad H2020 LAUNCH projectwww.launch2020.eu April 2020SpecialAnina.net from Beijing talking about Corona Credits Anina Net, Founder, anina.netwww.anina.netFounder, 360Fashion Networkwww.360fashion.net The Future Now Show The future of zoos Jo-Anne McArthur – Captive Animals and the Future of Zoos Jo-Anne McArthur is an award-winning photographer, author, and educator based in Toronto. She has been documenting our complex relationship with animals around the globe for fifteen years; She was sharing in her photography exhibition that questions the future of zoos and the ethics surrounding animals in captivity. A Vision of a Zoo to Preserve Wildlife Few animals in modern zoos have to spend their entire lives behind bars and in the best cases, they can move around in spacious artificial landscapes based on their natural habitats. The World Zoo Conservation Strategy stipulates that the main priority of zoos today should be nature and species conservation and public awareness. So how effective are they at this? Horizon explores the existence of Zoos – Horizon: Should We Close Our Zoos? – BBC Two Liz Bonnin looks at the science behind zoos, what does it say about animal welfare? How good are zoos at conservation? How should they change in the future? News about the Future Self-healing potassium batteries In research published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute demonstrate how they can overcome a persistent challenge known as dendrites to create a metal battery that performs nearly as well as a lithium-ion battery, but relies on potassium — a much more abundant and less expensive element. Batteries contain two electrodes — a cathode on one end and an anode on the other. If you were to look inside a lithium-ion battery you’d typically find a cathode made of lithium cobalt oxide and an anode made of graphite. During charging and discharging, lithium ions flow back and forth between these two electrodes. In this setup, if researchers were to simply replace lithium cobalt oxide with potassium cobalt oxide, performance would drop. Potassium is a larger and heavier element and, therefore, less energy dense. Instead, the Rensselaer team looked to boost potassium’s performance by also replacing the graphite anode with potassium metal. “In terms of performance, this could rival a traditional lithium-ion battery,” said Nikhil Koratkar, an endowed professor of mechanical, aerospace, and nuclear engineering at Rensselaer and the lead author on this paper. UV-Disinfection Robot The UVD Robots provide efficient and automated disinfection solutions for hospitals and life science customers. Application of UVD Robots in hospitals patient and operating rooms save patients’ lives by reducing Hospital Acquired Infections (HAI’s) and operational costs for hospitals. Claus Risager, CEO of Blue Ocean Robotics and Chairman of the Board of UVD Robots, calls it atremendous satisfaction for employees, management and the circle of owners to witness the deployment of the UVD Robot. “We are now helping solve one of the biggest problems of our time, preventing the spread of bacteria and viruses with a robot that saves lives in hospitals every day.” Green chemistry Source: Wageningen University 24 May 2019 he industry is seeking alternatives to petroleum-based products to help achieve the climate targets. Substitutes for petroleum can be extracted from biomass obtained from agricultural and organic waste streams. Scientists from Wageningen University & Research have been developing such green alternatives for use in cosmetics, detergents, paints and plastics. This will not only reduce CO2 emissions, but it will also result in a healthier environment for humans, animals and plants. Dishwasher tablets contain polyacrylates, which are petroleum-based chemicals. Researchers from Wageningen University & Research have developed a product based on sugar beet pulp that can be used as a green alternative to these chemicals and help the industry to reduce its CO2 emissions. The new product is also biodegradable and less harmful to the environment. ‘So we’ve killed two birds with one stone!’ says Jacco van Haveren of Wageningen University & Research. The Programme Manager for Biobased Chemicals and Fuels is involved in the development of biobased products. The chemical industry is seeking raw materials based on biomass to replace petroleum. Examples of these materials are agricultural and organic waste flows. Van Haveren believes they should not delay with the next step, which is to test the new ingredients to ensure that they are harmless and safe. Harmful substances Products like cosmetics, detergents, paint and plastic can contain toxic or potentially toxic substances and hormone-disrupting softening agents. These substances can be harmful to humans, animals and the environment. One example of such a substance is the resin used to fix tram rails in their bedding. ‘The resin used is based on isocyanates, which are harmful to the workers who install the rails. We have replaced the harmful product with a resin that is partly based on vegetable oils,’ explains Van Haveren. The new resin is currently being tested in practice. Biodegradable bio-plastic The researchers are also trying to find new biobased ingredients for cosmetics and personal care products. Moreover, many products and packaging materials contain non-degradable plastics. ‘We need to increase the use of biobased plastics and recycle as much as we can. Where recycling is not possible, or if the plastic ends up in the environment, we need it to degrade more quickly and completely so that it does not pollute the environment. This is particularly important for products that are only used once or for a very short time,’ says Van Haveren. His research team is hoping to find building blocks that can be used to create sustainable alternatives to packaging materials.“ Wageningen is truly unique in that it conducts research into fossil-free, sustainable alternatives to chemical products that are also safe and harmless to the environment. We have the world’s most extensive and long-running research programme in this area.” – Jacco van Haveren, programme manager Biobased Chemicals and Fuels Business and government Much of the research takes place in collaboration with businesses. ‘Some industrial partners do not only want to achieve the necessary CO2 reductions; they also genuinely want to go greener,’ says Van Haveren. For many major chemical companies, however, this is still a step too far. ‘They are willing to reduce CO2 emissions by deploying biomass, but they also want to continue manufacturing the current petroleum-based products. It is hard for them to change.’ The government is also supporting research into alternatives to ‘substances of very high concern’ and harmful substances, a field in which Wageningen has been active for some time now. ‘Wageningen is truly unique in that it conducts research into fossil-free, sustainable alternatives to chemical products that are also safe and harmless to the environment. We have the world’s most extensive and long-running research programme in this area.’ Recommended Book Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economyby Hazel Henderson With insight, clarity, warmth, and enthusiasm Hazel Henderson announces the mature presence of the green economy. Mainstream media and big business interests have sidelined its emergence and evolution to preserve the status quo. Throughout Ethical Markets Henderson weaves statistics and analysis with profiles of entrepreneurs, environmentalists, scientists, and professionals. Based on interviews conducted on her longstanding public television series, these profiles celebrate those who have led the highly successful growth of green businesses around the world. Ethical Markets is the ultimate sourcebook on today’s thriving green economy. The Big Role of Small Business in Dealing with the Climate Crisis By Patrick Crehan, CEO and Founder, Crehan, Kusano & Associates On 28 November 2019, days before the UN COP25 in Madrid, the European Parliament passed a resolution declaring a climate and environmental emergency. The conversation had changed from being one about climate change to talk about the climate crisis. After a year of extreme weather events that saw people from the EU and across the world dying from heatwaves, property and lives lost due to uncontrollable wildfires and more property and lives lost due to uncontrollable flooding, it was time to call out what Greta Thunberg called an existential threat to humanity. The media was full of discussion about the need for immediate action, by everyone citizens and business as well as governments, then along came the COVID-19 crisis, and it has dominated the news ever since. We don’t know how long it will take to get out from under the shadow of this global pandemic, but we do know that when we do, the climate crisis will still be there, just as urgent as it was before, and still in need of attention. Anyone in business needs to know what they can do about the climate crisis. This is as true of small business owners and managers as it is for giant corporations. Every business has a role to play and any see it as a catalyst for change at the level of its business model, and in terms of the way it relates to its clients, customers and employees. Received wisdom has it that small businesses have no time and no resources to devote to climate action. But this is not necessarily true. Recent conversations with Fréderic Mathout of CO2 Strategy and Mathieu Cribellier of CO2 Logic indicate that there is growing demand from small businesses for climate, energy and carbon audit services. As independent auditors they usually start by talking with the business owners, managers and employees about the concern of citizens for the climate and the environment, for the way they live and work, for the products and services they consume. This provides the starting point for examining and updating the way the business operates. The formal audit identifies opportunities for aligning operations with the needs of society based on improving their energy efficiency and energy management, switching to renewable energy sources and reducing their overall carbon footprint, in some case by planting trees. As a general rule, climate change is caused by the presence of greenhouse gases such as CO2 in the atmosphere. These are mainly due the way we use energy derived from fossil fuels. The contribution of a business to climate change can roughly be equated to the amount of CO2 emitted either directly by the business, due to energy consumed by the buildings it occupies, by its industrial processes, by its use of vehicles for transport and logistics, as well as the CO2 emitted indirectly based on products and services it consumes. Switch to renewables. This may be as simple as switching electricity supplier. It may mean electrifying the company fleet, switching to biodiesel or adopting strategies based-on bicycle logistics. It may also mean becoming a prosumer or joining a renewable energy cooperative. Reduce the use of energy or increase the energy efficiency of key processes. This might mean investing in better equipment, installing automated systems for energy management, re-inventing key processes and re-training staff to operate with a view to optimizing energy consumption in some way. Finally, it is also possible to de-carbonize activities by simply planting trees. It is interesting to note that there is an international market for planting trees, one that creates the possibility of planting a mixture of trees that allow the business to de-carbonize much of activities at the least cost financially, while completing the project with a planting strategy in line with the restoration of local eco-systems. The reality is that there are many things that even the smallest business can do. These efforts are not perfect and can always be improved; the threat of greenwashing is handled by having a certified auditor that can provide objective proof of the CO2 savings made. Energy efficiency measures provide cost savings and play an important role in providing access to sources of credit or investment for projects related to the energy, climate and environment. But the real pay-off goes way beyond those cost savings, it can have a transformative effect on the image of the company, on its communication and marketing, on the way it relates to its clients, customers and employees. The challenge for owners and managers of small businesses is to navigate the vast range of options available and choose a course of action that aligns with other business goals, such as responding to the needs of its clients who may want to green their supply chains, responding to the needs of customers who want to live in a more climate friendly way, and responding to the needs of employees who want to feel proud of the overall impact they have on the world in which they live. An independent energy, climate or carbon audit is a good place to start. If you are involved in running a business, you are invited to provide feedback on your awareness and training needs in relation to energy and climate related audits and other measures that you can take to help address the climate crisis. You can do this by responding to this ONLINE SURVEY. You will be informed of the results of the survey in a future edition of the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The focus is on energy efficiency, but the survey provides an opportunity for you to shape the program based on your specific needs. The survey has been created by INNOVEAS, an EU funded project to develop training courses and capacity building material aimed at small and medium sized enterprise, and intended to help them take climate action. If this is of interest for you, you are invited to join its LinkedIn group, Twitter feed and YouTube Channel for updates. If have friends or colleagues who are small business owners or managers (business with up to 250 employees or a turnover of up to €40M), please forward this article to them, tell them that there is much they can do to contribute to fighting the climate crisis and urge them to provide feedback on their possible training needs. 25 March, 2020Patrick Crehan of CKA is a member of the INNOVEAS project consortium Climate Change Success Story: Sahara Forest Project In 2050 about 9.3 billion people will share our planet. Already today the world is facing intertwined challenges of food, water and energy security, coupled with climate change, desertification and shrinking forests. None of these challenges are without solutions. At the same time it is ever clearer that we cannot afford to pursue responses to one challenge that come at the expense of another. The greatest challenges of our time are closely interlinked and the same must be true for their answers. To borrow the words of Albert Einstein: “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” Considerable parts of what are now considered desert areas were formerly vegetated. The army of Julius Caesar conquered much of the African territory north of the Sahara, turning forests into farmland. For some 200 years North Africa supplied around two-thirds of Rome’s total grain supply. This resulted in deforestation, increased salinity in the soil and loss of minerals. In the same way that the extractive use of resources has contributed to the loss of natural vegetation, The Sahara Forest Project proposes to use restorative practices to establish vegetation in arid areas and reverse the trend of desertification. This process of restorative growth will be catalyzed by combining already existing and proven environmental technologies, such as the evaporation of saltwater to create cooling and distilled fresh water (i.e. in a saltwater cooled greenhouse) and solar thermal energy technologies. The technological combination in The Sahara Forest Project is designed to utilize what we have enough of to produce what we need more of, using deserts, saltwater and CO2 to produce food, freshwater and energy. The Sahara Forest Project proposes to establish groups of interconnected economic activities in different low lying desert areas around the world. The simple core of the concept is an infrastructure for bringing saltwater inland. A Sahara Forest Project facility will be successful only when it is well integrated with the local communities. In addition to mitigating effects of climate change and contributing to conflict reduction in resource-scarce areas, the SFP facilities will provide employment for both high- and low-skilled workers. Programs and facilities for knowledge transfer and training will be established to ensure that long-term social and economic development opportunities are created. The Sahara Forest Project is not too good to be true. It is an integrated system designed to harvest technological synergies while minimizing waste. The design is founded on the premise that we must find a more holistic approach to successfully tackle challenges related to energy, food, and water security.. Futurist Portrait: Blake Morgan Blake Morgan is a leader in customer experience. She is a keynote speaker and customer experience futurist and author of two books on customer experience. Her bestselling second book is called “The Customer Of The Future: 10 Guiding Principles For Winning Tomorrow’s Business” (HarperCollins). Her first book was “More is More: How The Best Companies Work Harder And Go Farther To Create Knock Your Socks Off Customer Experiences.” She has worked with Comcast, Allstate, Genentech, Accor Hotels, Accenture, Adobe, Cisco, Parker Hannifin, Ericsson, Verizon, Omron and more. Blake is a guest lecturer at Columbia University, the University of California, San Diego as well as adjunct faculty at the Rutgers executive education MBA program. Blake contributes to Forbes, the Harvard Business Review and Hemispheres Magazine. She is the host of The Modern Customer Podcast and a weekly customer experience video series on YouTube. She lives in the Bay Area with her husband, daughter and their two dogs. 50 Leading Female Futuristsby Blake Morgan Futurists are looking ahead to prepare themselves, their organizations and their audiences for how the world could change. And as they delve into the future, they have a chance to shape it. The Company Of The Future Has A Soul printable version
By Patrick Crehan, Director, Club of Amsterdam, CEO, Crehan, Kusano & Associates sprl March 2008 Thoughts about the event about the future of Ecological Architecture 1) The term ‘ecological architecture’ is not well defined it refers to something that lies beyond green or sustainable architecture. It demands more in terms of environmental and human performance. 2) Existing standards for sustainable/green/ecological/good architecture are inadequate. They set the bar too low in terms of performance. They are ineffective in that they attenuate the aspirations of building owners when commissioning. Owners who want to achieve a certain rating or certification with respect to a recognized standard, feel no need to go beyond the highest rating, even if this could be done at little extra cost. 3) The building is one of the basic units for architecture. The challenge of ‘ecological architecture’ exists at many levels – building, urban environment, city, country or planet. Question: Do standards exist at these different levels? How do they interact? 4) Though technical, the issue of measurement is important for the reason that you cannot manage, compare or improve what you cannot measure. Question: What are the dimensions of performance for ‘ecological’ architecture’? … at the level of the day-to-day running and maintenance of the system? … over the life-cycle of a ‘project’? … at different scales? 5) High performance architecture (at building level anyway) does not have to be expensive. It is possible to build ‘zero-energy’ or ‘autonomous’ buildings at no extra cost. The cost structure will be different from conventional approaches in that some items cost more but are off-set by savings elsewhere. 6) To have a real impact there is a need to educate people and help them make appropriate changes to the way they live. 7) The real issue for large scale adoption under current conditions is the retro-fitting of existing buildings. Making high-performance buildings from green-field sites is relatively easy. Question: Is there a role here for standards to be required of landlords or of government in public procurement? 8) One of the challenges of adopting ecological architecture is resistance to the substitution of consumables. The ‘radiator’ is an old consumable, often not the best solution to a problem, but other solutions are possible such as in-floor systems for heating and cooling. This has been possible for many years, but take-up has been low. Another example is in the design of sun-screens. Those that roll from the bottom to the top are much more efficient than those that go from the top to the bottom, but they are generally not employed. 9) Governments have no incentive to reduce the energy cost of buildings. Energy is taxable and ecological architecture ultimately means the loss of a source of revenue. The enemy is not ‘government’ in that governments need taxes to run society. But they need to recognize an alternative. The same force is at work in the case of alcohol and tobacco. Question: What would happen if overnight all taxes of energy, alcohol and tobacco disappeared? What would this mean in terms of loss of revenues for taxation to pay for healthcare, social security, school and hospitals? What could be done to replace these revenues in an ageing post-petroleum society? What would such a society look like and where would it generate the taxes to cover its own cost of social infrastructure. Maybe the real revolution is not in building standards, but in a whole new vision for organizing society that includes a new model for taxation?
by World Economic Forum Highlights Switzerland takes the leading position in the TTCI rankings. Switzerland is an extremely safe country, with excellent health and hygiene indicators, as well as environmental regulation that is among the most stringent and effective in the world. And in a country that has some of the most well regarded hotel management schools in the world, the quality of the country’s human resources is second to none, ensuring an adequate supply of high quality staff for the industry. The air and ground transport and tourism infrastructure are also among the best in the world, making it very easy and comfortable for visitors to move around the country. Further, the country’s natural and cultural resources are among the richest in the world (the country is home to six World Heritage sites, and much protected land area). Switzerland is one of the only high-income countries, together with Spain, that is among the top ten countries with regards to the prioritization of travel and tourism. All of this comes together to make Switzerland a very attractive place to develop the travel and tourism sector. Austria and Germany, ranked 2nd and 3rd, respectively, are among the top three countries, together with Denmark, regarding the quality of environmental regulation, and they are among the top four in terms of safety and security in the country, with very low crime and violence, and reliable police services. And most strikingly they hold the top two spots in the area of natural and cultural resources attributable to several World Heritage sites in both countries (especially in Germany), and large nationally protected national parks and such areas. Germany is rated as doing better with regards to the quality of transport infrastructure, particularly ground transport infrastructure, where it is rated number one, whereas Austria’s tourism specific infrastructure is rated as the best in the world, ahead of Germany. The United States is ranked 5th in the index. The US is among the top three of the 124 countries covered regarding natural and cultural resources, with a large number of World Heritage sites (20 of them), as well as in the percentage of protected land area, making the country an attractive destination. The country also has an excellent infrastructure and business environment for Travel & Tourism, ranked number one in the overall subindex: it has the most well-developed air transport infrastructure in the world, by a significant margin, as well as excellent tourism infrastructure. The country’s human resources also get excellent marks (ranked 5th overall). It should be noted, however, that hiring foreign labor is highlighted as difficult (ranked 43rd), and this is an area of concern due to the seasonality of much of the tourism labor force. France, the most travelled to destination in the world, is ranked just outside the top-ten at 12th place. The country’s strengths lie in areas such as natural and cultural resources (with for example 30 world heritage sites, among the highest in the world), the quality of the air and ground transport infrastructure (both ranked 4th), and health and hygiene (9th). However, these strengths are offset by weaknesses, such as the country’s policy rules and regulations (ranked 40th), and the general attitude of the French towards visitors (ranked a very low 122nd overall). Spain, a country that has seen an impressive increase in tourism over the years, is ranked 15th overall, just behind France within Europe. Spain’s strengths can be traced to its excellent tourism infrastructure (ranked 2nd) and air transport infrastructure (ranked 7th), as well as excellent natural and cultural resources (with the second highest number of World Heritage sites in the world – second only to Italy). And Spain is notably ranked 3rd overall with regards to the prioritization of the travel and tourism sector by the country, the top ranked European country in this area, demonstrating the recognition within Spain of the importance of the sector as an important driver of economic growth. Italy, the country with the highest number of World Heritage sites in the world ranks a mediocre 33rd in the TTCI ranking. The country is strongly assessed for its cultural aspects, and its very good tourism infrastructure. However, Italy’s T&T competitiveness also suffers from several weaknesses, which bring the overall rating down. This includes policy rules and regulations, where it ranks a dismal 70th, below most European countries due to very strong foreign ownership restrictions, and rules governing FDI. Further, the government is not seen to be prioritizing the sector (ranked 92nd). Within Asia, Hong Kong is the highest ranked country (6th), followed closely by Singapore (8th). These economies have excellent infrastructure: the ground transport infrastructure of both are assessed as among the top three in the world, and their air transport infrastructure also gets high marks. They also have top notch human resources, providing healthy and well educated people to work in the sector. With regards to the policy environment, they hold the top two places out of all countries, with regulatory environments that are extremely conducive to the development of the travel and tourism industry (policies facilitating foreign ownership and foreign direct investment, well protected property rights, few visa restrictions). Further, they are among the safest countries of all assessed with regards to crime and security issues. Hong Kong is unsurpassed with regards to the quality of health and hygiene, and Singapore is ranked second with regards to the overall prioritization of travel and tourism. Australia is ranked 13th overall, just ahead of New Zealand (14th). Both countries are characterized by excellent natural and cultural resources, with much nationally protected land area and in the case of Australia, many World Heritage sites as well (16, placing the country 12th). And given the importance of the natural environment for much of their leisure tourism, it is notable that they also have stringent environmental regulations. Further, both countries are characterized by a relatively strong prioritization of the tourism sector, and effective destination marketing campaigns. Malaysia, ranked 31st, has good ground transport infrastructure, and excellent price competitiveness, ranked 2nd overall on this indicator, with low ticket taxes and airport charges, low comparative fuel prices, and a favourable tax regime. The country is perceived as quite safe (24th), although health and hygiene indicators lag behind many other countries in the region, with in particular a low physician density. The country’s policy environment is measured as relatively conducive to the development of the sector (ranked 26th), and the government is prioritizing travel and tourism, with one of the highest travel and tourism fair attendances in the world (ranked 2nd), and an excellent evaluation for its destination marketing campaigns (ranked 6th). Thailand is ranked 43rd in the TTCI, just behind Korea (ranked 42nd). Thailand benefits from a very friendly attitude towards tourists (ranked 6th), and the sector is indeed prioritized by the government (ranked 14th) with, similar to Malaysia, excellent destination marketing campaigns and an effort to ensure national presence at major travel and tourism fairs internationally. However, important weaknesses remain, particularly regarding the quality of transport and tourism infrastructure, both of which remain relatively underdeveloped. India is ranked 65th overall. The country has some clear strengths, mainly linked to cultural endowments, ranked a very high 7th overall with regards to the number of World Heritage sites in the country, and its famously welcoming attitude towards foreign travellers. The country also benefits from excellent price competitiveness, ranked 6th overall, with low ticket taxes and airport charges and low prices in the economy as a whole. And with regards to the policy environment, property rights are indeed well protected, and foreign ownership is authorized, although the stringency of visa requirements places India a very low 106th overall. However, the tourism infrastructure remains underdeveloped. Further, despite government and industry efforts to promote the country abroad (India is ranked 4th with regards to tourism fair attendance), and the exposure given to recent promotional campaigns, the assessment of marketing and branding to attract tourists remains mediocre (ranked 59th). China is ranked 71st in the TTCI. Although China is ranked 3rd in terms of World Heritage sites, and 11th in terms of price competitiveness, it has a policy environment that is not at all conducive for T&T development (ranked a low 97th), with property rights that are not sufficiently protected, strong foreign ownership restrictions and stringent visa requirements. Environmental regulation also gets low marks, with the government not seen to be prioritizing the development of the sector in a sustainable way. China has a relatively good air transport infrastructure (ranked 36th), and ground infrastructure which is ranked 45th overall. However, tourism infrastructure remains highly underdeveloped (ranked 113th). There are also some safety and security concerns (83rd), as well as issues related to health and hygiene (84th), with a low physician density and access to improved sanitation and drinking water which is low by international standards. Barbados, at 29th, is the highest-ranked country in the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region. Barbados is ranked 2nd overall with regards to national tourism perception, with a positive attitude towards tourists, and the value of tourism in the country. The government is prioritizing the sector to a very high degree (ranked 2nd), spending a high percentage of GDP on the sector, and ensuring quality destination marketing campaigns. Further, the country has a regulatory environment that is quite conducive to the development of the sector, with low visa requirements, and very open bilateral Air Service Agreements. Costa Rica, ranked 41st, is second in the LAC region. The country’s strengths are in the area of natural resources, ranked 12th on the percentage of nationally protected land areas. Its policy environment is very conducive to the development of the sector (ranked 17th), with open bilateral Air Service Agreements, low visa requirements and an environment that welcomes foreign investment. However, safety and security remains a concern (67th). And while tourism infrastructure is quite well developed (36), ground transport infrastructure remains highly underdeveloped (93rd), particularly roads and ports, making travel in the country somewhat difficult. Mexico, in 49th place, gets quite high marks for its natural and cultural resources (ranked 29th) with nationally protected areas and a large number of World Heritage sites. This “natural attractiveness” is reinforced by a relatively good policy environment for the development of travel and tourism, ranked 33rd overall with low visa requirements, and low foreign ownership restrictions, for example. Mexico also has relatively well developed air transport infrastructure (32nd), although its tourism infrastructure (47th) and ground transport (62nd) get lower marks. And its price competitiveness is ranked a low 85th, in particular due to high ticket taxes and airport charges. Safety and security is also a major concern for the country, with high levels of crime and violence. Brazil is ranked 59th overall. The country benefits from some excellent cultural and natural resources. And the air transport network gets relatively high marks (28th), as well as measures of the dedicated tourism infrastructure (also 28th), such as the presence of major car rental companies. However, the general ground transport network remains underdeveloped with the quality of roads, ports and railroads ranked 96th, 88th and 81st respectively. Safety and security also continues to be of serious concern, ranked 90th overall, as is the case in a number of countries in the region. More generally, the overall policy environment is not particularly conducive to the development of the sector, ranked 75th, with, for example, highly stringent visa requirements, and foreign ownership restrictions. Among countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) ranks highest, at 18th, well ahead of the second ranked country, Israel at 32nd place. While UAE ranks quite low with regards to natural and cultural resources (80th), it makes up for this with a number of strengths in other areas measured by the index. For example, national tourism perception is rated 3rd in the world, with an extremely positive attitude towards foreign travellers, and pride in the value of the country for tourism. The country also does very well with regards to price competitiveness, ranked 8th in this area, despite a very high price level, due to low ticket taxes and airport charges, low taxation more generally, and low fuel price levels in the country. The UAE’s infrastructure also gets good marks, particularly air transport infrastructure, ranked a very high 8th out of all countries assessed. The government is seen as prioritizing the sector strongly (ranked 4th), and carrying out very effective destination marketing campaigns (ranked 1st). Egypt, a country so rich in cultural heritage, ranks a low 58th overall in the TTCI. And this is despite a number of clear strengths beyond the cultural richness. Egypt has excellent price competitiveness, ranked 5th overall with low comparative prices overall, including fuel prices. Further, the government is prioritizing the sector, with relatively high government spending on travel & tourism and ensuring the country’s presence at major tourism fairs. This level of prioritization is reflected in some policy areas such as the favourable policy on visa requirements. On the other hand, the country’s infrastructure is underdeveloped, particularly tourism infrastructure (85th). An upgrading of the quality of the country’s human resources available to work in the sector, ranked 69th, would also improve the country’s overall travel and tourism competitiveness. Mauritius is by far the most competitive country in the sub-Saharan Africa region with regards to Travel & Tourism, ranked 39th overall. The general attitude of the population to foreign travellers is quite welcoming, and this is buttressed by great support by the government, which demonstrates the greatest prioritization of the industry of all countries analyzed. The country’s tourism infrastructure is quite well developed, with a high concentration of hotel rooms and many major car rental companies operating in the country. On the negative side, the policy environment could be improved, ranked a low 63rd in this area due to foreign ownership restrictions and rules on foreign direct investment, as well as a visa regime that could be simplified to allow foreign tourists to enter the country with less hassle. South Africa is the region’s second-strongest performer, ranked 62nd in the TTCI. The country is endowed with a significant number of World Heritage sites, and infrastructure in the country is also relatively well developed, particularly air and ground transport infrastructure. Some aspects of the regulatory environment are conducive to the sector’s development, such as the excellent protection of property rights and visa requirements that are not extremely onerous. And the country is assessed as carrying out very effective destination marketing. However, there are also some areas of weakness that have brought down South Africa’s overall ranking. Safety and security is of serious concern (ranked 95th), as well as health and hygiene, where it is ranked 82nd overall, with a low physician density, as well as concerns with regards to access to improved sanitation and drinking water. You can download the full report click here
Futurist (definition): (Twelve) Types of Futures Thinkingby: Acceleration Studies Foundation, Understanding the nature, common pitfalls, and limits of human inquiry can help us avoid classic traps and dogmas, including the false threats and promises of many of the most successful memeplexes in global culture, and allow us to see through scenarios which are more a reflection of our own human-centric fears and idealizations than a realistic assessment of what the universe seems busily engaged in doing. We need the ability to be humble and to truly look and listen to see beyond our own individual and collective limitations.more…. IFTF’s Map of the Decadeby: Institute for the Future Each year, IFTF steps out beyond the edge of today’s common knowledge and asks uncommon questions about the trends and innovations that are likely to reshape our world in the coming decade. Innovation – a hybrid connection between old practices?by: Humberto Schwab, The Club of Amsterdam LABs lead to a change in internal dialogue; people really need a strong dialogue with other beings to change their internal reflections and dialogues. This will directly lead to action, when you make shared action plans and design a sustainable dialogue with the stakeholders. To shift from a money driven society to a value driven society needs a new way of talking: the real human dialogue.more…. Mapping the Global Futureby: National Intelligence Council,type: Articlesin: 00 The Future Report of the National Intelligence Council’s 2020 Projectmore…. Navigating in a Rough Seaby: Franz Tessun,type: Articlesin: 00 The Future The enterprise relevant scenarios are the basis for a FSC-supported [Future Scorecard] business management. Starting point is the vision what the enterprise should have reached in three, five or ten years and what is its position in the market compared with the competitors. more…. On the responsibility of visionby: Dr. Wendy L. Schultz,type: Articlesin: 00 The Future Reaching our full potential – as a civilization, society, organisation, or community – requires goals that challenge us to exceed that potential. Unfortunately, in this most instrumental of ages, daydreaming is unfashionable. An educational system inherited from the industrial era teaches us to keep our attention on the task at hand; the drive for upward mobility focuses our creativity on immediate problem-solving and practical matters of management. The age of deconstruction awards more points to critiques than to castles in the air. Given these barriers, little wonder that people are uncomfortable with the verbs “vision,” “imagine,” “dream.” If not for the cases cited in recent leadership and management literature which underscore the utility of vision for motivating exemplary performance, it would be difficult to convince professionals to engage in visioning. Yet it is something humans do naturally, that in fact we must be trained not to do. Reinstating visioning as a powerful creative tool is simply re-balancing our internal environment: giving equal pride of place to intuition and imagination next to logic and calculation. Envisioning a preferred future requires them all. more…. Summit for the Future Report 2005by: Club of Amsterdam,type: Articlesin: 00 The Future
by Frank Brüggemann 1 Introduction 1.1 BackgroundA lot of companies expand their business into international markets. In most cases, the motive is a search for improved cost efficiency or looking for the chance to expand and achieve growth. Today, companies are able to respond rapidly to many foreign sales opportunities; this is made easier by technological, governmental, and institutional developments. They can shift production quickly among countries because of their experience in foreign markets and because goods can be transported efficiently from most places. Companies can also distribute component and/or product manufacturing among countries to take advantage of cost differences. Once a few companies respond to foreign market and production opportunities, others may see that there are foreign opportunities for them as well. All this is a part of the so called “globalisation”. In operating globally, a company has to consider what the company will seek to do and become over the long term (mission), its specific performance targets to fulfil its mission (objectives), and the means to reach its targets (strategy). There are many factors that may influence companies to succeed in doing global business and remaining competitive in the global arena. Many companies are riding on the wave of globalisation; some of their employees might get tangled up in the flow of the wave with more and more personal involvement as the borders between the working day and the private life become “grey”. They are challenged with a multi-lingual working environment, exposure to different cultures, an increase of pace and stress, they must adapt in order to succeed. The job profiles and working conditions of an international company are nowadays aligned to totally different factors as possibly to a decade ago. The markets are not limited anymore to the exclusive region in which the company is based, but to the whole world. Additionally, technological developments have promoted a flood of communications on every level of economy which helped to ease the way of globalisation. 7 Conclusion – Part 4 Is the daily work life affected by the process of globalisation, which is influencing the attitudes of the company or the employers? Generally yes, it is. We have seen that this company and the whole economy changed their orientation on the market and thus their attitudes and policies to their employees. Tremendous revolutions took place in the plot of the working life of an employee in contrast to decades before “globalisation” made pace. The examined company moves in a global environment. The requirements to do so for this company no longer exclusively refer to their core competencies and activities, e.g. within the production goods range from purely a technological view. But include far more interdisciplinary entwinements (labour unions; wage policies; etc.), which the company and the employee must go around. Having observed items the employee depends on, tendencies in the answers such as the sorrows and insecurities the employees have because of changed work conditions, we can conclude there are several interactions between the economy, the society, the enterprises and the single employee, but there is only a little focus on the impacts on this little “cog-wheel” – the employee and his private life. Even in literature there are only a few scientists who researched in this environment. Scientists on the subject of globalisation like GOSHAL, BARTLETT and YIP are mainly focused on the economy and the enterprises – not on the humans “behind all this”. So, there is a wide field for investigation on how our society, and the individuals in it, are going to change in the coming years with regard to ongoing globalisation. The major difficulty during globalisation is, like in material existing communism, the human being. It is not foreseeable how an employee is acting in a company that is going global. Because of this each person may think egoistically first, and also company heads provide first for their company and their profit. And furthermore each state puts first its own interests at expense of the other. A good example of this is the European Union, in which only important resolutions come to tough negotiations. No technical invention, no political development, and no social change – automatically leads exclusively to change for the better or worse for everyone. No well intended ideology or policy will bring eternal peace. Wealth for all is not realisable, neither by economic systems, nor by globalisation. Every employee in a global company is affected by globalisation – even though everyone is not yet fully aware of how it currently functions.So, he must try to understand what is happening and why and he must regard globalisation as a personal challenge and take personal action. Finally in such a work situation he will and has to pay attention more than ever to his job and his personal life, in order to be able to exist in a global job market. In fact, the “Impact of globalisation on daily working life” is there. The company passes on the pressure of globalisation to each and everyone of the workforce – it has to. But first of all globalisation is neutral. It holds risks and even chances for a nation state, a corporation and finally also for the single employee even in his daily job situation. Globalisation is furthermore not a natural phenomenon. It is sought and made by people. That is why every single employee can also change, shape and guide it in the right direction. What counts is what the single employee makes out of the new possibilities. As far as the company is globalised, or better spoken, as far as the company is determined by the characteristics of globalisation, e.g. entering into new cultures, as far are the employees forced to adapt to those habits, just as being highly flexible also goes with it. Deficits in qualifications and flexibility of the workforce could destabilise the position of the company in a global “arena”. Consequently the company cannot make use of the workforce in a way it would like to do, to fulfil the requirements in global markets. The needs of workers themselves have changed. There is more and more talk about the need to balance work and family or personal responsibilities. The labour force has become increasingly diversified, and this means that ongoing training has become a necessity. Moreover, workers want a greater say in workplace organisation. Despite this movement toward globalisation, there remain significant environmental differences between countries and regions. Managers in an international business must be sensitive to these differences and also must adapt to the appropriate policies and strategies for dealing with them (YIP, 1995). Significant aspects of globalisation with regard to influences and altering processes in the daily job are e.g. the trend to shift toward more highly skilled jobs, as it is shown in Table 2 and the trend that production and jobs have progressively shifted from the goods sector to the service sector, so that knowledge-based industries have grown. That means more and more occupations take place in the office and not as much in a workshop as before. But all the evidence is that these changes would be taking place – not necessarily at the same pace – with or without globalisation. In fact, globalisation is currently making this process easier and maybe less costly to the economy as a whole by bringing the benefits of capital flows, technological innovations, and lower import prices. Thus, all the challenges and changes an employee has, could not have been avoided. Economic growth, employment and living standards are all higher than they would be in a closed economy, so the economy as a whole will of course flourish from policies that embrace globalisation by generally promoting an open economy [8], and coincidently by undertaking of the industry and the government to focus on education and vocational training, to make sure that workers and employees have the opportunity to acquire the right skills in dynamic changing work environments. The philosophy of world companies such as Sony, Coca Cola or McDonald’s “to produce and sell theirs products on the whole world” became generally accepted more and more: Today liberty is defined as boundless consumption. The problem of this variant from free-market economy is however: If there is only the market, everything and everyone becomes the commodity. Companies with ten thousand employees are sold back and forth several times in one year. The individuals fate apparently of no interest, as long as the dividend is good. Are there any possibilities to defend oneself against this? Numerous other socio-economic factors currently affect the workplace and the people in it. The rapid pace of technological change is transforming the workplace and the job experience. It is facilitating the growth of various non-standard forms of work, especially home work, telework and part-time work.7.1 Recommendations It has been shown how the requirements in a globalised working environment have changed over the years. Here are some recommendations to be implemented or at the very least considered in order to fulfil these requirements in the daily working life. Upon closer consideration of all previous thoughts it has become clear that, in general learning in and for the daily job is of most significance for anticipating your future employability and an ongoing satisfaction in the current job. This requires some education, and because learning new skills takes time, it is additionally important to plan ahead and identify the types of skills that will make the employee most employable in the job market. It had been already said that what counts is what the single employee makes of the new possibilities. Thus the employee has to cope with his personal situation and should gain an overview of his work environment and the associated possibilities. Derived from the situational facts some more questions arise, which ought to be considered for further action and planning: Ø How do global shifts in the market and workplace apply to the employee? The hierarchical structures and the discrepancies between the divisions that are global focused and those that are local focused in this very company are an example of shifts in that very workplace. At the edge of an internal merger of these divisions it has to be evaluated if an increase e.g. in travel is really feasible for the employee; if working in a global team is desired due to different cultures and habits; and if the employee is able to communicate in an unfamiliar environment. Ø What opportunities do those global shifts create for the employee? Those shifts could of course in general have positive or negative effects upon the employee. If the employee is keen on getting to know new people and able to communicate in a proper and adequate manner, he might see this shift as a true opportunity, and thus it could contribute to his career. If he is not enthusiastic toward that shift, it might cause some trouble for him because he has to e.g. learn a foreign language or work together with colleagues who have a totally different mentality. This could cause dissatisfaction in the job, psychological problems may be, and could lead to a certain lack of productivity for the company. Ø How can the employee prepare himself for the possibilities of the future? It is critical to stay current with and be aware of what new skills are needed to remain highly employable. The employee should tune in to formal and informal information channels that relate to his work, especially in the areas of technological developments, economic influences, globalisation, legislation, and competition. He should discover where he can use his strongest, most enjoyed skills to meet a need or to solve an important problem. When critical changes arise at the horizon – and in a globalised work environment which, is almost every day – it is most important to undertake learning projects to be prepared for dealing with those situations. In fact, the ability to learn effectively is a very important skill to have in a globalised world in which knowledge increases rapidly every year. For companies and employees alike, being on the competitive edge in global processes means, being on the learning edge. It is not enough to simply perform as you did yesterday or last week. As someone working in a globalised company you also should constantly build “performance capability”. Increasingly, the degree or professionalism is determined largely by the ability to quickly acquire new information and adjust to new situations. In fact, a key measure of learning is how well the acquired knowledge is applied and converted into improved performance. Helpful for this is also reflecting upon and exchange of past experiences and reaching conclusions about them for future application. This really means deriving actions from those findings. Some individual benefits of learning from day-to-day experiences is keeping ahead of and attuned to change, finally attaining a greater sense of work satisfaction. 7.1.1 Further recommendations for the company The Company should not only deliver “technical” knowledge or just facts in the manner of language courses e.g. for preparing their workforce, but they should offer the possibilities of getting to know the real characteristics of a foreign colleague – what makes a Chinese a Chinese for example. This could e.g. be done by multicultural parties in different locations sponsored and held by employees of several foreign subsidiaries. Or the company could offer a forum for exchange: If the company would have a data base in which everyone who is interested in going into a foreign country would be registered. The assumption of this topic is that someone who is personally interested in doing so, has a deep desire and motivation for this. Thus it makes it easier for the company to promote only the “right” persons for working abroad. If a company is going global it has to take care that it is possible for everyone in that company to experience the process of globalisation and its meaning on a local and individual level. 7.1.2 Further recommendations for the employee It is generally important to deal with stress at work in the right manner; therefore it is also of importance to make clear in which environment one is working. If the company has several subsidiaries located in different time zones, it will definitely arise one day that the employee would have to come into the office early in the morning or late at night, if there is a live video conference e.g. Thus he should be mentally prepared for that to avoid stress in that specific situation. If the employee prefers to have regular working times, he should rather join a local acting team or company. To stand against this pressure put on him by the characteristics of globalisation, he should actively get up – actively means not to wait until the stress comes up or occurs, but to do something against it in advance. This could be joining vocational trainings, knowing more about your rights in the working place, maybe participating in a labour-union, or just conscious of the challenges in a positive manner and break through without being stressed. All this could be done or better still should be done to overcome personal obstacles in a globalised work environment and to “survive” all the implications and unpleasantness of “globalisation”, and thereby enjoy more fully the positive aspects which would lead to greater job satisfaction. 7.2 Outlook We live in the age of globalisation: A growing mobility, the dismantling of borders and trade barriers and other blurred frontiers accompanied with technological developments and radical changes enable the global village to develop. There is already a 24-hour financial market and increasingly there is the 24-hour working, shopping, and banking day. All this has consequences upon patterns of working which in turn refract into our personal lives and relationships. We generally have to change our way of thinking concerning work in future. And we have to change our habits if we are to work in a globalised company or one that is affiliated to such. We should get rid of imaginations that deal with going to an office early in the morning and returning late in the afternoon. We should get rid of working in the same profession all life long. The scientist CHARLES DARWIN once said: “It’s not the strongest species that survive nor the most intelligent, but the most responsive to change”. This is, I believe, one of the most important aspects of globalisation with regard to influences and altering processes inthe daily job. Each employee should be aware of that, when planning his personal job career or just joining a global company and especially when confronted with these issues. Moreover and concluding according to my opinion, is the development and influence of information and communication technology the synonym for the move towards a knowledgebased economy which is the real meta driving force. This can be compared with the great leaps forward such as when steam powered the industrial revolution and transformed agriculture and electricity ignited consumerism. I suppose that a knowledge based revolution will have an impact on all aspects of human endeavour and will cause us to review and redefine economic, social, cultural, and political activity, and thus my daily job. This impression isgained by the experiences made in the company during the last years when more and more activities focus and refer on an increasing number of data bases, so called “Knowledge Banks”. The knowledge in the institutions grew so rapidly during the last decades that it became necessary to handle this knowledge on a global base in an appropriate way. This assumption of a “new age” is confirmed by the KONDRATIEFF CYCLE, which says that the general development happens in waves with an approximately wave-length of 50 years. The full report can be downloaded as a *.pdf click here
by John Stewart Evolutionary adaptability Adaptability is of central importance to the evolutionary process. It is through adaptation that organisms are able to survive in changing environments, become better suited to their existing environment, or expand into new environments. In general, organisms that are more adaptable can be expected to be more successful in evolutionary terms. A major improvement in adaptive ability is a major evolutionary advance. Humans are the most adaptable organism to live on this planet. We use our rapidly improving science and technology to survive and satisfy our adaptive goals in a wide range of environments. Whatever adaptive problem we put our minds to, we can generally find a solution. We have proven far more adaptable than organisms that evolve by gene-based evolution. It took millions of years for genetic evolution to discover how to produce reptiles that fly, while humans developed the technology to achieve this in a few thousand years. The massive adaptive improvements seen in human capacities over recent centuries are significantly greater than could be achieved by genetic evolution over hundreds of millions of years. Whatever our wants, whatever our needs, we are very effective at finding ways to manipulate our environment to achieve them. But we are very poor at achieving things that we do not want. We don’t use our creativity to find better ways to achieve things we are not motivated to achieve. In evolutionary terms, this turns out to be the central limitation in human adaptability. Typically we do not see this as a limitation. It does not prevent us from doing anything that we want to do. It does not stop us from living happy and fulfilled lives. We do not feel restricted because we have no desire to do what we have no desire to do. If we evaluate our adaptability by asking whether it enables us to satisfy our needs and wants, we continue to see ourselves as being highly adaptable. But if we measure our adaptive ability in evolutionary terms, we reach a very different conclusion. What if our continued evolutionary success demands that we adapt in ways that conflict with the satisfaction of our existing needs and wants? What if our existing motivations and needs do not produce the behaviours that are best in evolutionary terms? These sorts of conflicts between our needs and evolution’s needs seem highly likely to emerge during our evolutionary future. It is improbable that the needs and wants implanted in us by our evolutionary past will produce the behaviour that is also optimal for our future. This means that our adaptability is seriously limited in evolutionary terms. There is an enormous range of behaviours, life styles and technologies that we would not want given our current needs and motivations. But these might be critically important for achieving evolutionary success in the future. We have a very large evolutionary blind spot. We are not motivated to explore an immense variety of adaptive possibilities, no matter how useful they may be in evolutionary terms. Until we overcome this limitation, we will continue to use genetic engineering, artificial intelligence and other technological advances to satisfy our past evolutionary needs and conditioning, rather than to achieve future evolutionary success. If we are to be successful in evolutionary terms in the future, we will need to overcome this adaptive limitation. We will have to be able to do whatever it takes for future success. Humanity will need to free itself from the needs and wants installed in us by our biological and cultural past. For this we will find that we will need to develop in ways that have traditionally been classified as spiritual. Humanity will need to widely adopt the practices currently associated with spiritual development if we are to continue to be successful in evolutionary terms. To get a better understanding of how human adaptability would need to change in the future, it is useful to see how adaptability has improved during the past evolution of life on Earth. This will enable us to locate the current level of human adaptability within a long sequence of evolutionary improvements. We will see how our current level surpassed previous abilities, but how it too is limited. This will help identify the new capacities we would have to develop if we are to overcome these limitations. It will point to the new psychological skills and capacities we need if we are to overcome our current deficiencies. The evolution of adaptability There are a number of quite distinct mechanisms that adapt organisms on our planet[1]. One of the first to emerge was gene-based natural selection. With this mechanism, organisms produce offspring that differ genetically from each other and from their parents. The genetic difference might produce a change within the organism that carries it. This changed characteristic might in turn make the individual more successful and have a greater number of surviving offspring. If so, the proportion of individuals that carry the genetic difference will increase, and the genetic difference will spread throughout the population. The population will be better adapted, having acquired an improved characteristic. Gene-based natural selection discovers adaptations by trying out changes amongst offspring. But gene-based natural selection operates only across generations. It does not adapt individual organisms during their life. It is unable to discover new adaptations by trying out changes within the individual while it lives. Obviously an adaptive mechanism that could do so would have a significant advantage in evolutionary terms. It could discover and implement improved adaptations continuously within individuals, long before genetic evolution was able to do so. Somewhat ironically, the adaptive arrangements that operate within organisms during their life were discovered and established by genetic evolution. Genetic evolution has developed the superior adaptive mechanisms that have the potential to replace it, at least in humans. The first adaptive mechanisms established by genetic evolution searched for better adaptation by trying out changes within the organism, using trial and error. But how could the organism’s systems know whether a particular change had improved the organism’s adaptation? This was a key challenge for genetic evolution—it had to install the organism with some way of identifying the internal changes that were beneficial in evolutionary terms. This challenge was easier in the case of changes that produced some immediate improvement in the functioning of the organism. The efficacy of a change could be judged against its immediate effects within the organism. For example, changes to the amount of oxygen delivered to a tissue could be evaluated by their effect on the metabolic rate in the tissue. The challenge could not be met so easily for changes that might produce longer-term evolutionary advantage, without immediate beneficial effects on the organism. Behaviour that leads to sexual reproduction provides a clear example. These behaviours have no immediate pay-off for the organism. They do not improve its functioning, and may even impede it. How could evolution fit out organisms so that they implemented behavioural changes that led towards successful reproduction, and rejected behaviour that did not? The answer discovered by genetic evolution was to install organisms with an internal reward system. This system rewards individuals internally when they try out behaviours that are beneficial in evolutionary terms, and punishes them when they do otherwise. We experience these internal rewards as various kinds of attractive feelings, motivations and emotions. The habits and behaviour patterns that an organism adopts are those that are positively reinforced by its internal reward system. Its behaviour and lifestyle is shaped by the goals that are established by its motivations and emotions. The internal rewards and punishments act as proxies for evolutionary success. Genetic evolution tunes the system of motivations and emotions so that when an organism pursues its internal rewards, it acts in a way that leads to evolutionary success. An organism’s motivations and emotions guide it to discover and implement adaptations that are beneficial in evolutionary terms. If circumstances change, and a particular behaviour is no longer optimal in evolutionary terms, genetic evolution will modify the internal reward system so that the behaviour is no longer reinforced. Genetic evolution adapts the internal reward system so that the organism’s goals continue to be aligned with evolutionary success. Other important developments in the evolution of adaptive mechanisms within organisms were learning and imitation. Once an organism discovered by trial-and-error that a particular change was useful in particular circumstances, learning enabled it to implement that adaptive change whenever those circumstances arose again. And imitation enabled an organism to adopt an adaptive change discovered by another individual, without having to discover it for itself. Both these improvements reduced the amount of trial-and-error that organisms had to use to adapt. But the most significant and far-reaching advance in adaptability came with the development of a capacity for mental modelling[2]. This capacity is very familiar to us—it is most fully developed in humans. We use thinking and other mental representations to model the effects of our behaviour on our environment. So instead of having to try out alternative actions in practice, humans can use mental models to predict their effects. We can try out possible adaptations mentally. This significantly reduces the need for costly trial and error in the search for adaptive behaviour, and enables us to take account of the (predicted) future consequences of our actions. Our ability to test alternative behaviours mentally is the basis of our capacity to plan ahead, imagine alternatives, invent and adapt technology, build structures such as houses and roads, radically modify our external environment for our adaptive goals, establish long-term objectives, imagine how we might change the world, develop strategic plans, design projects and undertake activities that pay off only in the future (such as plant crops and feed animals). The acquisition of language was a critically important step forward in our ability to construct mental models. Language and associated forms of communication enabled humans to share the knowledge used for building models. Communication enabled all members of a society to acquire and use the knowledge discovered by any individual. It also enabled knowledge to be accumulated across the generations. The progressive accumulation of knowledge has enabled humans to model a greater range of interactions with our environment, and to predict the consequences of our actions over wider scales of space and time. This has enabled us to discover more effective ways of achieving our adaptive goals and obtaining positive reinforcement from our internal reward systems. Our ability to construct and manipulate models has also improved as we have learnt to augment our mental abilities with external artefacts such as pen and paper, books, recording devices, computers and other forms of artificial intelligence. Our mental adaptability can be expected to continue to improve as humanity accumulates more knowledge about how the external world responds to our interventions and as artificial intelligence is developed. The full evolutionary potential of mental modelling is obvious. Once organisms have accumulated sufficient knowledge, their modelling will often be superior to the internal reward system at identifying the adaptations that are best in evolutionary terms. No longer would the organisms have to be guided towards evolutionary success solely by a system of motivations and emotions. Instead the organisms could use mental modelling to identify and implement the actions that would enable it to survive and flourish into the future. Mental models have the potential to be far superior than the internal reward system established by genetic evolution in the organisms’ evolutionary past. The motivations and volitions (moral or otherwise) that were favoured by Darwinian selection in their evolutionary past are highly unlikely to be optimal for their successful survival throughout the next million years. And as circumstances change into the future, the values and motivations that are optimal are likely to change repeatedly. But mental modelling is not able to fulfil its enormous adaptive potential when it first emerges. Initially, it does not have the capability to take over the adaptation of the organism. It has not accumulated the detailed knowledge and information needed to predict the future consequences of a wide range of alternative actions. As a result, modelling will be less effective than the pre-existing motivation and reward systems at discovering the best adaptations. However mental modelling will still provide immediate advantages. It enables the organism to find better ways of achieving its internal rewards and motivations. The organism can use mental models to identify the behaviours that will achieve outcomes that produce desirable internal states. Initially mental modelling will not establish or change the adaptive goals of the organism—it begins as a servant of the pre-existing motivation and reward systems. Limitations of human adaptability It is easy to locate humanity within this evolutionary sequence[3]. Humans are not yet organisms that use mental modelling to adapt in whatever ways are necessary for future evolutionary success. We are still organisms that spend their lives pursuing proxies for evolutionary success as ends in themselves. We use our mental modelling to work out how to achieve the goals set by our internal reward and motivation system—goals that we have been fitted out with by natural selection and that are modified to a limited extent by conditioning during our upbringing. We use the enormous power of mental modelling to see how we can act on the world to produce desirable psychological states and avoid unpleasant ones. For most this means using modelling to pursue sex, wealth, popularity, satisfying relationships, social status, power, feelings of uniqueness, and so on. And we spend our lives trying to avoid undesirable psychological states such as those associated with stress, guilt, depression, loneliness, hunger, and shame. But when our evolutionary interests clash with these motivations and emotional responses, our evolutionary interests lose out. We have not yet developed a comprehensive capacity to free ourselves from the dictates of our biological and social past. We cannot adapt or modify at will our likes and dislikes, our emotional reactions, our motivations, what it is that gives us pleasure or displeasure, our habits, or our personality traits (eg we cannot change from extrovert to introvert at will). Few of us can effortlessly ‘turn the other cheek’ even when we can see mentally that it is in our interests to do so. This is the case whether these predispositions are largely inherited, or the product of individual experience during our upbringing. As a result, the evolutionary adaptability of humanity is seriously limited. We do not use the immense capacity of mental modelling to pursue evolutionary ends. Adaptations exist that are superior in evolutionary terms, we can see that they are superior, but we do not implement them. Instead we spend our lives chasing positive reinforcement from our internal reward system. If humanity is to realise the full evolutionary potential of mental modelling, we will have to free ourselves from our biological and cultural past. Can humans develop such a psychological capacity? Or will our ability to adapt be forever constrained by the predispositions resulting from our evolutionary history? Will we be able to adapt only in directions currently rewarded by our internal reward system, irrespective of what is best for our evolutionary future? Or can we develop the capacity to move at right angles to our history and conditioning, and to adapt in whatever ways will produce future evolutionary success? Modern scientific psychology has not yet developed an understanding of how we can develop a psychological capacity along these lines. To date it has concentrated on understanding how our psychology currently operates, and how pathologies can be corrected. It has little to say about our potential for future psychological development. Spiritual development But humans have accumulated an extensive body of knowledge and practice about how we can develop these new psychological capacities. This knowledge is embodied in religious and spiritual systems. Although some systems are more explicit about it than others, and some have a number of other goals for spiritual development, the world’s major religious systems all advocate the development of an ability to free oneself from particular emotional responses, desires and motivations. Furthermore, all systems contain methodologies and practices that can assist the development of such a capacity. Despite the fact that religious systems use widely different terminology to describe their practices and beliefs, it is possible to identify a broadly common approach to spiritual development. Most practices are directed at promoting the emergence of a new self that stands outside the individual’s emotional states, thoughts, and sensations. This new observing self is not bound up in the flow of thoughts and feelings and sees them as objects of attention. The individual experiences herself as the new observing self, as separate from her thoughts, feelings and sensations, and able to treat them as objects that can be managed and modified[4]. What were once part of the subject are objects in relation to the new self, and can be managed and controlled by it[5]. This contrasts with the individual’s experience before a new observing self is developed. Previously the individual tended to be absorbed in and identified with emotional reactions and thoughts, was not aware of herself as separate to them, and could not easily choose whether to be influenced by them. The individual experienced herself as her motivations and thoughts, and defined herself through them and through the personality traits and behaviour patterns they entrenched. The new self is given a wide variety of names in various religious and philosophical systems, including the silent witness, the true self, Buddha mind, the Lord, the observer, the soul, atman, the master, Christ consciousness, the observing “I”, an emergent metasystem transition[6], and the higher self. Religious systems generally promote the emergence of the new self through practices that separate the mind into an observing part and an observed part. The observing part is the precursor to the new self. These practices typically operate by turning attention and awareness inwards, and directing it at mental contents—at sensations, emotions, motivations, mental images and thoughts as they arise in the mind. For example, many religious systems require adherents to struggle against the dictates of their ‘lower’ desires and impulses. Doing so directs attention inwards, makes these mental states objects of attention and begins the separation of the mind into an observing part and an observed part. The waging of an internal war against desires and impulses will assist the development a new self that stands outside them and is no longer identified with them. Other practices also enhance the separation of the mind into an observing part and an observed part. Meditation typically involves turning attention inwards and making thoughts and emotional states objects of attention[7]. Similarly the mindfulness practices of Buddhism and the self-observation[8] of Gurdjieff promote the development of the new observing self during ordinary life. These practices focus attention on the physical sensations, emotions, mental images and thought that arise as the individual goes about daily activities and interactions. All these techniques emphasise that self-observation it to be passive and non-judgemental. This assists in ensuring that the new observing self does not identify with or become absorbed in mental contents as they arise. A number of practices help the observing self to remain separate from mental contents. Some of these operate by dampening mental activity and reducing the incidence of intense emotional experiences. This makes it easier for the new self to stand outside the flow of mental contents without becoming absorbed and identified with them. Examples include practices that take individuals away from the pressures of normal life such as retreats, monastic life, asceticism, and pilgrimages. Many systems have also discovered that meditation is an effective method of tranquillising mental activity, and that prayer and devotion can have similar effects. Most systems emphasise that repeated effort and vigilance is needed to maintain separation—the individual will tend to slip back into identification with thoughts and emotional states, and will find it very difficult to stand outside and observe them for extended periods. These practices also develop the ability of the individual to dispose attention wilfully and to break the control of attention by emotional states. Devotional practices also enhance this ability—they require the individual to continually bring attention back to the object of devotion and away from distractions. The new self that can be developed as a result of these practices is relatively free of the adaptive goals of the internal reward system. Once the emerging new self can remain functionally separate from motivations and emotional impulses, it can decide whether or not to be influenced by them. Instead of ‘going with’ these impulses as they arise, it can decide not to act on them. This functional separation also enables the new self to control the disposition of attention. The new self can direct attention and energy only at activities that serve the aims of the self. As the observing self accumulates knowledge about the operation of the motivational and emotional system, it improves its capacity to manage them. The individual learns how to modify the goals of her internal reward system, and is then able to align them with goals and objectives of her choosing. As a result, the individual can find motivation and emotional satisfaction in whatever activities serve her goals and objectives. For example, if an individual chooses to pursue evolutionary success as her ultimate goal, she will be able to align her internal reward system with evolutionary goals[9]. The metaphor of a carriage (or chariot) drawn by horses has been used by a number of religious and philosophical systems to represent the psychology of a person who has developed these capacities[10]. Generally the driver is the intellect, the horses the emotions, the carriage the body, and the master in the carriage (or lord of the chariot) is the new self. The master coordinates the actions of the various components so that they cooperate together to serve the objectives and goals set by the master. Importantly, this metaphor emphasises that the new self does not repress, override, or take over the functions of the emotions and the body. A competent higher self, like a competent manager of a modern corporation, or like the conductor of an orchestra, works with and makes best use of the special abilities of the elements it manages. Why have religions developed this extensive body of knowledge and practice about freeing humans from the requirements of their motivational and emotional systems? A key reason is that religions generally promote adherence to ethical systems that conflict with the dictates of our internal reward system. Religions have learnt that it takes much more than an intellectual commitment to an ethical system before an individual is able to implement it. Reason does not control the passions until the individual has developed a new psychological structure that has the capacity to manage the individual’s internal reward system. Another reason for religions’ deep interest in this area is the intuition that only a self that has transcended emotional impulses could conceivably live beyond the body. A self that is bound up in bodily desires and emotional responses will surely die when the body that gave rise to them dies. A number of religious traditions that take this position also believe that the end point of spiritual development is the fusion of this transcendent self with the absolute (eg God). Of course, the great majority of the members of religions do not develop a higher self. Most do not adopt in full the practices prescribed by their religion, and few understand the practices and beliefs in the terms described here. Very few Christians develop the capacity to effortlessly turn the other cheek in the full sense of that metaphor. If the practices of spiritual development are to succeed in transforming the psychology of humanity in general, they will need to be enhanced and developed. This is most likely to be achieved if the practices are investigated by modern scientific psychology, and eventually integrated into it. If spiritual practices are subjected to the sceptical scrutiny and rigorous testing of modern science, the practices and beliefs that are grounded in fact could be separated from those that are embedded in supposition and baseless mysticism. And the powerful techniques and extensive resources of modern science could be used to discover new and better practices. This process would continue the progressive expansion of science into new domains that has taken place throughout its relatively young history. Science has grown by incorporating and developing bodies of knowledge that were initially unsystematic and riddled with contradictions and folk knowledge. The future Until we humans develop the capacity to free ourselves from our biological and cultural past, our evolutionary adaptability will be seriously constrained. We will not use the enormous potential of mental modelling to identify and implement the actions that will contribute most to the evolutionary success of humanity. Instead of using our technological advances and economic resources for evolutionary goals, we will continue to use them only to serve the needs and wants established by our evolutionary past and conditioning. Humanity will continue to spend its time on this planet masturbating stone age desires, going nowhere in evolutionary terms. Alternatively we could massively enhance our evolutionary adaptability by freeing ourselves from the dictates of our biological and cultural past. We could develop the ability to align our internal reward and motivation system with evolutionary goals. This would enable us to find satisfaction and motivation in whatever adaptations serve these goals. With this capacity we could choose to implement whatever actions would advance the evolutionary success of humanity, and would find satisfaction and motivation in doing so. This would enable us to use the immense power of mental modelling to pursue evolutionary goals, rather than continue to blindly pursue outdated and inaccurate proxies for evolutionary success as ends in themselves. If we make this transition, humans would become self-evolving beings, able to adapt in whatever directions are necessary for future evolutionary success, relatively unfettered by our biological past or by our previous life experiences. As we move out into the solar system, the galaxy and the universe, we would be able to change our adaptive goals and behaviour in whatever ways were demanded by the challenges we meet. We would be able to continually recreate ourselves, to change human nature at will, to repeatedly sacrifice what we are for what we can become, to continually die and be born again. ——————————————————————————- [1] For a more detailed discussion of the evolution of these mechanisms see Dennett, D. C. (1995), Darwin’s Dangerous Idea (New York: Simon and Schuster). [2] The evolutionary significance of mental modelling was first clearly recognised by Popper, K. R. (1972), Objective knowledge – an evolutionary approach (Oxford: Clarendon). [3] For a fuller discussion see Stewart, J. E. (2000), Evolution’s Arrow (Rivett: Chapman Press) [online at http://www4.tpg.com.au/users/jes999/ ]. [4] For more on the relationship between the new self and mental contents, see Nicol, M. (1980b), ‘The Four Bodies of man’, in Psychological Commentaries on the Teachings of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky (London: Watkins) 1, pp. 218-35. [5] This point is made very well by Keegan, R. (1994), In over our heads – the mental demands of modern life (Cambridge: Harvard University Press). [6] See Heylighen, F. (1991), ‘Cognitive Levels of Evolution: from pre-rational to meta-rational’, in The Cybernetics of Complex Systems – Self-organisation, Evolution and Social Change, F. Geyer Ed., (Salinas, California: Intersystems) pp.75-91. [7] For example, see Goleman, D. (1988), The meditative mind – the varieties of meditative experience (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons). [8] For more on self-observation see Nicol, M. (1980c), ‘Commentary on Self-Observation and ‘I’s’, in Psychological Commentaries on the Teachings of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky (London: Watkins) 1, pp. 302-17. [9] This notion is developed in greater detail in Stewart, J. E. (2001), ‘Future psychological evolution’, Dynamical Psychology [online at http://www.goertzel.org/dynapsyc/ ]. [10] For example, see the Katha Upanishad, Plato’s Phaedrus, and Gurdjieff’s Beelzebub’s tales to his Grandson. John Stewart is a member of the Evolution of Complexity and Cognition Research Group, the Free University of Brussels
by Milverton Wallace The new Corinthians: How the Web is socialising journalism Milverton Wallace The momentum of change is with the new Corinthians. The open source ethos and method of work/production, which began in the periphery with collaborative software development, is moving to centre stage by way of the blogging revolution and open standards in web services. In tagging, syndication, ranking and bookmarking we have the rudiments of a peer-to-peer trust, reputation and recommendation system well suited to self-regulating collaborative networks. James Cameron[1] (1911-1985), arguably the greatest British journalist of the last 100 years, always insisted that journalism is a craft. Now “craft” implies pride in work, integrity in dealing with customers, rites of passage, and long years of training to acquire the requisite skills/knowledge. But that was then. Today, journalism is a “profession”. Many aspiring hacks now need a university or other accredited “qualification”, and, except in the Anglo-American world, a government issued licence to “qualify” as a journalist. In some countries you’re compelled by regulations to belong to a recognised association and to obey its code of standards in order to practice and earn a living as a journalist. The march towards professionalism began with the rise of the mass media in the latter part of the 19th century, a development made possible by the invention of the rotary printing press, cheap papermaking from wood pulp, and mass literacy. Cheap mass circulation newspapers gave proprietors the kind of political influence they never had before. The press was becoming an increasingly powerful social force, a counter-balance to big business and the state. However, this power was fragile. Corporations and governments resisted the press’s self-appointed role of watchdog and muckraker. But the press barons fought back. In response to state and corporate resistance to openness and disclosure of information, they raised the banner of “the public’s right to know” as a fundamental democratic freedom. To counter charges of irresponsible reporting, journalists developed rigorous techniques for gathering, distilling and presenting information; and, to standardise these procedures and wrap them in an ethical framework, a normative model for reporting, carved in stone, was crafted: impartiality, objectivity, accuracy, transparency. Thus was Cameron’s craft gradually “professionalised”, and, in the process, turned into an exclusive club with a privileged membership. Today, this carefully constructed edifice is crumbling as the read/write web blows away the need to be a member of any such club to be able to practise journalism. Arguments about who is or isn’t a journalist is a sideshow, a pre-occupation mostly of self-styled guardians of truth. The inexorable fact is that the genie is out of the bottle and a significant number of “unqualified” people are “doing journalism” without permission from anyone. So, let us accept that the “authorities” can no longer decide who is or isn’t a journalist. We have no choice. But we need to ask some crucial questions: Who will now enforce the rules and codes? What is to become of them? Should we care? Do we still need them? Are they “fit for purpose” in the digital age? Digital media, and in particular, it’s social offsprings – social media such as blogs, vlogs, wikis, IM; social networks such as MySpace, Facebook, Bebo, Tagworld, Orkut etc., and social bookmarking services such as Furl, Del.icio.us, DIGG, StumbleUpon, MyWeb – have enabled the amateurisation of the media. The barbarians have entered the gates. Is the empire on the verge of collapse? Nowadays, the word “amateur” is being deployed by media professionals to belittle the media-making efforts of bloggers and others who create media productions outside the journalism guilds. Such reporting is deemed “unreliable”, “biased”, “subjective”; they are “unaccountable”, the facts and the sources “unverifiable”. All of this must be puzzling to historians of the modern mass media. Consider the first newspaper in English, a translation of a Dutch coranto, printed in Amsterdam in December 1620 and exported to England. It began with an apology, a typographical error, a number of lies and disinformation. The apology appeared in the first line of the publication: “The new tydings out of Italie are not yet com”. The error (in spelling) was in the date: “The 2. of Decemember”. The lies? The dates of many events were brought forward to make the news appear fresher than they were. The disinformation? Many news items in the Dutch edition which might have displeased the English government were not translated for the English edition out of fear that the authorities would seize or ban the publication.[2] Verily, a very unprofessional beginning! And who were the “reporters” for the early periodical press? Postmasters, clergymen, sheriffs, burghers, shipping clerks, court officials, merchants, travellers. In a word, “amateurs”! So now we’ve come full circle: from 17th /18th century amateurism, to 19th/20th century professionalism and back to amateurism in the 21st century. Here we use “amateur” in the noble, Corinthian sense – someone or an activity motivated by love. And therein lies the problem. Amateur ethics, motivated by love, crashes against professional ethics, driven by commercial gain. Can they be reconciled? The opposing principles characterising the amateur and professional worldviews may be summarised thus: Amateur Play for love Participation primary,winning secondary Play to develop team spirit,Cooperation, org skills Fair play, the game’s the thing Professional Play for pay Winning is everything Play only to win Zero sum game, win at all cost However, the differences between 17th century amateur reporters and 21st century citizen journalists go beyond stark polarities. The former were contributors to the new media of their age but over whose operation, growth and development they had no influence or control; their 21st century counterparts, on the other hand, are contributors to a new media which they themselves are creating. What started out as people’s desire for unfiltered, independent self-expression is threatening to overthrow the old order in the world of media. Howcome? The old media model was/is based on assembling disparate and varied information – news reports, share prices, weather reports, crosswords, classified ads, sports scores, horoscopes etc. and selling this ensemble to readers. Today that cornucopia is being unbundled: content is cut loose from the formal wrapper, messages from their media container. (Note the dire fate of newspaper classified ads, financial information, product reviews, real estate and job ads as they become Craiglisted and Monsterised). This unbundling has serious implications for the economic foundation of the media business as we’ve known it. For the journalists employed in these institutions, two critical changes, among many, stand out: their roles as gatekeepers between you and the world outside your window is irrevocably undermined and the line between themselves as producers of “tydings” and the former audience as consumers has become blurred. There’s a big misconception among professional journalists that the new media is about news. Wrong. It’s about self-expression, it’s about participating in defining and shaping the information/communication environments in which we live. The various forms of digital media – blogging, podcasting, social bookmarking and networking etc – are merely the means and the channels for achieving this. An entire generation – call them the digital natives or the new Corinthians – is creating an open, collaborative, networked communications infrastructure in opposition to the closed, top down, hierarchical traditional media organisations which have dominated the media universe since the 19t century. Demanding that these digital natives adhere to old methods of discovering and learning about the world won’t do. They’re crafting their own methods, thank you very much. Ten years ago Slashdot, Kuro5hin and others pioneered peer-to-peer coverage of technology. Stories gained credibility through the trust and reputation of peers. Digg has added collaborative filtering via powerful algorithms; Del.icio.us lets you organise the world via shared social taxonomies. Even some of the backend functions of the news business have been socialised: Wikipedia for reference, Answers.com for expert sources, Flickr for pictures. All these new ways of understanding, making and managing media are only a specific case of the mass participatory culture made possible by digital technology. All of a sudden, unprecedented numbers of people can express themselves and connect with each other on a global scale. And here’s a salient feature of this mass participation: it’s organised activity without a central organisation. More precisely, it’s a self-organised collaborative endeavour in which people combine their ideas, knowledge, talents, skills without an hierarchy controlling and co-ordinating their activities. Confronted by a disruptive technology, process or service, the disrupted party has only a limited number of responses: they can ignore it – not a viable choice for survival; they can try to destroy it – this is the “kill the messenger” option which may destroy the messenger (e.g. Napster) but fail to kill the message (i.e. file sharing); they can posit competitive offerings – but note the fate of newspaper “facsimile editions” versus RSS; or they can co-opt or embrace the new – note media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s “Damascene conversion” and his subsequent moves in the digital media space.[3] It is hard for a mature, long-dominant culture to make radical changes to its ideology and practice. And that’s why many newspaper groups still cling to the command and control model even as their businesses head for the butchers4 and their customers “head into the cemetery”[5]. Bold and adventurous though he is, Rupert Murdoch has only chosen co-optation (buying the number one social networking service MySpace); however, full embrace of the new world is a revolutionary step, a rupture in the old order. Anyone doubting the difficulty of such a move need only look at the upheavals and dislocations being experienced by the UK’s Telegraph Groups as it re-engineers it news gathering/reporting processes towards a networked journalism model. The momentum of change is with the new Corinthians. The open source ethos and method of work/production, which began in the periphery with collaborative software development, is moving to centre stage by way of the blogging revolution and open standards in web services. In tagging, syndication, ranking and bookmarking we have the rudiments of a peer-to-peer trust, reputation and recommendation system well suited to self-regulating collaborative networks[6]. These could be taken as analogous, but not identical to, the “checks and balances” of traditional journalism, but we shouldn’t belabour the points of difference too much. In mainstream media “editorial authority” is concentrated in the hands of a single, all-powerful person whereas in social media it is distributed among many voices. This could be seen as a weakness and critics point to it as the Achilles heel of Web journalism. Yet in many instances, the networked world, e.g. the blogosphere, has proven to be much better (and quicker) at correcting errors, falsity, lies and distortions than the mainstream media. As the number of people who participate in open, collaborative, networked communications increases, the veracity of messages will improve and the need for corporate gatekeepers and standards-setters will decrease. Will we all become Corinthians then? [copyright 2006 Milverton Wallace] Notes 1) See http://tinyurl.com/ykdalv 2) Mitchell Stephens, A History of News. Wadsworth Publishing. 1996. 3) “Speech by Rupert Murdoch to the American Society of Newspaper Editors”(http://www.newscorp.com/news/news_247.html) 4) Vin Crosbie, “A Date with the Butcher” (http://tinyurl.com/ljjh3) 5) “Buffett: Newspapers are ‘a business in permanent decline’ “(http://tinyurl.com/ycx4a5) 6) Tim O’Reilly, “The Architecture of Participation”(http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/3017)
by Rutger Rienks, Anton Nijholt, Paulo Barthelmess Introduction Meetings are often inefficient. Starting with probably the first meeting ever held by humans, people have looked at techniques and protocols to enhance them. The development of technology to support meetings has therefore long been a subject of research. Meetings can nowadays be assisted by a wide variety of tools and technologies, facilitating interaction, saving money and time, and creating opportunities that would not be possible without technology. The foremost benefit of technology so far is its support for meetings in which participants are distributed. Being able to attend meetings remotely results in substantial savings of time and money that might have been otherwise spent on travel. Tele-conferencing systems augmented with additional advanced services such as instant messaging, file transfer and application sharing are becoming more and more prevalent. In the near future meetings will be possible in virtual worlds where participants will be represented by virtual humans. There is also evidence that technology-enabled processes can positively impact meeting performance. Studies reported by De Vreede et al. and Nunamaker Jr. et al.show a significant reduction in labor cost and overall project duration when Group Support Systems (GSS), or Electronic Meeting Systems (EMS) are used. These systems support alternative, technology-enabled meeting processes that can help participants with the formulation of and search for solutions to ‘problems’ listed on the agenda. A participant generally has a computer terminal connected to a central server at his or her disposal through which several problem resolution tools are available. Typical tools are an electronic brainstorming tool, an idea organizer, a topic commenter and a voting support tool. Despite the huge savings and proven increased efficiency brought about by GSS and similar technology, its adoption has proven sometimes problematic. There are instances in which the use of these systems has been discontinued due to stakeholders’ objections to the (radical) changes in work practices that are introduced by them. This leads us to investigate alternative means for positively influencing meeting outcomes in ways that would encounter less resistance. In particular, we want to investigate how pro-active meeting assistants can be exploited to reap the benefits of technology-enabled meetings instead of being exposed to its drawbacks. Successful automated meeting assistants can potentially integrate themselves into their surrounding social environment, offering support that blends more seamlessly into users’ work practices. Technology in the field of meeting support ranges from completely passive objects like microphones to pro-active autonomous actors such as virtual meeting participants. In earlier work we defined several dimensions that can be distinguished in this spectrum, with the major ones being the reasoning ability, the acting ability and the sensing ability. In this paper we will focus on pro-active meeting assistants that are able to act autonomously. Pro-active meeting assistants are those that (preferably in real-time) support the participants and act autonomously in the process either before, during, or after a meeting. For this type of assistants, its operating dimensions are highly dependent on their functionality. This functionality or sophistication directly depends on the state of the art of automatic collection of appropriate meeting information (the sensing) as well as on the required intelligence to use it (its reasoning ability) and the means through which the assistant can influence a meeting (its acting ability). To aid in this process, so-called ‘smart’ meeting rooms appeared. These smart rooms embed all sorts of sensors, providing data about the meeting and hence create the opportunity to collect and learn from this data in order to build models. These models may in turn provide insights into interactions and their contents. The first project presenting ideas to augment meetings with various ‘smart’ technologies was probably Project Nick. This project discussed the incorporation of screens displaying both the agenda and live meeting statistics to aid the meeting process. From that point onward smart meeting rooms appeared at several institutionswhere large meeting corpora were recorded. In the last four to five years there has been a surge in interest in meeting support. Many large projects were established, including consortia with partners from all over the globe, working on meeting collection, and research on meeting models and support technology [IM2 Website, CALO Website, Nectar Website]. The remainder of this paper will elaborate on the concept of pro-active meeting assistants, in particular software agents that aim to assist the meeting process and thereby facilitate more effective and efficient meetings. As there are a lot of ideas but hardly any implemented systems yet, we will, apart from looking at the existing ideas, show how to get from ideas to a full requirements specification. We also present a Wizard of Oz experiment where we simulate several forms of pro-active meeting assistants designed to streamline the meeting process. Meeting Assistants Meeting assistants have been the topic of research in various projects, e.g., the Neem Project. In Neem, a basic premise is that assistance has to be provided along multiple dimensions, including the organizational, but also the social and informational. A good meeting is one in which organizational goals are achieved, but not at the expense of the social well-being of a group. Support in Neem revolves around tools and virtual participants, both of which are designed to explore aspects along the organizational, social and informational dimensions. Tools are artifacts that crystallize certain aspects of an interaction, allowing for participants to become aware of and be able to influence these aspects. (e.g. by being able to manipulate items of discussion within an agenda tool.) Virtual participants are anthropomorphic assistants. They are designed to have consistent personalities and well-determined roles. Kwaku is a virtual participant that takes care of the organizational aspects of a meeting. Kwaku for instance reacts to discussions that extend over the pre-allocated period of time by reminding participants that they might want to move on to the next agenda item. Kwaku “listens” to the reaction of the group (by examining transcribed speech and text message channels) and will either update the agenda tool, moving it to the next agenda item in case of agreement, or leaving it in the current item if its perception is that the suggestion was overruled by the group. Kwabena on the other hand is a social facilitator. Kwabena looks after the participants’ social well-being, monitoring the actions a group would want to undertake at each point in time, such as take a break, switch topics, change the level of detail, or pace of the interaction. These wishes are expressed via a ‘Moodbar’ tool that displays a set of possible actions that participants can select by clicking on corresponding buttons. A mechanism is provided to poll the input from the different participants. Kwabena takes the initiative to suggest the course of action (e.g. taking a break) expressed by the group. (e.g. by voicing the suggestion via all participants’ audio systems.) Conversely, if a particular participant is expressing wishes that disagree with the rest of the group, Kwabena communicates in private with this participant, letting him or her know that the rest of the group seems to think differently. Finally, Kweisi is responsible for providing the group with additional information. This can happen upon request of one or more participants, but also autonomously, as Kweisi perceives (again by analyzing the content of the speech and typed messages) that a certain topic is under discussion for which additional documents are available. All these assistants can be realized as embodied pervasive software systems that operate alone or in groups, interact with the users and with other participants, and learn user preferences. Neem illustrates an approach to assistance during the meeting. We will now frame ongoing research in the domain of meeting assistants by making a division into assistants that support activities that take place before, during as well as after the meeting. […] Some findings and results To verify whether meeting assisting agents can benefit the meeting process we compared the predefined given agendas with the actual agendas of the meetings of the various systems. The results averaged for the two groups are shown in figure b. It appears that when no system is used at all, the meetings lasted on average 57% longer than what had actually been planned. With System 3 we reached an optimum, shortening the meeting by 27%. Although chairmen might have improved their planning capabilities in the meantime, they were not informed about any of the results. When we look at the participants’ ratings of degree of intrusiveness versus efficiency, figure (d)) shows that the added intrusiveness of System 3 pays off in terms of meeting efficiency. Notable is the fact that the perceived efficiency appears to be in-line with the actual efficiency. System 3 also resulted in a slight disturbance increase, whereas its ”enjoyability” is rated much lower than Systems 1 and 2 (See c).After every session the chairmen were asked again to give their opinion about the disturbance and efficiency for both the voice as well as the screen feedback strategies. It appeared that in contrast to the pre-meeting questionnaire results, they now rated them equally for efficiency. Voice messages were still found more intrusive than the text messages, though. An interesting side result was that when the system uses voiced feedback, the participants of the meeting appeared to be much more aware of their own behavior. When they tended to go off topic for example they corrected themselves very quickly, sometimes saying: “off-topic” before continuing with the current item on the agenda. This is probably due to the fact that the system can speak directly to specific participants; participants would therefore try to prevent being corrected by the system.After getting used to a system with voice output, participants did notice and use the information, but did not interrupt their talking. It should be noted that although the above findings speak in favor of a system that assists the meeting process, a lot of additional research is required, for instance by examining a larger number of groups over a longer period of time. Some results of the Wizard of Oz experiment Conclusion We have shown that there is potential for ambient intelligent systems that aid the meeting process. We have discussed a wide variety of possible applications and application areas. A concrete example of how requirements for a conflict management meeting assistant can be developed has been given. We have shown that the results of an experiment utilizing multiple system paradigms of varying degree of intrusiveness; the experiments employed a Wizard of Oz technique. The results show that meeting efficiency can be improved with respect to a baseline in which no meeting assistants are employed. You can download the full document click here