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Club of Amsterdam Journal, February 2018, Issue 202
Content Does Passion Ignite Perception by Mara Lemanis The Library of Congress The Future Now Show: Social Banking with Christian Heyner World’s biggest ‘smart city’ to rise in Philippines News about the Future:This is how money grows from trees / UNICEF Sudan Humanitarian Situation Report, December 2017 How Nanotechnology Will Bring The End of Scarcity by James Burke Recommended Book:Dawn of the New Everything: A Journey Through Virtual Reality by Jaron Lanier Common Sense – helping kids thrive in a world of media and technology Futurist Portrait: Bertalan Meskó Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show: Social Banking with Christian Heyner It is a strange and unfortunate fact of life that many things people in the developed world pay little for cost substantially more in the developing world. One of these is banking, often costly in the developing world while in much of the developed world banks now offer you money to encourage you to open a charges-free account. Meanwhile, the once highly praised micro-credit systems are now charging loan shark interest rates in some poor countries. This is the story of a new attempt to change all that by creating a global low-cost banking service cleverly designed to be accessible to the poorest. And you can play a part. – Paul Holister Felix F Bopp, Founder & Chairman Does Passion Ignite Perception by Mara Lemanis So many of us have grown up with and then outgrown the division between passion and reason. But early imprinting still urges us to demote one or the other as we set out on our personal course or career, convictions intact. Hamlet’s cry: “Give me that man that is not passion’s slave, and I will wear him in my heart’s core,” is a great motto for many. Conversely, in The Mirror and the Lamp, the great critic M.H. Abrams refers to a quote from the 18th c. playwright John Dennis: “The more passion there is, the better the Poetry.” But I admit to having read poems where passion peaks into barbaric yawps. We’ve been flooded by many therapeutic formulas both to quiet raging passions and skim top-heavy doses of intellection. One of these, especially trendy in today’s culture, is “Mindfulness,” which some objective heads deride as “McMindfulness” — a marketing tool. In fact the mindfulness technique has proved effective at reducing anxiety and stress in many people, deprogramming harmful emotions and addictive passions. It’s an approach that works. Apparently it’s also a program that has become a commodity. To Be or Not To Be Mindful We know it too as a concept birthed through Buddhism. Its original aim was meant to generate unbiased perception of actual events in the world, understanding of one’s own involvement in those events, and compassionate reaction toward all participants, especially those suffering adversity. It underscored exercising compassion for those on opposite ends to one’s own perceptions. But as practiced in the west mindfulness often glosses over the original Buddhist emphasis on compassion, which welcomes foreign and contrary viewpoints that challenge our personal perceptions. Yet following the western model, it can’t be denied that when we’re less depressed or anxious, or less obsessed, we’re prone to make more room for the anxieties and woes of others. I think it’s worth reflecting on how compassion swells into passion. Compassion absorbs sympathy for another person’s sensibility and pain and grows into a strong desire to stop the pain. At that point it transforms into empathy; so it makes sense that strong desire equates with passion. But this is not the common measure. Compulsion or Passion? Clinical psychologists distinguish between compulsive passion and voluntary passion. Clearly compulsions are not under one’s control, whereas voluntary passions are engaged in freely. One of the most valuable insights of Buddhism is how it alerts us to awareness of things in relation to each other, evolving into an awareness of their relative value – prodding us to remember (Smriti) that whatever emotion we experience exists in relation to a mosaic of feelings with either benevolent or noxious outcomes. In remembering, one rises past present-centered, non-judgmental mindfulness toward insights keenly retained. Often this catalyzes a call to ethical action. In the west mindfulness strives to dispose of prejudices, to foster awareness of the moment – the self present in the moment. But retention and remembering can also stir our attention toward sensory experience. Which doesn’t mean that the sensation we have retained necessarily craves after something. Instead it embraces the experience (anubhavah) of our being in the world, often inspired through the medium of art – music, dance, drama, poetry – and leads us to self-knowledge. Because this knowledge can come as a sudden insight, its culmination can be enlightenment, self-revelation, even rapture. Insights Inviting Ecstasy What elation, for instance, when we evoke the memories of perfumes that suffused our senses as we strolled in a garden full of lilacs, freesias, or honeysuckle, or tread through a forest, inhaling the fragrance of pine. And though the moment of exhilaration is transitory, it unites the self with the natural world. It boosts consciousness. Mindful memory enables us to freely recall the feeling of blissful attention evoked by strands of music, images in particular paintings, glints of wit and vision released by certain poems and texts. Or the euphoric scent of intimacy when we make love in contrast to the tang of physical contact when we have sex. Embracing one’s awakened being expresses itself too in the continuous pleasure of work we perform at the peak of our abilities and give to others. In all these ways mindfulness morphs into self-actualization. The character of self-actualized people is autonomous. They don’t cater to societal approval; they seek fulfillment in purposes beyond themselves. Such people detail many instances of “peak experiences” kindred to a sense of ecstasy and oneness with the universe, sustained within a strong, calm, centered self. Probably the most dramatic kind of mindfulness beyond ego, involving millions of people, is witnessed in social reform. This is well-documented in the passionate self-sacrifice of persons like Gandhi; Martin Luther King; the civil rights worker Viola Liuzzo, a white woman relentlessly struggling against segregation before she was felled by a gunman. Their biographies are clear accounts of empathy with those made wretched by injustice and detail their passionate efforts to kindle mankind’s humanity. The passion for reform among such people can’t be reduced to ego drives. They consider themselves as a vehicle to rouse others who are more concerned with personal acquisition, or, for that matter, personal liberation. Critical Thinking From the Buddha Here is where the standardized objective of Buddhism – nirvana, which translates to no/not craving – branches off from liberation for oneself (with the rationale that what you do for yourself automatically contributes to others) and grows into the pursuit of liberation for all humanity. And here again, it is persons like Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, born into the caste of untouchables, who launched human rights campaigns for India’s oppressed and later converted to Buddhism; A.T. Ariyaratne, a high school teacher who helmed a grassroots movement to upgrade agriculture, education, and health that was enacted throughout 15 thousand villages in Sri Lanka; and Buddhadasa Bhikku, who initiated “engaged Buddhism” in Thailand, motivating Theravada monks to do actual work in their communities instead of solely cultivating meditative mastery. Many of these adherents have become “Development Monks” in Thailand and Cambodia. They engage in physical as well as spiritual development to reforest and recultivate the environment and foster economic growth without destroying the countryside. All these movements inspired mindfulness not just beyond ego and passionate avowal but beyond the formal creeds of Buddhism. It was Gautama Buddha himself who warned against accepting his own teachings without first studying, thinking, observing, and investigating before deciding what is true. He strongly advocated freedom of thought and freedom of inquiry. And he invited criticism. Not negation of thought or rationality. Gautama’s attitude highlights the kind of mindfulness in which attentive thoughts are followed by actions that bear fruit. These percepts rise to a flame of passion that does not burn out but ignites the sense of what it means to bear loving kindness for the world and its people. Mara Lemanis has been a teacher and scholar of literature and film at Stanford and Yale; her essays have been selected for 20th CENTURY LITERARY CRITICISM and are included in undergraduate student textbooks in the U.S. She has worked as an archivist for Historical Preservation with particular interest in the study of Oglala Sioux sites at Pine Ridge and Wounded Knee. Her recent work has been with the IRC to assist refugees in Oakland, California. Her father, Osvalds J. Lemanis, was an internationally renowned Latvian choreographer (The Royal Order of Vasa – Gustav V). The Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the de facto national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. The Library of Congress claims to be the largest library in the world. Its “collections are universal, not limited by subject, format, or national boundary, and include research materials from all parts of the world and in more than 450 languages. The Library has kept the “American Memory” name for its public domain website, which today contains 15 million digital objects, comprising over 7 petabytes. American Memory is a source for public domain image resources, as well as audio, video, and archived Web content. The Future Now Show 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. Shape the future now, where near-future impact counts and visions and strategies for preferred futures start. 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. The Future Now Show February 2018 Social Banking withChristian Heyner It is a strange and unfortunate fact of life that many things people in the developed world pay little for cost substantially more in the developing world. One of these is banking, often costly in the developing world while in much of the developed world banks now offer you money to encourage you to open a charges-free account. Meanwhile, the once highly praised micro-credit systems are now charging loan shark interest rates in some poor countries. This is the story of a new attempt to change all that by creating a global low-cost banking service cleverly designed to be accessible to the poorest. And you can play a part. – Paul Holister The Future Now Show Credits Christian Heyner, President of the board at 1bank4all Gründungsverein www.1bank4all.net Paul Holister, Editor, Summary Text Credits Katie Aquino, aka “Miss Metaverse”, Futurista™, USA The Future Now Show and join the dialogue in ourLinkedIn Group: The Future Now Show World’s biggest ‘smart city’ to rise in Philippines Philippines FUTURE BIGGEST PROJECTS 2018-2030 “You will see the mega projects that will change the philippines. Philippines passed form a poor country to a emerging country in less than a generation. Manila is now very modern and is full of skyscrapers,malls and other modern things. The skyline of Manila is one of the best in the world. The philippines is a place to travel and visit. The 3 mega projects that will change the country are :the manila mega subway, the Eco friendly city and the city of pearl. One day, Phlippines will be developed . In 2030, the country will be a middle income country. The city of pearl will be the biggest smart city on earth and the manila mega subway will be the biggest infrastructure project of the country.” BBC HardTalk On The Road in the Philippines News about the Future This is how money grows from trees BioCarbon Engineering is featured in a ground-breaking report from World Resources Institute and The Nature Conservancy. As we encounter constraints in the planet’s resources, pressure is growing to find new ways to enhance productivity and recover lost natural assets. Land restoration offers a path forward. Companies that develop profitable and scalable business models for restoration have the potential to grow substantially. UNICEF Sudan Humanitarian Situation Report, December 2017 In addition to the response to the protracted humanitarian situation, caused by armed conflict, floods and epidemics, UNICEF responded in 2017 mainly to three new emergencies related to the high rates of malnutrition in newly accessible areas, the Acute Watery Diarrhoea outbreak and the high influx of South Sudanese refugees. Also, the year marked a huge step forward in protecting children from violations in armed conflict by implementing the Action Plan signed between UN and the government. In numbers2,300,000 children in need4,800,000 people# of people who need Humanitarian Assistance (Source: Sudan Humanitarian Needs Overview 2017) 1,100,000 children2,300,000 people# of internally displaced people (Source: Sudan Humanitarian Needs Overview 2017) 126,987 children192,404 people# of South Sudanese refugees since January 2017 (Source: ’Sudan: Refugees from South Sudan as of 15 December 2017’ reported by UNHCR. Around 66% of South Sudanese refugees are children) How Nanotechnology Will Bring The End of Scarcity by James Burke Recommended Book Dawn of the New Everything: A Journey Through Virtual Realityby Jaron Lanier Jaron Lanier, ‘the father of Virtual Reality … a high-tech genius’ (Sunday Times), tells the extraordinary story of how in just over three decades Virtual Reality went from being a dream to a reality – and how its power to turn dreams into realities will transform us and our world. Virtual Reality has long been one of the dominant clichés of science fiction. Now Virtual Reality is a reality: those big headsets that make people look ridiculous, even while radiating startled delight; the place where war veterans overcome PTSD, surgeries are trialled, aircraft and cities are designed. But VR is far more interesting than any single technology, however spectacular. It is, in fact, the most effective device ever invented for researching what a human being actually is – and how we think and feel. More than thirty years ago, legendary computer scientist, visionary and artist Jaron Lanier pioneered its invention. Here, in what is likely to be one of the most unusual books you ever read, he blends scientific investigation, philosophical thought experiment and his memoir of a life lived at the centre of digital innovation to explain what VR really is: the science of comprehensive illusion; the extension of the intimate magic of earliest childhood into adulthood; a hint of what life would be like without any limits. As Lanier shows, we are standing on the threshold of an entirely new realm of human creativity, expression, communication and experience. While we can use VR to test our relationship with reality, it will test us in return, for how we choose to use it will reveal who we truly are. Welcome to a mind-expanding, life-enhancing, world-changing adventure. Common Sense – helping kids thrive in a world of media and technology Common Sense is the leading independent nonprofit organization dedicated to helping kids thrive in a world of media and technology. We empower parents, teachers, and policymakers by providing unbiased information, trusted advice, and innovative tools to help them harness the power of media and technology as a positive force in all kids’ lives. Media and technology are at the very center of all our lives today — especially our children’s. Kids today spend over 50 hours of screen time every week. The media content they consume and create has a profound impact on their social, emotional, cognitive, and physical development. Learning how to use media and technology wisely is an essential skill for life and learning in the 21st century. But parents, teachers, and policymakers struggle to keep up with the rapidly changing digital world in which our children live and learn. Now more than ever, they need a trusted guide to help them navigate a world where change is the only constant. Futurist Portrait: Bertalan Meskó Dr. Bertalan Meskó MD, PhD. – The Medical Futurist, Private Professor at Semmelweis University, keynote speaker, author, visionary. A geek physician with a PhD in genomics and Amazon Top 100 author, he envisions the impact of digital health technologies on the future of healthcare, and helps patients, doctors, government regulators and companies make it a reality. The mission of The Medical Futurist Institute is to initiate public discussions about how the old paradigm of the paternalistic model of medicine is transforming into an equal level partnership between patients and professionals and how it is aided and augmented by disruptive technologies. By providing reports, publications and daily commentary on new technological innovations, the Institute aims at preparing every stakeholder of healthcare for adopting digital health in a way that the human component remains decisive. Under the term “digital health”, advanced medical technologies, disruptive innovations and digital communication have gradually become inseparable from providing the best practice healthcare. While the cost of treating chronic conditions is increasing and doctor shortages are imminent worldwide, the needed transformation in the structure of healthcare and medicine fails to catch up with the rapid progress of the medical technology industry. This transition is slowed down by strict regulations; the reluctance of stakeholders in healthcare to change; and ignoring the importance of cultural changes and the human factor in an increasingly technological world. With access and adoption of technology getting higher, the risk of patients primarily turning to an accessible, but unregulated technological solution for their health problem is likely to increase. We need to acknowledge the ongoing cultural transformation and include digital health in the practice of medicine. Grand Challenges Embrace disruptive medical technologiesMedical professionals and patients must prepare for a technological revolution in medicine – the only way to make healthcare effective and more humanistic. Put patients in the center of healthcarePatients must become experts on their own health so they can be involved in decisions about their health, while also taking part in designing healthcare Digitize Healthcare InformationDigitalization can make care affordable and available, ensuring sustainability and growing our understanding of disease. Shift focus from treatment to preventionLive healthier lives and prevent disease by reforming healthcare based on widespread access to health data. Technology and the Future of Medicine printable version
Club of Amsterdam Journal, March 2018, Issue 203
T Content How to make smart cities human again by Nick Malleson & Alison Heppenstall China’s Demography Challenge by Miraç Yazici The Future Now Show:Wearable technology for breast cancer patients with Victor Portes hosted by Miss Metaverse Powering Businesses with Space Data News about the Future: Engineers create plants that glow / Atlas of Sustainable Development Goals 2017 Holo Recommended Book:The Silent Intelligence – The Internet of Things by Daniel Kellmereit, Daniel Obodovski The Still Small Voice in the Eye of Contradiction by Mara Lemanis Futurist Portrait: Nancy Giordano Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show: Wearable technology for breast cancer patients with Victor Portes hosted by Miss MetaverseBreast Cancer has a massive impact on a woman’s physical, psychological, social-cultural economical well-being. This extends to their families and in some cases, to entire communities. Continuous research and development of materials and technologies include wearable technology, artificial intelligence, 3D scanning and 3D printing solutions forthe purpose of realizing external customized breast prosthesesthat provide comfort, functionality and their personal lifestyle. Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman How to make smart cities human again By Nick Malleson, Associate Professor of Geographical Information Systems, University of Leeds & Alison Heppenstall, Professor in Geocomputation, University of Leeds Huge quantities of networked sensors have appeared in cities across the world in recent years. These include cameras and sensors that count the number of passers by, devices to sense air quality, traffic flow detectors, and even bee hive monitors. There are also large amounts of information about how people use cities on social media services such as Twitter and foursquare. Citizens are even making their own sensors – often using smart phones – to monitor their environment and share the information with others; for example, crowd-sourced noise pollution maps are becoming popular. All this information can be used by city leaders to create policies, with the aim of making cities “smarter” and more sustainable. But these data only tell half the story. While sensors can provide a rich picture of the physical city, they don’t tell us much about the social city: how people move around and use the spaces, what they think about their cities, why they prefer some areas over others, and so on. For instance, while sensors can collect data from travel cards to measure how many people travel into a city every day, they cannot reveal the purpose of their trip, or their experience of the city. With a better understanding of both social and physical data, researchers could begin to answer tough questions about why some communities end up segregated, how areas become deprived, and where traffic congestion is likely to occur.Difficult questions Determining how and why such patterns will emerge is extremely difficult. Traffic congestion happens as a result of personal decisions about how to get from A to B, based on factors such as your stage of life, your distance from the workplace, school or shops, your level of income, your knowledge of the roads and so on. Congestion can build locally at pinch points, placing certain sections of the city’s transport networks under severe strain. This can lead to high levels of air pollution, which in turn has a severe impact on the health of the population. For city leaders, the big question is, which actions – imposing congestion charges, pedestrianising areas or improving local infrastructure – would lead to the biggest improvements in both congestion, and public health. The irony is, although modern technology has the power to collect vast amounts of data, it doesn’t always provide the means to analyse it. This means that scientists don’t have the tools they need to understand how different factors influence the way cities function and grow. Here, the technique of agent-based modelling could come to the rescue. The simulated city Agent-based modelling is a type of computer simulation, which models the behaviour of individual people as they move around and interact inside a virtual world. An agent-based model of a city could include virtual commuters, pedestrians, taxi drivers, shoppers and so on. Each of these individuals has their own characteristics and “rules”, programmed by researchers, based on theories and data about how people behave. After combining vast urban datasets with an agent-based model of people, scientists will have the capacity to tweak and re-run the model, until they detect the phenomena they’re wanting to study – whether it’s traffic jams or social segregation. When they eventually get the model right, they’ll be able to look back on the characteristics and rules of their virtual citizens, to better understand why some of these problems emerge, and hopefully begin to find ways to resolve them. For example, scientists might use urban data in an agent-based model to better understand the characteristics of the people who contribute to traffic jams – where they have come from, why they are travelling, what other modes of transport they might be willing to take. From there, they might be able to identify some effective ways of encouraging people to take different routes or modes of transport. Seeing the future Also, if the model works well in the present time, then it might be able to produce short-term forecasts. This would allow scientists to develop ways of reacting to changes in cities, in real time. Using live urban data to simulate the city in real-time could help to inform the managers of key services during periods of major disruption, such as severe weather, infrastructure failure or evacuation. Using real-time data adds another layer of complexity. But fortunately, other scientific disciplines have also been making advances in this area. Over decades, the field of meteorology has developed cutting-edge mathematical methods, which allow their weather and climate models to respond to new weather data, as they arise in real time. There’s a lot more work to be done before these methods from meteorology can be adapted to work for agent-based models of cities. But if they’re successful, these advancements will allow scientists to build city simulations which are driven by people – and not just the data they produce. China’s Demography Challenge by Miraç Yazici, Intern at Copenhagen Institute for Futures Studies, Nevsehir, Turkey China is the most populous country in the World, at least for now. India and China are expected to have nearly a population of 1.44 billion each, by 2024, according to UNPD forecasts. By the 1970s, China was facing food and housing shortages and in 1979, decided to limit couples to have only one child and sustained this rule until 2016. Adopting one-child policy created drastic demographic imbalances between old and young population, also between men and women that it could take decades to return to normal. Less babies and more singles As a result of 35 years of the one-child policy, the country has an exceptionally low fertility rate with the sex ratio at birth for every 100 girls to 114 in 2015 according to national statistics. On the other hand, China’s singles population is increasing, it has reached 200 million. The proportion of single men and women within the whole population increased from 6 percent in 1990 to 14.6 percent in 2013. In 2015, It is projected that there won’t be enough brides for almost a fifth of males born today in China, by 2035. Over time, an increase in the number of single people can lead to an aging population and a decrease in the birth rate. In 10-20 years, China might face with a decreasing number of working-age people and the problem of maintaining pensions and pension insurance will arise according to Zhang Ning, an economics expert at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Two-child policy: First Outcomes China has changed its rules to allow all families to have two children in 2016, after 35 years of one-child policy rule. The new policy is widely regarded as a countermeasure to cope with low fertility rates and the country’s rapidly aging population, but it is highly uncertain whether it will, in fact, positively affect China’s fertility rate. In 2016, there was an increase of newborns more than 2 million compared with 2015. But those figures fell short of what policy makers expected. The one-child years left social scars: Many couples aren’t convinced that two children are better than one child. New Approaches for the challenge There is an extraordinary approach practising to increase fertility rate in China. Communist Youth League organises blind date matchmaking activities across China to help young people find the right partner. What’s more, other government bodies such as labor unions and women’s federations also plays cupid in China. Encouraging fertility has become common in many sectors of Chinese society. For instance, many television stations are making efforts to create a climate of respect for families and fertility, as illustrated by television programs on CCTV’s annual Spring Festival Gala. The Future Now Show 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. Shape the future now, where near-future impact counts and visions and strategies for preferred futures start. 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. The Future Now Show Wearable technology for breast cancer patients withVictor Porteshosted byMiss Metaverse Breast Cancer has a massive impact on a woman’s physical, psychological, social-cultural economical well-being. This extends to their families and in some cases, to entire communities. Continuous research and development of materials and technologies include wearable technology, artificial intelligence, 3D scanning and 3D printing solutions forthe purpose of realizing external customized breast prosthesesthat provide comfort, functionality and their personal lifestyle. The Future Now Show Credits Victor Portes, Chairman at STICHTING FIGURA NOVA FOUNDATION, the Netherlandswww.figuranova.foundation Katie Aquino, aka “Miss Metaverse”, Futurista™, USAwww.facebook.com/missmetaverse The Future Now Show Powering Businesses with Space Data The European economy is powered by space, so you might already be considering how to use it in your business. At ESA Business Applications we’ve been driving change across the world for years, and our network continues to grow. We want you to be a part of that. We have invested an average of half a million euros in more than 500 businesses across Europe, supporting them in leveraging space in commercial ventures. And it goes way beyond the money. We’ll set you up with a dedicated consultant, access to our global network of experts, investors and incubators, a collection of space resources and a mark of credibility that’ll propel your business well beyond its launch. What will you build with the combined resources of space at your fingertips? Find out about our Industry 4.0 and High Value Manufacturing Kick-Start Activities:https://business.esa.int/funding/invitation-to-tender/industry-40 Find out more about our funding schemes here: https://business.esa.int/funding-schemes https://business.esa.int/funding-schemes News about the Future Engineers create plants that glow Imagine that instead of switching on a lamp when it gets dark, you could read by the light of a glowing plant on your desk. MIT engineers have taken a critical first step toward making that vision a reality. By embedding specialized nanoparticles into the leaves of a watercress plant, they induced the plants to give off dim light for nearly four hours. They believe that, with further optimization, such plants will one day be bright enough to illuminate a workspace. “The vision is to make a plant that will function as a desk lamp — a lamp that you don’t have to plug in. The light is ultimately powered by the energy metabolism of the plant itself,” says Michael Strano, the Carbon P. Dubbs Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT and the senior author of the study. Atlas of Sustainable Development Goals 2017: From World Development Indicators With over 150 maps and data visualizations, the new publication discusses measurement issues, and charts the progress societies are making towards the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Holo We are a community of passionate humans building a distributed cloud, owned and run by users like you and me. Holo provides a way to unleash the enormous idle capacity in everyone’s computers. This gives us the power to build vibrant cloud hosting communities that will challenge how the Internet monopolies control our data and our interactions. Holo offers each of us the ability to participate by sharing, earning, and building the future of the web. When the gift you wish to share with the world is a decentralized mode of measuring the subtlest streams of value; river, rain, and tidepool metaphors begin to take on more meaning. Eric Harris-Braun, Fernanda Ibarra, and Art Brock’s intuitions about distributed computing and (r)evolutionary human collaboration became a rich floodplain, gathering together techno-culture enthusiasts, activists, media theorists, healers, next economy geeks, artists, and leading thinkers in collective intelligence. Some were in the business of manifesting social entrepreneurship. Others were pursuing their crafts. A few were furthering their studies. Each effort was a steady flow, chipping away the same myth, layered in centuries of thick sediment: humans function best when responding to a central authority-from-above, whether in governments, schools, businesses, or in our increasingly networked digital lives. A year before the financial crisis of 2008 and the subsequent rise of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency projects, many of the Holo team began dreaming, together as part of the MetaCurrency Project, or separately, driving deep explorations in work and life, of new modes of coordinating and new tools to increase our capacity to affect and be affected by one another. In 2018 we proudly break the levee, bringing to bear a concerted groundswell from our robust team of communicators, programmers, strategists, and artists. The Holo project was created to bring the benefits of distributed apps to anyone with a web browser. Casting light on the abyssal zones of our computational culture, we aim to redistribute the wealth and health made possible by our mounting interconnectivity. Recommended Book The Silent Intelligence – The Internet of Thingsby Daniel Kellmereit, Daniel Obodovski The Silent Intelligence is a book about the Internet of Things. We talk about the history, trends, technology ecosystem and future of Connected Cities, Connected Homes, Connected Health and Connected Cars. We also discuss the most exciting growth areas for entrepreneurs and venture capital investors. We share exciting stories and unique opinions of more than 30 industry veterans, experts and visionaries from Google, Ericsson, AT&T, Qualcomm, SAP, MIT, Jawbone and many others. We called this book The Silent Intelligence because most of the activity and growth in the space so far has been outside of mainstream visibility. Our aim is to help executives, entrepreneurs, investors and everybody who is interested in this topic, better understand the opportunities and challenges of the Internet of Things. We also hope that the new growth opportunities discussed in this book will be as exciting to you as they are to us. The World In 2050 The Real Future Of Earth by Mara Lemanis Though The Law of Excluded Middle claims that two distinct states can’t co-exist in the same time and space, in fact our minds often do battle with a state of cognitive dissonance. If one is striving for little more than the acquisition of power, one’s mind will find a fairly straightforward path toward cognitive consistency. But when cultures seek an accord between each individual’s inner meanings and the social midst through which those meanings ripen, mankind needs supple skills to map a steady path. This is no different from how we all wend our way through life. Like people walking between tall hedges in a maze, we tread in the eye of contradictions. In a famous quote F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.” It isn’t really a matter of holding ideas like galloping horses, sweating to rein them in so they don’t fling the rider into a ditch. If we are aware we know, and if unaware we feel the push and pull of polar opposites. To confront this duality means to come up against the age-old divisions: between reason and emotion;between individual and community;between material and spiritual;between life and death. Except those times when we’re particularly stressed or under siege from painful trials, these oppositions don’t cause strife. We typically acknowledge them through irony-“I’m proud of my humility”…or, “As I’m a saint I see the devil in your heart.” More simply put, we incorporate the polarities. Attempting to prevent disputes and enmities, cultures seek to collaborate. Yet despite its goodwill motives, each community encounters contradictions-between advocacy and self-defense; prowess and deficiency; business zest and public dearth. The mind can be trained to hold most attitudes in harmony. “I love how you boost me” vs. “I hate how you hype me”; “I’m proud of my money” vs. “I’m ashamed of what I do for it” are oppositions susceptible of binding together to streamline goals and focus. Finding cognitive consistency is a normative act. It takes a balancing act-accommodation — to neutralize the force in each polarity. But the best and brightest functions of our brain can turn oppositions into unities. If this sounds like a dialectical turn, it is still not Hegelian. Yet a synthesis is created. That synthesis is less a climax than a fusion, and it is a fusion that heals. Because whatever we believe to be responsible for fulfilling this valued equilibrium, the impact revitalizes. We may believe it is a series of biological moments-neural firings and integration — or we may believe it is a spiritual gift, an intercession beyond clinical analysis. Regardless, it works. It only seems to betray us at times of deep emotional turmoil or a catastrophic event that thrusts us out of our reliable orbit. The sudden imminence of death is such an event. It can overwhelm us. Though we float in the eye of the life-death spectrum, at once absorbing both survival and extinction, the alarming demise of someone close — a sudden forecast of our own end — throws us way off course. We may be hurled so far that it will take some wandering — maybe the balm of therapy and even medication, a suspension of regular activity — before we’re able to return. But when we do return, we come back redeemed by that which integrated us again and made us whole. We can call it a chemical-biological rescue, or we can say our spirit intervened; that God breathed into us. In the final analysis even if we contend that our neurons found a way to reassemble and point out the quick of our path again, a spiritual impulse, like a law of fusion, could be stamped into those neurons. It’s not impossible to state that they have always been and always are inspired. The art in our personal balance and the stability of our culture is to stop the tortuous stumbling away from our core path and let our minds re-mind us we must stop obsessing over one polarity or the other-cease fixating on death but no less on life. In admitting the contradiction and letting our neural grid act as our spiritual guide, we are able to submit and reconcile ourselves. When we keep the contradiction constant, we keep duality at bay. Opposing forces cannot tear or break us. We are not at the mercy of emotional storms. And through that constant within ourselves and our extended community we can once more be joined, at one, made whole. Futurist Portrait: Nancy Giordano Nancy (Patierno) GiordanoStrategic Futurist + Gatherer + Speaker Strategic Futurist | Corporate Strategist | Event Catalyst | Keynote SpeakerDescribed as endlessly optimistic, Nancy is a strategic futurist with a drive to help enterprise organizations and visionary leaders transform to meet the escalating expectations ahead. Recognized as one of the world’s top female futurists, she has spent her career building, shaping and evolving a portfolio of $50 billion worth of major global brands with her unique abilities to sense and synthesize the shifts ahead and to guide those ready to build more relevant and sustainable solutions for us all. With an early career at several of the most influential ad agencies in NY, Chicago, and LA, Nancy has spent the past 10 years as Founder/CEO of Play Big Inc, a strategic inspiration company, applying her broad understanding of the intense cultural and technological shifts we’re facing. Her extensive knowledge of the drivers shaping our future (and driving business) have guided transformation projects with The Coca Cola Company, Brinker International, Sprint, Nestle, Acumen, Energizer, Mercedes Benz and many other Fortune 500 companies. And through keynote talks to CXO leaders in wide range of industries including entertainment, travel, food, business, homebuilding, culture/talent and more. Diving more deeply into the intersections of tech, business and society, she recently worked to frame the internal culture and talent infrastructure for a provocative artificial intelligence company and currently is producing Gigaom Change, a Leader’s Summit diving into the seven most disruptive technologies for enterprise. She has been ranked as one of the World’s Top Female Futurists (research by Ross Dawson) and was voted 7th Woman of Influence on the Future of Leadership list (Women Speakers Association). She was the first global TEDx licensee and currently leads a youth-led team to produce one of the globe’s largest TEDx events for teens, hosting nearly 1000 annually. Nancy’s distinctive ability to design meaningful, future-forward solutions and pathways is honed by her active collaboration with idea-centric organizations such as TED, The World Future Society, REX, Voice & Exit, and the newly forming Global Synthesis Network. She partners with (and learns from) many of the most provocative influencers currently building our collective futures — whom she describes as PYNKrs: people you need to know. Nancy lives in Austin with three fast growing, very curly teens and her ideas can be found on her blog Cultural Acupuncture, often featured on The Huffington Post. printable version
Club of Amsterdam Journal, April 2018, Issue 204
Content 7 success factors to empowering rural women through ICTs Truth in the Time of Chaos by Jordan Peterson The Future Now Show Foresight Future of the Sea News about the Future: Drawdown / Laying Down the Groundwork for a Knowledge-Led Society: Policy and Practice How a New World-view will emerge from Industry 4.0 by Mark Timberlake Recommended Book: Living Well Now and in the Future: Why Sustainability Matters by Ellen Metzger and Randall Curren The World In 2050 The Real Future Of Earth – BBC Futurist Portrait: Jean-Christophe Bonis Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman 7 success factors to empowering rural women through ICTs By FAO – Food and Agricultar Organisation of the United Nations FAO is an intergovernmental organization present in over 130 countries. The Organization is comprised of 194 Member States, two associate members and one member organization – The European Union. Using technology to transform livesInformation and Communications Technologies (ICTs) improve the lives of smallholder farmers in many ways, from monitoring crops to tracking market prices. While women play a fundamental role in agricultural production, they tend to have less access to ICTs, leaving them and their families at a disadvantage. ©FAOThe digital revolution has changed the way we work, access information and connect with each other. It offers opportunities to those who can use the new technologies, but also presents new challenges for those who are left behind.Often referred to collectively as Information and Communications Technologies or ICTs, these technologies are any method of electronically sharing or storing data: telephones, mobile broadband, the internet, broadcasting, sensor networks, data storage and analytics, and more. ICTs improve the lives of small farmers in a myriad of ways, from monitoring crops to tracking market prices and from spreading good practices to facilitating access to banking services. The list goes on.Yet much of this potential remains untapped, particularly in the case of women, who play a fundamental role in agricultural production but also face a triple divide: digital, rural and gender. They often tend to have less access to ICTs, leaving them and their families at a disadvantage. Here are seven critical factors for success when making ICTs available and accessible to rural communities, especially women. 1. Adapt content so that it is meaningful for them.While ICTs can deliver large amounts of information, this does not imply effective use of it. Adaptation of content to local needs, languages and contexts often remains a challenge. Hence, content should be adapted to local languages and repackaged to suit formats that meet the different information needs. 2. Create a safe environment for them to share and learn.Illiteracy, and limited skills in using complex devices to search for information and cultural issues, remain barriers to effectively receiving and using information delivered via ICTs. For example, illiterate and older farmers often have less developed digital skills, and are therefore generally less likely to adopt ICTs.Digital literacy in rural institutions and communities should be developed and enhanced, taking into consideration local needs and constraints by providing appropriate learning opportunities for men, women, youth and people with disabilities, which will enhance individual and collective decision-making skills.Social norms, lack of connectivity and poverty are some of the reasons that rural women have less access to ICTs. Digital inclusion policies should take gender into account to enable men and women to access ICTs equally. 3. Be gender sensitive.Gender inequalities remain a serious issue in the digital economy, as does the gap between urban and rural populations. Access and opportunities for women, youth, older farmers and people living in the most remote areas is hindered by the price of access to ICTs, and by persistent inequalities.Many of the factors that constrain male farmers in adopting more sustainable and productive practices restrict women to an even greater extent. Specific gender barriers further limit women farmers’ capacity to innovate and become more productive. Gender, youth and diversity should be systematically addressed in the planning phase of project design and during the whole project cycle. 4. Provide them with access and tools for sharing.Rural women have less access to ICTs – the phones, the laptops, the Wi-Fi – because they are confronted with social norms, because they are living in unconnected areas, and because they are usually poor. The price of access to ICTs can be very high in some countries. Pricing of broadband or mobile services is a significant barrier for most vulnerable groups, such as women, youth, older farmers and people living in the most remote areas. Digital inclusion policies with gender perspectives should be promoted to enable men and women to access and use ICTs equally. 5. Build partnerships.Small, local private companies, local producer organizations and community-based non-governmental organizations (NGOs) often have the social capital to provide trusted information and good quality services. Diverse advisory and extension services offered by different types of providers are more likely to meet the various needs of farmers, as there is no single type of service that can fit all circumstances.Gender inequalities remain a serious issue in the digital economy, as does the gap between urban and rural populations. Identifying the right mix of technologies and strategies that are gender-sensitive and suited to local needs is critical to increasing farm efficiency and revenues. 6. Provide the right blend of technologiesIdentifying the right mix of technologies that are suited to local needs and contexts is often a challenge, in spite of – or because of – the rapid increase in mobile telephone penetration in rural areas. Blended approaches, such as a combination of radio and telephone, and locally relevant technologies selected on the basis of in-depth analysis of local needs and existing information systems, should be adopted to increase the efficiency of initiatives for ICT in agriculture, and better serve different users and contexts. 7. Ensure sustainability.The digital divide is not only concerned with technological infrastructure and connectivity. It is critical that ICT initiatives target both women and men, as well as the larger family unit and the community to ensure long-term sustainability. An inclusive approach to ICT initiatives will help to generate widespread recognition that it is important for women to be able to use ICTs.ICTs offer valuable opportunities for agricultural and rural development, increasing sustainable output, farm and agribusiness efficiency and revenues for a wide range of players. Access of women to information and education can also increase acceptance for sending both daughters and sons to school, which will have a greater impact, and increase the chances of reducing poverty and achieving a world without hunger. Truth in the Time of Chaos Jordan Bernt Peterson (born June 12, 1962) is a Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology at the University of Toronto. His main areas of study are in abnormal, social, and personality psychology, with a particular interest in the psychology of religious and ideological belief, and the assessment and improvement of personality and performance Psychologist and professor Jordan Peterson has come to fame, or notoriety depending on your perspective, over the last year. But many of those attracted to his attacks on political correctness are saying that he is one of the world’s most significant thinkers – why? Rebel Wisdom investigates a man who is redefining spiritual and religious thought for the internet generation. Jordan Peterson: Truth in the Time of Chaos The Future Now Show 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. Shape the future now, where near-future impact counts and visions and strategies for preferred futures start. 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. The Future Now Show Foresight Future of the Sea A Report from the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, UK Government Office for Science This report considers the role that science and technology can play in understanding and providing solutions to the long-term issues affecting the sea. It outlines a number of recommendations to help the UK utilise its current expertise and technological strengths to foster trade links, build marine capacity across the world and collaborate to tackle climate change. The sea covers 70% of the world’s surface and is essential to regulating global temperature, water, and oxygen and carbon dioxide levels. Technological advances are creating new opportunities to understand the sea, its resources and the effects of climate change.We carried out a Foresight project to consider the role that science and technology can play in understanding and providing solutions to the long-term issues affecting the sea. The project worked with policy-makers to identify the most important future trends, challenges and opportunities for the UK from the sea.It focused on the following areas:resources and economic potential of the seaenvironmental issuesgovernance of the sea download the Report News about the Future Drawdown Project Drawdown is the most comprehensive plan ever proposed to reverse global warming. Our organization did not make or devise the plan — we found the plan because it already exists. We gathered a qualified and diverse group of researchers from around the world to identify, research, and model the 100 most substantive, existing solutions to address climate change. What was uncovered is a path forward that can roll back global warming within thirty years. It shows that humanity has the means at hand. Nothing new needs to be invented. The solutions are in place and in action. Our work is to accelerate the knowledge and growth of what is possible. We chose the name Drawdown because if we do not name the goal, we are unlikely to achieve it.Drawdown is based on meticulous research that maps, measures, models, and describes the most substantive solutions to global warming that already exist. It is the most important goal for humanity to undertake. Laying Down the Groundwork for a Knowledge-Led Society: Policy and PracticeWhite paper by AIMS / Robert Bosch Stiftung Africa is a continent with a growing consumer base, entrepreneurial ambition and homegrown innovation. With more than 314 active technology hubs in 93 cities in 42 countries in Africa, entrepreneurs on the continent are innovating in every sector from education and health to agriculture and energy, be it products or services. How a New World-view will emerge from Industry 4.0 by Mark TimberlakeAnalytics | BI | Digital | Mobile Applications | IoT | Senior Project Manager, Sydney, Australia Are we on the cusp of a new World-view or global employment tsunami? Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, and other recent tech innovations are forecast to impact up to 50% of Global employment. And this time it could be different from previous Industrial revolutions. If Artificial Intelligence and Robotics displace humans on a mass scale then the human in human society becomes marginalised; this could be the legacy that we leave to the future. Industry 4.0 In recent years there have been major advances in several technology areas that collectively have been labelled Industry 4.0. Industry 4.0 will have an impact in two ways that will affect us all; employment, and information privacy and security. Through this article, I hope to raise awareness of the impact of Industry 4.0, and how serious it will be.Industry 4.0 will have a Dramatic Global Impact on Employment Robotics, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), Augmented Reality (AR), Analytics, and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) are some of the Industry 4.0 technologies. These technologies are at an advanced stage of understanding and development. It has become clear that these technologies can be combined and applied to a wide range of industrial, commercial and social applications. What has also become clear is that, over the next few years, the large scale application of these technologies will have a significant global impact upon employment, economies, and society. In the next section, I suggest that the global impacts upon employment, global pollution, and climate change share a common set of underlying causes; these causes include the nature of technological developments, and some ‘structural’ issues in our society. I will try to outline some reasons as to why I feel that the impact of Industry 4.0 should be carefully considered.Structural Issues in Our Society Will Accelerate the Impact of Industry 4.0 Scientific, technological and industrial developments have frequently involved side-effects, and trade-offs that have had global scale impacts on our environment and society; for example, plastics, power stations and the internal combustion engine have had the side effects of global pollution, and climate change. The prevailing paradigm in our society is based on exploitation: – Scientific, technological and industrial developments involve side-effects, and trade-offs that have had global scale impacts on our environment and society. – Regardless, both Industry and Governments have incorporated these innovations in short-sighted policy decisions, and short-sighted commercial gain. – Responses to issues have been reactive, not proactively managed. And typically the issues have been dumped on governments frequently unable to deal with them. There have been published views that Industry 4.0 technologies applied on a global scale could have non-linear flow on effects upon other industries, economic sectors, and countries. Governments, Industry and societies seem dangerously focused on the short term. We have not approached the management of our society in a long term holistic way. What are the effects on society when significant, multi- industry scale disruptions are unfolding, and with potentially non-linear cascading effects on other industrial and economic systems? And for industries dominated by siloed, reductionist thinking, those disruptions will have amplified effect. I would like to weaken the automatic nexus between new technology innovations and solutions to global problems which were largely the result of technology side-effects and trade-off. I see that nexus as a concern in the case of Industry 4.0 If we pause for a moment to reflect on these issues we open ourselves to new understanding and new possibilities. In the next section I suggest that our future direction may be found in new transcendent levels of awareness of our society and its issues. How Integral Theory Opens a New Perspective on Our Future Developments in Integral Theory present a framework for the development of human consciousness, society, and civilisation. Within the context of Integral Theory is the idea of the emergent evolution of consciousness and culture. Civilisations develop from one world-view to a more expanded world-view, in concert with the evolution of human consciousness. So for example, the Mythical world gave way to an expanded level of human consciousness and the ‘Age of Reason’. Each transition was driven by an evolution of our consciousness that enlarged our understanding of society, its structures, limitations, power relations, and issues. These transitions are irreversible; there is no possibility of returning to the mythical world-view. The transitions involve a paradigm shift. Now emerging, there is a new transcendent level of understanding that recognizes that the tools of the current world-view will not resolve the issues of the day. Historically, social progress at scale has been driven by new perspectives and values that underpinned a totally new world-view. Scholars have recognized (since early last century) that this shift in the evolution in our consciousness has been developing for some time. The sources of many of today’s issues can be found in the amoral nature of scientific and technological developments, and industry; and the frequent adverse impacts of these developments to our environment, to employment, to our society at large. Science and technology have no moral or social consciousness drivers. Developments in science and technology are greatly influenced by ego, competitive pressures, and a simplistic belief in progress. Many scientific ‘advances’ involve side-effects, or trade-offs (typically mass scale impacts on other people); they are not absolute advances, but often shift the problem around: ‘solving’ one issue by creating another. Further, science and technology are instruments that are easily and routinely incorporated into abuses of power (social, economic, political). The suggestion that AI could help solve complex global problems ignores history, and does not address the fundamental causes. First, it suffers from the fallacy that scientific, technological and industrial developments constitute absolute progress that can be applied to the issues of the day; we have serious global unemployment and environmental problems because of technology innovations that have been unleashed on a global scale. Second, the fundamental causes of our issues today are structural problems in our society. So, Integral Theory suggests that we should recognize the structural issues in our society, and look for solutions in new perspectives and values, a totally new transcendent world-view. We need to be more reflective about the issues in society. If technology is being applied on a mass scale regardless of side-effects, and involves trade-offs then we need to rethink. You might still wonder just how relevant this is to the impact of AI and Robotics on jobs. Well, I believe that the collapse of the Soviet Union and the downfall of the Berlin Wall are examples of the social progress at scale I mentioned. In these two situations, there appeared to be a mass alignment of people and their Collective Consciousness; the old paradigms were swept away. The Future of Humanity Institute has just published the Asilomar A.I. Principles; 23 guiding principles for the development of Artificial Intelligence. This could develop into a proactive form of global governance relating to AI and Robotics which is what I suggest in the conclusion of this article. And it could be another expression of our shift in global consciousness. In the title of this article I suggest that a new world-view will emerge out of Industry 4.0; either because the shift in our consciousness to a new level becomes global soon, or because of a global reaction to mass job loss accelerates that change. Industry 4.0 will impact Information Privacy and Security There are moves to provide ‘open’ access to customer data stored by banks. Banks hold a significant amount of confidential information about their customers. When a customer applies for a home loan, or insurance, from a bank, they are NOT offering open access to their confidential details. Whether banks voluntarily offer, or a forced by legislation, providing open access to customer data is an abuse of power, facilitated by the ease with which technological possibility can be appropriated for that purpose. That abuse of power over customer data cascades further, for example: the risk of fraud rises, and the risk of data being stolen increases, and so, the associated risk and cost are transferred to the customer; and since, more customer data is openly available, more of it is assumed to be available BY DEFAULT to Digital Identity, Digital Wallets, Digital Profiles, Digital Attestation ‘services’, IoT devices that can identify you and retrieve your open customer details. And because of this default availability, individuals are increasingly imposed upon to ‘opt-out’; however, over time the option to opt-out is gradually removed by either legislation, or because it becomes wide-spread practise. Some European countries are already considering moves to a cashless society; there will be no opt-out option. The US Company Oculus VR has already claimed the right to your biometric data that its devices can capture. How Industry 4.0 will Impact Global Employment The incorporation of technology in the abuse of economic power has delivered a global mass scale loss of jobs. The global loss of jobs will likely accelerate, because, for example, when a factory retrenches its workforce due to, say, automation, it has a negative effect on the surrounding economy, and suppliers to that factory. The spread of Industry 4.0 will likely accelerate global mass scale job loss; not only will people lose their jobs, but those jobs will simply disappear. So, it is irrelevant where the factory is located because Robotic Process Automation, IoT, Digital Transformation and all other technology innovations that constitute Industry 4.0 will vapourize jobs as we know them. This is not about education, or retraining redundant workers; the jobs simply will not be there. Of course, there will be specialist jobs, but even many of these will disappear as technology innovation encroaches into each and every field of human endeavour. The transitions of economies from agriculture to manufacturing to services to high technology has influenced economies to expand, employment has increased in absolute terms. In the move from agriculture to manufacturing there is an increase in the number of jobs. Why? Because Manufacturing requires human capabilities not used in agriculture, such as; planning, design, forecasting, and other specialist skills. That is, latent human capability was activated and made economically valuable and productive. But, is that trend guaranteed? With the advent of Industry 4.0, is it clear where people may have a role? It is not clear what role for people if Robots can perform manufacturing, and process tasks, and AI can answer the phone, perform design activities, solve problems, predict, and make inferences, etc. The set of human activities that only humans can perform is shrinking. With the previous economic transitions the full range of human capabilities were engaged in an economically productive way. This time with Industry 4.0, technology innovations are acquiring those economically useful capabilities to the extent that the human role is uncertain. If people have a future role, it will likely be highly specialised, advanced analytical, or creative. But, that is not going to guarantee employment for the majority, at all. AI and Robotics will replace Humans In the case of Augmented Reality (AR) headsets deployment, the maturity of this technology, leading to human replacement, might evolve through four stages: The first level might provide or display detailed, step by step instructions in the AR headset. The second stage provides confirmation; for example, the visual display in your AR headset shows readings that confirm success of the task. The third stage generates analytics; for example, showing the last time maintenance was performed and what the results were. The fourth stage then would be to build the AR headset capability into a robot. Low skilled jobs are the easier to displace since they have a lower creative element, involve lower decision making, and a lesser degree of analytical processing. Substantial cost efficiency can be achieved through mass scale jobs displacement. Low skilled process jobs are especially easy targets for replacement by Robotics. The displacement path for white collar workers is more difficult because of the degree of skill specialisation, the high degree of decision making, and the high level of analytical processing involved. The likely first stage would involve partial automation of their job by implementing Robotic Process Automation (RPA) aimed at automating the routine components of their job. This is happening now, but it requires a non-trivial amount of analysis to identify, specify and encode the relevant business logic, workflow, decision / escalation points, etc.; and this must be repeated for each job type.How Significant is the Impact on Global Employment A recent article contained a forecast that by 2020 more than 3 million truck drivers in the US will be displaced by self drive vehicles. The US Robotics Industries Association (RIA) estimates that more than 265,000 robotics installations are currently deployed at factories across the US. China and Japan have considerably more robotics deployments. Studies at The Centre for Business and Economic Research at Ball State University suggested that between 2000 and 2010, 5.6 million manufacturing jobs were lost, where 85 percent of these losses were due to technology developments. Currently, robots have replaced approximately 10 percent of manufacturing jobs, and this could rise to 25 percent by 2025. Japan also has the worlds first ‘Autonomous Corporation’, that is, it operates with no operational personnel. To be clear, these are deliberate human replacing initiatives. In a recent report, the World Economic Forum predicted that robotic automation will yield a net loss of more than 5 million jobs across 15 developed nations by 2020 which is considered a conservative estimate. And the International Labour Organization estimates that as many as 137 million jobs across Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam are at risk of replacement by robots. This represents approximately 56% of the total workforce of these countries. That displacement could happen quickly and before affected governments wake up to what is happening. There will be no noticeable impact until some critical level of jobs displacement has been reached; that is, due to a lag effect governments probably will not notice for some time. The impact on those countries will not be immediately felt in Europe or the US, and may not even be noticed until regional chaos becomes a global issue. Again, because there will be a lag before any effect is noticeable, no one will probably notice, especially governments. So, there will be a significant global impact because of the fragmented geographic / economic sector nature of this jobs displacement, the lag effect before any noticeable impact, and assuming that governments have no proactive governance framework in place. All countries will be affected by jobs displacement due to process automation and robotics, and that impact will be significant. Our Future Lies in a New World-View As a society we need to understand Industry 4.0 and its impact on employment, and how society and economies are going to function when the number of people with jobs is a small minority of the population. I feel that our issues today are structural; we need to embrace a new transcendent level of awareness of our society, new values and perspectives; and not just blindly roll-out the red carpet for Industry 4.0 Possibly one thing that is missing is a ‘Social Responsibility Contract’ which takes into account the total cost to society (for example, the cost of unemployment that governments typically have to carry) that results from the adoption of technology enabled practices. New forms and levels of local and global governance may help to facilitate proactive management of developments in our global community. New global perspectives and values that enable us to rise above environmental and social exploitation are desperately needed. AI, Robotics and the other Industry 4.0 technologies must be subject to Global Governance. The significant potential of these technologies individually and in combination demands that they be considered within the human context of their development, deployment, use, side-effects, trade-offs, scenarios of misuse, appropriation in abuses of power, and proscribed paths of development and application. The world is already struggling with the well understood issues of global governance of Climate Change and Nuclear weapons. To me it is clear that, under the current paradigm, we do not have the maturity to develop global governance of Industry 4.0 technologies which is genuine and unconstrained by trade-offs and political deals, and which gives primacy to considerations of human benefits without side-effects and trade-offs. Our record with most important developments does not suggest serious in-depth reflection at a holistic level, in which we recognize all interdependent relations, the relativeness of benefits, the delayed nature of adverse findings, and the risk of overlooking fundamental subjective assumptions behind decisions and paths taken. The dominant mode of thinking today embodies simplistic notions of scientific / technological progress; it is reductionist and siloed. This mode of thinking has stripped away the complexities and subtlety of holistic thinking in favour of absolutes; and so, it fosters the numerous uncritical evangelical praises of AI, Robotics and Industry 4.0. We all know of the Pied Piper of Hamelin; even sweet music can have a sinister intent. Coda A recently published essay attempted to expose the lie behind automation, technology, and efficiency drives. The author mentioned the naked contingency of the lives of low paid workers subject to ever increasing demands by business for consolidation and efficiency; that contingency manifest, for example, in personal budgets, and childcare. The author continued his theme by taking up the toilet paper dispenser that restricts the amount of paper that can be retrieved to the extent that actual utility is compromised; justified by the ruse of ‘saving the trees’, but in truth, an expression of cost efficiency and contempt. There seems to be a Human / Technology Ledger: new increments of technology are added to other layers of technology to improve on anti-human objectives such as efficiency; however, on the opposite side of the ledger, for each increment of technology added there is a subtle debasement of human values. So in the example of low paid workers, social responsibility, and human nurturing are degraded; with the second example, social consciousness is eroded. I welcome your comments on this important topic Recommended Book Living Well Now and in the Future: Why Sustainability Mattersby Ellen Metzger and Randall Curren Most people acknowledge the profound importance of sustainability, but few can define it. We are ethically bound to live sustainably for the sake of future generations, but what does that mean? In this book Randall Curren, a philosopher, and Ellen Metzger, a scientist, clarify normative aspects of sustainability. Combining their perspectives, they propose that sustainability can be understood as the art of living well together without diminishing opportunity to live well in the future. Curren and Metzger lay out the nature and value of sustainability, survey the problems, catalog the obstacles, and identify the kind of efforts needed to overcome them. They formulate an ethic of sustainability with lessons for government, organizations, and individuals, and illustrate key ideas with three case studies. Curren and Metzger put intergenerational justice at the heart of sustainability; discuss the need for fair (as opposed to coercive) terms of cooperation to create norms, institutions, and practices conducive to sustainability; formulate a framework for a fundamental ethic of sustainability derived from core components of common morality; and emphasize the importance of sustainability education. The three illustrative case studies focus on the management of energy, water, and food systems, examining the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, Australia’s National Water Management System, and patterns of food production in the Mekong region of Southeast Asia. The World In 2050 The Real Future Of Earth Full BBC Documentary 2018 Futurist Portrait: Jean-Christophe Bonis The future is the basis of his career, yet he is never without his trusty backpack as he travels across the globe. With a passion for innovation and technology, Jean-Christophe is an adventurer of modern times. Lecturer, writer, nomad, blogger, coach, eternal hunter of innovative projects, tireless traveler… Jean-Christophe is a confirmed expert who travels the world, pitching his tent and advocating a new world focused on user experience. An expert in new technologies, he worked for more than 15 years on behalf of investment funds and then as a consultant. He has devoted his professional life to analyzing the consequences new technologies have had on consumer behavior and strategic implications in organizations. Founder and President of Oxymore Inc., he is also deeply engaged in the international startup ecosystem. A true futurist, he is totally committed to his clients through the prism of user experience and brand values. Whether it is for the creation of new products, customer relationship, digitization of businesses or the anticipation of new technological breakthroughs, his unrivalled vision supports the teams involved throughout the various business sectors. Jean-Christophe also provides coaching for executive leaders, advising major companies and startups in France and abroad. Acting as a mentor in Europe, Russia and Asia, he also is involved in several business-incubator and booster programs. A real showman, his lectures will blow your mind and beliefs and broaden your outlook. Get ready for a real tornado! The future of humans in a digital world InSIGHT: Future Talk with Alexander Mankowsky printable version
Club of Amsterdam Journal, June 2018, Issue 206
Content From drone swarms to tree batteries, new tech is revolutionising ecology and conservation by Euan Ritchie and Blake Allan Yanny or Laurel The Future Now Show: Global Economy with Peter R Luik hosted by Miss Metaverse Energy Predictions – What Is The Future Of Energy? News about the Future: Digital Weeding / An electronic rescue dog Oudebosch eco-cabins at Kogelberg Nature Reserve Recommended Book: The New Human Rights Movement: Reinventing the Economy to End Oppression by Peter Joseph What Plants Talk About Futurist Portrait: Alexander Mankowsky Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal.The Future Now Show: Global Economy with Peter R Luiks hosted by Miss Metaverse“The Future Now Show gets a personal opinion about the global economy; where it’s at, what’s coming next, but much more – you can’t talk about the global economy without including geopolitics, from what drives Russia and China, to immigration and the refugee crisis. Peter Luiks makes clear from the start that he is not one for political correctness, so strap yourself in.” – Paul Holister Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman From drone swarms to tree batteries, new tech is revolutionising ecology and conservation By Euan Ritchie, Associate Professor in Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life & Environmental Sciences, Deakin University, Australia and Blake Allan, Deakin University Understanding Earth’s species and ecosystems is a monumentally challenging scientific pursuit. But with the planet in the grip of its sixth mass extinction event, it has never been a more pressing priority. To unlock nature’s secrets, ecologists turn to a variety of scientific instruments and tools. Sometimes we even repurpose household items, with eyebrow-raising results – whether it’s using a tea strainer to house ants, or tackling botfly larvae with a well-aimed dab of nail polish. But there are many more high-tech options becoming available for studying the natural world. In fact, ecology is on the cusp of a revolution, with new and emerging technologies opening up new possibilities for insights into nature and applications for conserving biodiversity. Our study, published in the journal Ecosphere, tracks the progress of this technological development. Here we highlight a few examples of these exciting advances. Tiny tracking sensors Electronically recording the movement of animals was first made possible by VHF radio telemetry in the 1960s. Since then even more species, especially long-distance migratory animals such as caribou, shearwaters and sea turtles, have been tracked with the help of GPS and other satellite data. But our understanding of what affects animals’ movement and other behaviours, such as hunting, is being advanced further still by the use of “bio-logging” – equipping the animals themselves with miniature sensors. Many types of miniature sensors have now been developed, including accelerometers, gyroscopes, magnetometers, micro cameras, and barometers. Together, these devices make it possible to track animals’ movements with unprecedented precision. We can also now measure the “physiological cost” of behaviours – that is, whether an animal is working particularly hard to reach a destination, or within a particular location, to capture and consume its prey. Taken further, placing animal movement paths within spatially accurate 3D-rendered (computer-generated) environments will allow ecologists to examine how individuals respond to each other and their surroundings. These devices could also help us determine whether animals are changing their behaviour in response to threats such as invasive species or habitat modification. In turn, this could tell us what conservation measures might work best. Autonomous vehicles Remotely piloted vehicles, including drones, are now a common feature of our skies, land, and water. Beyond their more typical recreational uses, ecologists are deploying autonomous vehicles to measure environments, observe species, and assess changes through time, all with a degree of detail that was never previously possible. Coupling autonomous vehicles with sensors (such as thermal imaging) now makes it easier to observe rare, hidden or nocturnal species. It also potentially allows us to catch poachers red-handed, which could help to protect animals like rhinoceros, elephants and pangolins. 3D printing Despite 3D printing having been pioneered in the 1980s, we are only now beginning to realise the potential uses for ecological research. For instance, it can be used to make cheap, lightweight tracking devices that can be fitted onto animals. Or it can be used to create complex and accurate models of plants, animals or other organisms, for use in behavioural studies. Bio-batteries Keeping electronic equipment running in the field can be a challenge. Conventional batteries have limited life spans, and can contain toxic chemicals. Solar power can help with some of these problems, but not in dimly lit areas, such as deep in the heart of rainforests. “Bio-batteries” may help to overcome this challenge. They convert naturally occurring sources of chemical energy, such as starch, into electricity using enzymes. “Plugging-in” to trees may allow sensors and other field equipment to be powered cheaply for a long time in places without sun or access to mains electricity. Combining technologies All of the technologies described above sit on a continuum from previous (now largely mainstream) technological solutions, to new and innovative ones now being trialled. Illustrative timeline of new technologies in ecology and environmental science. Source and further details at DOI: 10.1002/ecs2.2163. Euan Ritchie Imagine research stations fitted with remote cameras and acoustic recorders equipped with low-power computers for image and animal call recognition, powered by trees via bio-batteries. These devices could use low-power, long-range telemetry both to communicate with each other in a network, potentially tracking animal movement from one location to the next, and to transmit information to a central location. Swarms of drones working together could then be deployed to map the landscape and collect data from a central location wirelessly, without landing. The drones could then land in a location with an internet connection and transfer data into cloud-based storage, accessible from anywhere in the world. Visualisation of a future smart research environment, integrating multiple ecological technologies. The red lines indicate data transfer via the Internet of things (IoT), in which multiple technologies are communicating with one another. The gray lines indicate more traditional data transfer. Broken lines indicate data transferred over long distances. (1) Bio-batteries; (2) The Internet of things (IoT); (3) Swarm theory; (4) Long-range low-power telemetry; (5) Solar power; (6) Low-power computer; (7) Data transfer via satellite; and (8) Bioinformatics. Source and further details at DOI: 10.1002/ecs2.2163. Euan Ritchie These advancements will not only generatemore accurate research data, but should also minimise the disturbance to species and ecosystems in the process. Not only will this minimise the stress to animals and the inadvertent spread of diseases, but it should also provide a more “natural” picture of how plants, animals and other organisms interact. Read more: ‘Epic Duck Challenge’ shows drones can outdo people at surveying wildlife Realising the techno-ecological revolution will require better collaboration across disciplines and industries. Ecologists should ideally also be exposed to relevant technology-based training (such as engineering or IT) and industry placements early in their careers. Several initiatives, such as Wildlabs, the Conservation Technology Working Group and TechnEcology, are already addressing these needs. But we are only just at the start of what’s ultimately possible. Yanny or Laurel “Yanny or Laurel” is an auditory illusion that became popular in May 2018. In the brief audio recording, 53% of over 500,000 people answered on a Twitter poll that they heard a man saying the word “Laurel”, while 47% reported hearing a voice saying the name “Yanny”. MIT grad students explain why some people hear “Yanny” and others hear “Laurel” in the audio clip that’s taken the world by storm. 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. The Future Now Show June 2018 Global Economy withPeter R. Luiks hosted byMiss Metaverse “The Future Now Show gets a personal opinion about the global economy; where it’s at, what’s coming next, but much more – you can’t talk about the global economy without including geopolitics, from what drives Russia and China, to immigration and the refugee crisis. Peter Luiks makes clear from the start that he is not one for political correctness, so strap yourself in.” – Paul Holister The Future Now Showfeatures The Future Now Show Energy Predictions – What Is The Future Of Energy? Innovate UK We’ve all heard of green energy, but what about smart energy? Thanks to new innovations, the future is looking brighter than ever. The energy system of the future won’t look like today’s. The scale of change over the next 10 to 20 years will be considerable. The main focus will be on local, low-carbon energy. Thanks to the continuing rise of renewable energy like wind and solar power, the old economies of scale are being turned upside down so that generating and using energy locally will represent better value than the old system of generating energy at scale in relatively few, centralised, power plants. Here are some of our predictions for the future of energy.Decentralised energy and digital technologies One of the major benefits of decentralised energy is the move away from inefficient large power stations to localised production, so that energy won’t have to travel so far. Getting major energy users on board The move to new, greener production and consumption of energy will only be successful if major consumers are also on board. It’s estimated that the cold chain in the UK currently consumes around 14% of all electricity generated, with food retailers operating massive networks of machines distributed throughout the UK. Energy as a Service To make energy part of the circular economy – where, rather than producing, using and disposing of resources, they are kept in use for as long as possible, recovered, regenerated and re-used – there will need to be a shift away from buying energy in kWh and towards buying energy as a service. This means that instead of consumers buying energy from a supplier, they pay a company to get energy at the best price, get the best value from the energy they generate, and improve the efficiency of their homes so that they use less energy. Free energy? It’s easier than ever for us to generate green energy. The cost of renewable generation equipment is coming down, and the amount of energy on the grid is going up – often to such levels that during sunny days or when there’s a lot of wind, there can actually be too much energy on the grid. The swings that this creates in wholesale prices can mean that prices can go ‘negative’, so that there is effectively ‘free’ energy on the grid. Consumers at the heart The biggest change of all is that consumers will go from being on the edge of the energy system to being at its heart. They will have more control over where their energy comes from, how and when they want to consume it, and can take an active role in making sure it doesn’t cost the earth. News about the Future Digital Weeding Zasso Group specializes in weed and invasive plant control technologies by using high-voltage electric power. Zasso destroys both the shoots and the even more critical roots of plants by employing advanced lightweight high-voltage methods. These powerful systems deliver safe and robust solutions without requiring any chemical agro-toxics – save for the environment, the infrastructure and human beings.Specifically designed electric applicators run high-energy power through the whole plant, clearing targeted areas accurately within seconds and keeping them free of plants for months without any such side effects as chemical residues, chemical drift and resulting plant damages, soil erosion, damages to infrastructure caused by mechanical elimination. An electronic rescue dog ETH Zurich scientists have developed the smallest and cheapest ever equipment for detecting people by smell. It could be used in the search for people buried by an earthquake or avalanche.A new measuring device from researchers at ETH Zurich led by Sotiris Pratsinis, Professor of Process Engineering, however, is always ready for use. The scientists had previously developed small and extremely sensitive gas sensors for acetone, ammonia, and isoprene – all metabolic products that we emit in low concentrations via our breath or skin. The researchers have now combined these sensors in a device with two commercial sensors for CO2 and moisture. Oudebosch eco-cabins at Kogelberg Nature Reserve AfriSam-SAIA Award for Sustainable Architecture and Innovation Tucked away in an UNESCO World Heritage Site in the mountains above Betty’s Bay, Oudebosch Camp nestles unobtrusively within a protected wilderness area in the Kogelberg Biosphere in South Africa. The buildings are modestly scaled, lightweight, with planted roofs. The palette of natural, local, renewable, low embodied energy, non toxic materials and components develops the low impact sustainable qualities of the project. Low tech simple passive design principles underpin crafting of the building envelope which is shaped for the shifting seasons. Recommended Book The New Human Rights Movement:Reinventing the Economy to End Oppressionby Peter Joseph Society is broken. We can design our way to a better one. In our interconnected world, self-interest and social-interest are rapidly becoming indistinguishable. If current negative trajectories remain, including growing climate destabilization, biodiversity loss, and economic inequality, an impending future of ecological collapse and societal destabilization will make “personal success” virtually meaningless. Yet our broken social system incentivizes behavior that will only make our problems worse. If true human rights progress is to be achieved today, it is time we dig deeper – rethinking the very foundation of our social system. In this engaging, important work, Peter Joseph, founder of the world’s largest grassroots social movement – The Zeitgeist Movement – draws from economics, history, philosophy, and modern public-health research to present a bold case for rethinking activism in the 21st century. Arguing against the long-standing narrative of universal scarcity and other pervasive myths that defend the current state of affairs, The New Human Rights Movement illuminates the structural causes of poverty, social oppression, and the ongoing degradation of public health, and ultimately presents the case for an updated economic approach. Joseph explores the potential of this grand shift and how we can design our way to a world where the human family has become truly sustainable. The New Human Rights Movement reveals the critical importance of a unified activism working to overcome the inherent injustice of our system. This book warns against what is in store if we continue to ignore the flaws of our socioeconomic approach, while also revealing the bright and expansive future What Plants Talk About When we think about plants, we don’t often associate a term like “behavior” with them, but experimental plant ecologist JC Cahill wants to change that. The University of Alberta professor maintains that plants do behave and lead anything but solitary and sedentary lives. What Plants Talk About teaches us all that plants are smarter and much more interactive than we thought! Futurist Portrait: Alexander Mankowsky Alexander Mankowsky, Futures Studies & Ideation, Daimler AG “Future Studies & Ideation as a working field requires explanation:Future Studies normally results in reports made from scenarios about possible futures. Most often these futures are slightly dystopian or alarmist. These reports then are thrown at business and government, with the request on ‘do something about it’, which is the reason for the alarmist undertone. Personally I find this procedure boring and unsatisfying, even irresponsible. To make more about it, I added the ‘& Ideation’, to show that after the insight in possible futures, the product should be a concept, developed together with creative people from many professions. Take some risk; get your hands dirty, that’s where the fun part begins.” printable version
Club of Amsterdam Journal, May 2018, Issue 205
Content The fishy problem of underwater noise pollution by Adam Crane and Maud Ferrari Consumerism The Future Now Show: the future of Financial Services with John Best hosted by Miss Metaverse Tribalism – Security or Sovereignty? by Mara Lemanis News about the Future: Voting in real time / The Next Wave Of Tech-For-Good Companies Are Being Built By Women And Minorities Resilient by Design Recommended Book: The Future by Nick Montfort Processed Food by Robert Lustig Futurist Portrait: John Renesch Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show: the future of Financial Services with John Best hosted by Miss Metaverse With an emphasis on maintaining the culture, services, and features you have carefully crafted for your customers over the years, these strategies allow you to make your organization more resistant to digital disruption by adopting key technologies at key points in their evolution. – John Best, author of Breaking Digital Gridlock Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman The fishy problem of underwater noise pollution by Adam Crane and Maud Ferrari By Adam Crane, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Saskatchewan and Maud Ferrari, Associate Professor, University of Saskatchewan Listen Ambient noise These sounds are produced by the motion of the atmosphere, water and seafloor, by animals and, now more than ever, by machines created by humans. Nowadays, the underwater soundscape includes the roar of motors, the ping of military SONAR and the bangs and blasts from offshore development.Communication breakdown For fish, whales and other marine animals, intense underwater noises from blasts can cause acoustic trauma and even death. More common quieter noise, such as construction or shipping noise, may not kill the animals directly, but can disrupt their ability to find food, mates or avoid predators. Researchers use a hydrophone to record and measure noise from a passing motorboat. Maud Ferrari A wide range of species use acoustic signals to communicate with each other. Marine fishes, for instance, are known to make chirps, pops, knocks and grunts using their teeth, swim bladders or fins. One consequence of anthropogenic — humanmade — noise is a masking effect. When the noise is close to a fish, it reduces that individual’s ability to hear the sounds of others. Noise also interferes with the sounds this individual produces, jamming communication. School of noise More and more, scientists are discovering that noise not only interferes with an animal’s cognitive processing of sounds, but also other types of stimuli, such as sight or smell. For example, boat noise interferes with the visual signals that cuttlefish use to communicate with each other. Recent research in our lab indicated that noise can also impair an animal’s ability to process the chemical information released after a predator attack on shoal mates. We looked at the effects of noise from small motorboats on coral-reef fishes at Lizard Island Research Station at the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. In the lab, we trained young damselfish to recognize the odour of the predatory dottyback as a threat. Some fish were trained in the presence of boat noise, while the others were trained with the ambient sound of the ocean. A juvenile Ambon Damselfish being measured for body size traits. (Maud Ferrari) We found that fish trained with boat noise showed no fright reactions when they were exposed to the predator. It was as though they had had no preparation at all. The fish trained in the absence of boat noise, however, were scared. They reduced activity and foraging. We taught another group of fish to recognize the smell and sight of three common predators — in the presence or absence of boat noise — and then we released them back into the wild. School is out It turns out that fish don’t learn very well in noisy environments. After three days, only 20 per cent of the fish exposed to boat noise were still alive, compared to almost 70 per cent of unexposed fish. We often think of the ways climate change, overfishing and run-off pollution threaten fish populations in the Great Barrier Reef, but our study adds to the growing evidence that boat noise may also contribute to fish death through a failure to learn. Boat noise can have a variety of negative impacts on fishes. It can change their activity, force them to live in bad habitats and decrease their ability to feed, defend their territory, reproduce and avoid predators. In some places, such as biodiversity hotspots or sensitive habitats, it may be prudent to create rules or laws that minimize the impacts of noise. Approaches to mitigate the effects of boat noise may include the implementation of quiet zones, speed restrictions or the use of mufflers or low-volume engine models. For example, quiet zones were recently implemented in British Columbia to protect a population of killer whales. Humans rely on the ocean for its biodiversity and natural resources. It also plays a fundamental role in regulating atmospheric temperatures and gases. Cousteau cared deeply about ocean conservation and was gravely concerned about ocean pollution and the over-harvest of marine life. Today’s seas continue to face these threats, as well as from habitat destruction, warming and ocean acidification. These ocean threats are also human threats. As Cousteau said, “For most of history, man has had to fight nature to survive; in this century he is beginning to realize that, in order to survive, he must protect it.” Consumerism I shop therefore I am 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. The Future Now Show May 2018 the future of Financial Services withJohn Best hosted byMiss Metaverse With an emphasis on maintaining the culture, services, and features you have carefully crafted for your customers over the years, these strategies allow you to make your organization more resistant to digital disruption by adopting key technologies at key points in their evolution. – John Best, author of Breaking Digital Gridlock The Future Now Showfeatures The Future Now Show Tribalism – Security or Sovereignty? by Mara Lemanis “When people have tried everything and have discovered that nothing works, they will tend to revert to what they know best – which will often be the tribe, the totem, or the taboo.”– Christopher Hitchens Having done work with the Great Plains Indians of South Dakota, I glimpsed a social contract different from the one that has become a major impasse across the globe. As a movement populism seeks to bulwark political cohesion based on a common cultural history and national identity. To the extent that it aspires to homogeneity of attitude, sentiment, and sense of purpose it also looks to secure itself against ethnic diversity as well as local elites. In concerted opposition to a heterogeneous polity, populism claims prime legitimacy among its supporters and treats the opposition as illegitimate. Its most trenchant form is evidenced in Poland, where the Law and Justice party (PiS) holds power, and Hungary, where Fidesz, the right-wing political party, proclaims “nationalism based on soil, blood, culture.” Hallmarks of democracy, such as a free press or media, and an independent judiciary, have been disabled or derailed. Often the word “tribal” is used as a blanket description of an inflexible political stance based on the belief that it is genetically inherited. Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker ascribed the populist condition to the outcome of “our impulses of authoritarianism and tribalism.” Countering this facile rhetoric of dependence on a metaphor that covers supremely nationalistic ambitions are the actual behaviors of tribes as researched and compiled by anthropologists. Their studies show that the history of multiple, actual tribes does not conform to any concept about the deep-seated, organic nature of human society. Their analyses indicate nothing about a genetic cellular attribute, nor some instinctual inheritance that can never be modified or denied. Unlike religious constructs or undifferentiated populist movements, the sense of identity among aboriginal cultures is much more fluid. While nationalism is protectionist and anti-immigrant, tribal life has been disposed toward reciprocity both within and across different communities. Cultures such as the Native American tribes, the Berbers of North Africa, the Lozi of Central Africa, and the Mae Enja of Papua, New Guinea seek out enemy groups to advise them on selecting leaders and settling disputes. Authentic tribes, documented by anthropologists, practice four kinds of social interaction: ” They often adopt outsiders into their community” Marry members from opponent tribes” Are anti-authoritarian and do not endorse absolute judgments.” Avoid rigid structural identities in order to limit social isolation The common feature among these modalities is the desire to prevent internal division since societies that cultivate inequality eventually destabilize and spur internal violence. It has become common that the divisions among technological societies between working people and elites have been flouted as tribal allegiances and tribal enmity. Over the last generation this division has increasingly sharpened against immigrants, especially Muslims, and the political establishments that buttress them. The glaring example of this has been in Hungary, where the prime minister’s popularity rose when he implemented a policy to keep out refugees. Other nations-Poland, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia-have followed suit. A strong, underlying fear across Europe is that populations who consider themselves to be the ethnic natives and carriers of a legacy intrinsic to the cultural pride and legacy of their country are no longer dominant, are fast disappearing. Undeniably the undertow of economic downturns has led to stagnation in many European nations and caused the departure of their youth. Sweden and Denmark believe their welfare systems are under threat from an influx of refugees. “Stop immigration and stop Islamization” has become an unabashed slogan making a blatant appeal. Unlike the practice among aboriginal tribes in America and in numerous other regions of the world where cutting across cultures led to greater inclusion, the U.S., Britain, and Europe have been agitating for greater exclusion. By advocating greater, not lesser participation in their governing councils the identity and sense of purpose for the Iroquois Confederacy in the U.S., as well as the Pashtuns in Pakistan and Afghanistan have been strengthened. By honoring opposing views and attitudes from disparate groups they have been able to arrive at consensus, thus increasing their self-determination. Can there be any other paradigm for the world’s nations to build a stronger base within their borders? How willing are they to expel those immigrants now residing within their borders or repel the ones without? Would they be willing to corral the growing populace of displaced migrants and herd them into a ghetto or conduct them to some desolate island while defraying the cost of their sustenance? Finally what can be the meaning of a social contract that withdraws from its original principles and goals to shrink toward a narrow welfare, a hardened core solely protecting self-proclaimed nativists? Then what sort of humanity does a social contract espouse? These are questions that might be posed to all of us in all the nations of our world. The signing of the Mayflower Compact – a basic set of rules between the Native American tribes and the Colonists at Plymouth, Massachusetts. News about the Future Voting in real time My Vote‘s ambition is to build a secure online voting platform that will allow for greater election transparency. MyVote is a web-based application that enables you to create ranking, rating, and poll voting contests and view the results in real time. The audience can participate live on their mobile phones, tablets and desktops. There is nothing to download or install.Blockchain technology already secures billions of dollars around the world. We believe it should secure our votes as well. Using the unparalleled security of blockchain technology, we are poised to disrupt the established voting industry by offering a more cost-effective and technologically superior solution. The Next Wave Of Tech-For-Good Companies Are Being Built By Women And Minorities A new report by Fast Forward looks at the demographics of so-called “tech nonprofits.” That report, entitled “The State of Diversity and Funding in the Tech Nonprofit Sector,” shows that 47% of all tech nonprofit founders are women, compared to just 17% at traditional startups. Minorities make up 30% of all tech nonprofit founders compared to 13% in the for-profit field. Just what earns a nonprofit that “tech nonprofit” distinction could be the subject of its own debate. “We classify a tech nonprofit as a tech company building original software or hardware, but leveraging a nonprofit business model so they can focus 100% on social impact,” notes report co-author Christina Shatzen. Resilient by Design www.resilientbayarea.org A year-long collaborative design challenge bringing together local residents, public officials and local, national and international experts to develop innovative community-based solutions that will strengthen our region’s resilience to sea level rise, severe storms, flooding and earthquakes. The BIG + ONE + Sherwood Team is co-led by Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), One Architecture + Urbanism (ONE), and Sherwood Design Engineers (Sherwood). The team also includes experts from Moffat & Nichol, Nelson Nygaard, Strategic Economics, and The Dutra Group. The Team brings together significant international experience in Denmark, the Netherlands, and the Bay Area with a variety of experience in designing spaces that are vulnerable to climate events by understanding a region’s economic, political and social environment. The Team is founded on a shared belief in the power of well-designed spaces that are connected to their contexts – ecologically, economically, and socially – and overall play a transformative role in the cities where they are located. With a collective commitment to embrace the interconnected, rich, and diverse set of human and non-human ecosystems that comprise the Bay Area, the BIG + ONE + Sherwood Team looks at the city as a Social Ecosystem – one where we can proactively design the links between nature, and culture, between people, and their environment. Recommended Book The Futureby Nick Montfort How the future has been imagined and made, through the work of writers, artists, inventors, and designers. The future is like an unwritten book. It is not something we see in a crystal ball, or can only hope to predict, like the weather. In this volume of the MIT Press’s Essential Knowledge series, Nick Montfort argues that the future is something to be made, not predicted. Montfort offers what he considers essential knowledge about the future, as seen in the work of writers, artists, inventors, and designers (mainly in Western culture) who developed and described the core components of the futures they envisioned. Montfort’s approach is not that of futurology or scenario planning; instead, he reports on the work of making the future – the thinkers who devoted themselves to writing pages in the unwritten book. Douglas Engelbart, Alan Kay, and Ted Nelson didn’t predict the future of computing, for instance. They were three of the people who made it. Montfort focuses on how the development of technologies – with an emphasis on digital technologies – has been bound up with ideas about the future. Readers learn about kitchens of the future and the vision behind them; literary utopias, from Plato’s Republic to Edward Bellamy’s Looking Backward and Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Herland; the Futurama exhibit at the 1939 New York World’s Fair; and what led up to Tim Berners-Lee’s invention of the World Wide Web. Montfort describes the notebook computer as a human-centered alterative to the idea of the computer as a room-sized “giant brain”; speculative practice in design and science fiction; and, throughout, the best ways to imagine and build the future. Processed Food Dr. Robert Lustig believes the food business, by pushing processed food loaded with sugar, has hacked our bodies and minds to pursue pleasure instead of happiness; fostering today’s epidemics of addiction and depression. Yet by focusing on real food, we can beat the odds against sugar, processed food, obesity, and disease. The Hacking of the American MindThe Science Behind the Corporate Takeover of Our Bodies and BrainsLustig, Robert H. “We all know that we can’t put down our sodas or our cell phones. But what if these cravings are engineered — by design? And what if these desires actually cause damage — not just to ourselves, but to our families, our friends, and our entire society? While researching the toxic impact of sugar on our health for his New York Times best seller Fat Chance, Robert Lustig made a discovery that reaches beyond the politics of food. Our seemingly innocent addictions are far from it — they are biochemical, and they are damaging our bodies and our brains. With his trademark wit and incisiveness, Lustig reveals how these chemicals interact with one another to drive our behaviors, and how Big Business uses the science of addiction to keep us hooked — to our detriment, and for their profit. Dopamine is the ‘reward’ neurotransmitter that tells our brains ‘This feels good, I want more.’ Yet too much dopamine leads to addiction. Serotonin is the ‘contentment’ neurotransmitter that tells our brains ‘This feels good, I have enough.’ Yet too little serotonin leads to depression. Ideally, both should be in optimal supply. But too many of our simple pleasures have morphed into something else — a 6.5-ounce soda has become a Big Gulp; an afternoon with friends has been replaced by 1,000 friendings on Facebook. What we think we want, what we’re told will bring us happiness, is just a clever marketing scheme to lead us to consume more and more. Wall Street, Madison Avenue, Las Vegas, Silicon Valley, and Washington, DC., have gotten inside our heads, exploiting newly discovered brain physiology and chemistry to confuse and conflate pleasure with happiness. Our behaviors are not our own, because our minds have been hacked. But there are ways to reclaim our health and our lives. Using that same brain science, Lustig offers solutions to defend ourselves against Corporate America, and to reengage in the pursuit of happiness, even in the face of overwhelming opposition. And the time to take action — for ourselves, for our children, and for all of society — is now.” — Jacket. Dr. Robert LustigThe Hacking of the American Mind at the San Francisco Public Library Futurist Portrait: John Renesch John Renesch is an advisor, mentor, futurist and writer on matters of social and organizational change. He believes that commerce holds the key to bringing about a global shift of human consciousness thus creating a future of tremendous possibility for humankind – the possibility that will allow humanity to transcend the inevitable future that can be projected from current trends. (…) John: “It is so easy to give lip service to doing the right thing, stating the moral high ground, saying what people want to hear but an entirely different moral toughness is required to keep our word – to do what we say we are going to do. After years of hearing these tentative “commitments” the rest of us have gotten used to people reneging on their promises and not keeping their word. The worst of it? It has become “socially acceptable”; that is, we have grown accustomed to people failing to do what they say and we let them off the hook. Empty promises have become quite common. (…) –Journal of Values-Based Leadership (…) John: “Coaching leaders in consciousness requires a unique approach since the subject is ineffable. It requires a non-linear holistic approach that defies straight fact-learning or skill enhancing.” (…) – Coaching Psychology International printable version
Club of Amsterdam Journal, July & August 2018, Issue 207
Content Our Devices Know More Than We Think! by Peter Cochrane Earth Overshoot Day The Future Now Show: Do Banks have a Future? with Brett King hosted by Miss Metaverse Computer program looks five minutes into the future News about the Future: The CGIAR Platform for Big Data in Agriculture / The Mindfire Foundation What is Collective Intelligence? by Michael Silverman & Geoff Mulgan Recommended Book: Evolving Ourselves: Redesigning the Future of Humanity – One Gene at a Time by Juan Enriquez, Steve Gullans How can an artificial material instruct neurons and influence their behavior? by Laura Ballerin Futurist Portrait: Jeremy Bentham Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show: Do Banks have a Future? with Brett King hosted by Miss MetaverseOnce upon a time, people used to get paid with pieces of paper and coins – physical money – and take that to a building nearby, their bank branch, for safekeeping. Nowadays the idea of a physical bank branch is disappearing as it becomes increasingly irrelevant. And physical money is used less and less. Transactions are handled in near-real-time, increasingly initiated on smart phones. With the growing options in digital transactions and digitally based money, will banks even be needed in the future? – Paul Holister Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman Our Devices Know More Than We Think! Peter Cochrane OBEProfessor of Sentient Systems @ The UoS Ipswich UK When people think about their information and privacy few stray beyond eMail, TxT, IM, Documents, Social Networks, Browser History, Diary Entries, Address Book, who they call and who calls them. However, these are but the tip of a very big and fast growing iceberg! Our modern mobile phones and tablets contain a vast, and fast growing, array of sensors and network types that generate more information than we might imagine. Embedded sensors routinely include GPS, Compass, Proximity, Accelerometer, Gyroscope, Thermometer, Hygrometer, Barometer, Light Level, Microphone/s and Camera/s. And these immediately give details of our location, movements – speed, direction, altitude and orientation, plus of course, vibration and other movement patterns. As a result we see a new means of mapping our travels and activities in a new ‘N – Dimensional Space’ without recourse to any physical visualisation or reference to our 3D physical surroundings. Mapping a journey by vibration, G-force, acceleration and deceleration gives an entirely new, and very informative, picture. Then of course our microphone/s and camera/s also gather unique acoustic and visual data as we move location-to-location and thereby add more contextual data. What does all this mean? We have created a ‘forensic heaven’ that is about to be amplified by chemical sensors in the fingerprint security pad and touch screen to be followed by others on the device body. So, what might we know and what might we be able to deduce from all this disparate data? I’d say with far greater confidence we can tell who you are, what you are, what you do, have done, might do, where you have been when and how, and where you are likely to go and what you are likely to participate in next. In short, we are carrying our own behavioural analysis system and toolkit in our pocket and hands. Your exact location and mode of transport are easy to determine as is the general state of your health. It is even easy to ascertain the types of food, when and where, you eat and with whom. Your friends and colleagues are so easy to identify too! How? Apart from all the data you generate and carry, WiFi, BlueTooth, and to a lesser extent 3/4G, are connecting and colliding all the time even if you do not decide to connect, but when you do it is a confirmation of location and relationships. Who and what you connect too and for how long and the file transfers says an awful lot about you and them. Where does this stop and can we control it? It doesn’t, and we can’t! The bigger ques-tions are; how can society profit from all this? In short; health, safety, security, efficiency, ecological savings, social cohesion. There is great benefit to be had on all sides from the coalescence of information: it makes us more identifiable than ever before; it gives us continuous health monitoring for free; and real time feedback on our behaviours and that of others to achieve more in less time whilst reducing a wide range of risks. Of course the IoT (Internet of Things) and AI (Artificial Intelligence) add even more dimensions, and the Dark Side are already pondering how they might exploit it, whilst regulators and governments have yet to wake to this new reality. In my view, the more degrees of freedom and variation we create the more secure we become as it all amplifies the entropy of this space makes successful attacks less likely. Look at it this way; Passwords and PIN is relatively easy to crack. Additional biofactors make it exponentially more difficult very fast. So Two Factor Authentication by keyboard and fingerprint is going to drift up to Ten Factors and beyond. All counter intuitive, perhaps, in terms of security. In terms of how all that data is used, well, that’s perhaps a bigger matter and one that we are only just beginning to get our collective heads around – let’s hope we can work it out before ‘social credit ratings’, based on all these factors, become the norm. Earth Overshoot Day Earth Overshoot Day 2018 August 1, 2018 Earth Overshoot Day marks the date when we (all of humanity) have used more from nature than our planet can renew in the entire year. We are using 1.7 Earths. We use more ecological resources and services than nature can regenerate through overfishing, overharvesting forests, and emitting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than ecosystems can absorb. Earth Overshoot Day Earth Overshoot Day marks the date when humanity’s demand for ecological resources and services in a given year exceeds what Earth can regenerate in that year. We maintain this deficit by liquidating stocks of ecological resources and accumulating waste, primarily carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Earth Overshoot Day is hosted and calculated by Global Footprint Network, an international think tank that coordinates research, develops methodological standards and provides decision-makers with a menu of tools to help the human economy operate within Earth’s ecological limits. To determine the date of Earth Overshoot Day for each year, Global Footprint Network calculates the number of days of that year that Earth’s biocapacity suffices to provide for humanity’s Ecological Footprint. The remainder of the year corresponds to global overshoot. Earth Overshoot Day is computed by dividing the planet’s biocapacity (the amount of ecological resources Earth is able to generate that year), by humanity’s Ecological Footprint (humanity’s demand for that year), and multiplying by 365, the number of days in 2017: (Planet’s Biocapacity / Humanity’s Ecological Footprint) x 365 = Earth Overshoot Day Measuring Ecological Wealth Just as a bank statement tracks income against expenditures, Global Footprint Network measures a population’s demand for and ecosystems’ supply of resources and services. These calculations then serve as the foundation for calculating Earth Overshoot Day. On the supply side, a city, state, or nation’s biocapacity represents its biologically productive land and sea area, including forest lands, grazing lands, cropland, fishing grounds, and built-up land. On the demand side, the Ecological Footprint measures a population’s demand for plant-based food and fiber products, livestock and fish products, timber and other forest products, space for urban infrastructure, and forest to absorb its carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels. Both measures are expressed in global hectares — globally comparable, standardized hectares with world average productivity. A hectare is equivalent to 10,000 square meters or 2.47 acres. Each city, state or nation’s Ecological Footprint can be compared to its biocapacity. If a population’s demand for ecological assets exceeds the supply, that region runs an ecological deficit. A region in ecological deficit meets demand by importing, liquidating its own ecological assets (such as overfishing), and/or emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. At the global level, ecological deficit and overshoot are the same, since there is no net import of resources to the planet. HistoryThe concept of Earth Overshoot Day was first conceived by Andrew Simms of the UK think tank New Economics Foundation, which partnered with Global Footprint Network in 2006 to launch the first global Earth Overshoot Day campaign. At that time, Earth Overshoot Day fell in October. WWF, the world’s largest conservation organization, has participated in Earth Overshoot Day since 2007. Learn more about the Ecological Footprint 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. The Future Now Show July 2018 Do Banks have a Future? withBrett King hosted byMiss Metaverse Once upon a time, people used to get paid with pieces of paper and coins – physical money – and take that to a building nearby, their bank branch, for safekeeping. Nowadays the idea of a physical bank branch is disappearing as it becomes increasingly irrelevant. And physical money is used less and less. Transactions are handled in near-real-time, increasingly initiated on smart phones. With the growing options in digital transactions and digitally based money, will banks even be needed in the future? – Paul Holister Do banks Have Future The Future Now Showfeatures The Future Now Show Computer program looks five minutes into the future This is Prof. Jürgen Gall (right) and Yazan Abu Farha from the Institute of Computer Science at the University of Bonn.© Foto: Barbara Frommann/Uni Bonnby University of Bonn Software developed at the University of Bonn can accurately predict future actions Computer scientists from the University of Bonn have developed software that can look a few minutes into the future: The program first learns the typical sequence of actions, such as cooking, from video sequences. Based on this knowledge, it can then accurately predict in new situations what the chef will do at which point in time. Researchers will present their findings at the world’s largest Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition, which will be held June 19-21 in Salt Lake City, USA. The perfect butler, as every fan of British social drama knows, has a special ability: He senses his employer’s wishes before they have even been uttered. The working group of Prof. Dr. Jürgen Gall wants to teach computers something similar: “We want to predict the timing and duration of activities – minutes or even hours before they happen”, he explains. A kitchen robot, for example, could then pass the ingredients as soon as they are needed, pre-heat the oven in time – and in the meantime warn the chef if he is about to forget a preparation step. The automatic vacuum cleaner meanwhile knows that it has no business in the kitchen at that time, and instead takes care of the living room. We humans are very good at anticipating the actions of others. For computers however, this discipline is still in its infancy. The researchers at the Institute of Computer Science at the University of Bonn are now able to announce a first success: They have developed self-learning software that can estimate the timing and duration of future activities with astonishing accuracy for periods of several minutes. Training data: four hours of salad videos The training data used by the scientists included 40 videos in which performers prepare different salads. Each of the recordings was around 6 minutes long and contained an average of 20 different actions. The videos also contained precise details of what time the action started and how long it took. The computer “watched” these salad videos totaling around four hours. This way, the algorithm learned which actions typically follow each other during this task and how long they last. This is by no means trivial: After all, every chef has his own approach. Additionally, the sequence may vary depending on the recipe. “Then we tested how successful the learning process was”, explains Gall. “For this we confronted the software with videos that it had not seen before.” At least the new short films fit into the context: They also showed the preparation of a salad. For the test, the computer was told what is shown in the first 20 or 30 percent of one of the new videos. On this basis it then had to predict what would happen during the rest of the film. That worked amazingly well. Gall: “Accuracy was over 40 percent for short forecast periods, but then dropped the more the algorithm had to look into the future.” For activities that were more than three minutes in the future, the computer was still right in 15 percent of cases. However, the prognosis was only considered correct if both the activity and its timing were correctly predicted. Gall and his colleagues want the study to be understood only as a first step into the new field of activity prediction. Especially since the algorithm performs noticeably worse if it has to recognize on its own what happens in the first part of the video, instead of being told. Because this analysis is never 100 percent correct – Gall speaks of “noisy” data. “Our process does work with it”, he says. “But unfortunately nowhere near as well.” When will you do what? – Anticipating Temporal Occurrences of Activities (CVPR 2018) Qualitative results for the paper : When will you do what? – Anticipating Temporal Occurrences of ActivitiesYazan Abu Farha, Alexander Richard, Juergen Gall News about the Future The CGIAR Platform for Big Data in Agriculture is where information becomes power: power to predict, prescribe, and produce more food, more sustainably. It democratizes decades of agricultural data empowering analysts, statisticians, programmers and more to mine information for trends and quirks, and develop rapid, accurate and compelling recommendations for farmers, researchers and policymakers. The Platform aims to positively disrupt agricultural research, helping to generate impactful big data innovations that can revolutionize farming in developing countries. It will provide global leadership in organizing open data, convening partners to develop innovative ideas, and demonstrating the power of big data analytics through inspiring projects. It will also help ensure that the data revolution is deep, diffuse and democratic, reaching the most vulnerable farmers. As the largest network of agricultural research organizations in the world, CGIAR is uniquely positioned to be a thought leader and global convener on the use of big data and information technology in agriculture. The Mindfire Foundation is a Swiss non-profit which is focused on understanding the foundational principles which make up human intelligence, and applying those principles to the development of artificially intelligent organisms. Mindfire aims to achieve this through the implementation of a series of Missions. Each mission gathers the top minds across various fields of science, to collaborate and brainstorm solutions to a structured series of challenges. The first of which is the creation of an artificial organism. Participants of Mindfire missions are credited with their contributions through a blockchain based format (patent filed & pending), designed specifically to track and attribute intellectual property. The overall discoveries which take place during Mindfire Missions, will remain independent of any corporate ownership and serve for the betterment of all of society. What is Collective Intelligence? Michael Silverman, MD of Silverman Research and Founder of Crowdoscope, answers the following questions about Collective Intelligence: 1. What is Collective Intelligence? 2. Why is there an interest in Collective Intelligence now? 3. What’s the difference between the Wisdom of Crowds, Collective Intelligence and Crowdsourcing? 4. Can a normal survey gather “Collective Intelligence”? 5. How are organisations using “Collective Intelligence”? 6. What are some of the challenges that organisations face in implementing Collective Intelligence systems and tools? Turbulent produces micro, mini and small hydro-power plants. How Collective Intelligence Can Change the World | Geoff Mulgan | RSA Replay A new field of collective intelligence has emerged in recent years, supported by a wave of new digital technologies that make it possible for organizations and societies to think at large scale. But why do smart technologies not always automatically lead to smart results? Chief Executive of Nesta Geoff Mulgan shows how this intelligence has to be carefully organized and orchestrated in order to fully harness and direct its powers. Recommended Book Evolving Ourselves: Redesigning the Future of Humanity – One Gene at a Time by Juan Enriquez, Steve Gullans An eye-opening, mind-bending exploration of how mankind is reshaping its genetic future, based on the viral TED Talk series “Will Our Kids Be a Different Species?” and “The Next Species of Human.” Are you willing to engineer the DNA of your unborn children and grand-children to be healthier? Better looking? More intelligent? Why are rates of autism, asthma, and allergies exploding at an unprecedented pace? Why are humans living longer and having far fewer kids? Futurist Juan Enriquez and scientist Steve Gullans conduct a sweeping tour of how humans are changing the course of evolution for all species – sometimes intentionally, sometimes not. For example:• What if life forms are limited only by the bounds of our imagination? Are designer babies and pets, de-extinction, even entirely newspecies fair game?• As humans, animals, and plants become ever more resistant to disease and aging, what will become the leading causes of death?• Man-machine interfaces may allow humans to live much longer. What will happen when we transfer parts of our “selves” into clones, into stored cells and machines? Though these harbingers of change are deeply unsettling, the authors argue we are also in an epoch of tremendous opportunity. Future humans, perhaps a more diverse, resilient, gentler, and intelligent species, may become better caretakers of the planet – but only if we make the right choices now. Intelligent, provocative, and optimistic, Evolving Ourselves is the ultimate guide to the next phase of life on Earth. Chosen by Nature magazine as a Fall 2016 season highlight. How can an artificial material instruct neurons and influence their behavior? Laura Ballerini is professor in Physiology at the Biophysics Sector of the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA-ISAS) of Trieste, Italy How can an artificial material instruct neurons and influence their behavior? This is the main interest of Laura Ballerini‘s group, which is experimenting with new materials such as carbon nanotubes and using them as a substrate for growing neurons. Ballerini’s lab has shown that carbon nanotubes can make neuronal networks more efficient, a discovery which could have important applications for neuroprosthesis and for the treatment of spinal cord lesions. “The results demonstrate that, depending on how the interface with [single-layer graphene] is engineered, the material may tune neuronal activities by altering the ion mobility, in particular potassium, at the cell/substrate interface,” said Laura Ballerini, a researcher in neurons and nanomaterials at SISSA. “These materials are increasingly engineered as components of a variety of applications such as biosensors, interfaces, or drug-delivery platforms,” said Ballerini. “In particular, in neural electrode or interfaces, a precise requirement is the stable device/neuronal electrical coupling, which requires governing the interactions between the electrode surface and the cell membrane.” Futurist Portrait: Jeremy Bentham Jeremy Bentham, Vice President Global Business Environment and Head of Shell Scenarios Jeremy has been in the energy business for more than 35 years. After graduating with a physics degree from Oxford University, he joined Shell in 1980. He also holds a Masters degree in management from MIT, where he was a Sloan Fellow from 1990 to 1991. Jeremy joined the leadership team of Shell Global Solutions in 1999, with specific responsibility for commercial and strategic developments including new business. He was subsequently appointed as chief executive of Shell Hydrogen. Since January 2006 he has been responsible for Shell’s Global Business Environment team, which is best known for developing forward-looking scenarios to support strategic thinking and direction-setting. Jeremy Bentham on publishing Shell’s 2C scenarios SSEE Sustainability Debate: Jeremy Bentham printable version
Club of Amsterdam Journal, September 2018, Issue 208
Content Will artificial intelligence become conscious? by Subhash Kak cypher The Future Now Show: Annegien Blokpoel from Israel Does Life = Intelligence ? by Peter Cochrane News about the Future: Future of Transportation Report / RotoBeds Vortex Turbines Recommended Book: China and the Middle East: Venturing into the Maelstrom (Global Political Transitions) by James M. Dorsey When Lakshmi – our temple elephant ‘visited’ the grand park at Lyon by Arnab B. Chowdhury Quadrocopter Ball Juggling, ETH Zurich Futurist Portrait: Mark Pesce Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show: Annegien Blokpoel from Israel Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman Will artificial intelligence become conscious? What’s the link between technology and consciousness? By Subhash Kak, Regents Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Oklahoma State University Forget about today’s modest incremental advances in artificial intelligence, such as the increasing abilities of cars to drive themselves. Waiting in the wings might be a groundbreaking development: a machine that is aware of itself and its surroundings, and that could take in and process massive amounts of data in real time. It could be sent on dangerous missions, into space or combat. In addition to driving people around, it might be able to cook, clean, do laundry – and even keep humans company when other people aren’t nearby. A particularly advanced set of machines could replace humans at literally all jobs. That would save humanity from workaday drudgery, but it would also shake many societal foundations. A life of no work and only play may turn out to be a dystopia. Conscious machines would also raise troubling legal and ethical problems. Would a conscious machine be a “person” under law and be liable if its actions hurt someone, or if something goes wrong? To think of a more frightening scenario, might these machines rebel against humans and wish to eliminate us altogether? If yes, they represent the culmination of evolution. As a professor of electrical engineering and computer science who works in machine learning and quantum theory, I can say that researchers are divided on whether these sorts of hyperaware machines will ever exist. There’s also debate about whether machines could or should be called “conscious” in the way we think of humans, and even some animals, as conscious. Some of the questions have to do with technology; others have to do with what consciousness actually is. Is awareness enough? Most computer scientists think that consciousness is a characteristic that will emerge as technology develops. Some believe that consciousness involves accepting new information, storing and retrieving old information and cognitive processing of it all into perceptions and actions. If that’s right, then one day machines will indeed be the ultimate consciousness. They’ll be able to gather more information than a human, store more than many libraries, access vast databases in milliseconds and compute all of it into decisions more complex, and yet more logical, than any person ever could. On the other hand, there are physicists and philosophers who say there’s something more about human behavior that cannot be computed by a machine. Creativity, for example, and the sense of freedom people possess don’t appear to come from logic or calculations. Yet these are not the only views of what consciousness is, or whether machines could ever achieve it. Quantum views Another viewpoint on consciousness comes from quantum theory, which is the deepest theory of physics. According to the orthodox Copenhagen Interpretation, consciousness and the physical world are complementary aspects of the same reality. When a person observes, or experiments on, some aspect of the physical world, that person’s conscious interaction causes discernible change. Since it takes consciousness as a given and no attempt is made to derive it from physics, the Copenhagen Interpretation may be called the “big-C” view of consciousness, where it is a thing that exists by itself – although it requires brains to become real. This view was popular with the pioneers of quantum theory such as Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg and Erwin Schrödinger. The interaction between consciousness and matter leads to paradoxes that remain unresolved after 80 years of debate. A well-known example of this is the paradox of Schrödinger’s cat, in which a cat is placed in a situation that results in it being equally likely to survive or die – and the act of observation itself is what makes the outcome certain. The opposing view is that consciousness emerges from biology, just as biology itself emerges from chemistry which, in turn, emerges from physics. We call this less expansive concept of consciousness “little-C.” It agrees with the neuroscientists’ view that the processes of the mind are identical to states and processes of the brain. It also agrees with a more recent interpretation of quantum theory motivated by an attempt to rid it of paradoxes, the Many Worlds Interpretation, in which observers are a part of the mathematics of physics. Philosophers of science believe that these modern quantum physics views of consciousness have parallels in ancient philosophy. Big-C is like the theory of mind in Vedanta – in which consciousness is the fundamental basis of reality, on par with the physical universe. Little-C, in contrast, is quite similar to Buddhism. Although the Buddha chose not to address the question of the nature of consciousness, his followers declared that mind and consciousness arise out of emptiness or nothingness. Big-C and scientific discovery Scientists are also exploring whether consciousness is always a computational process. Some scholars have argued that the creative moment is not at the end of a deliberate computation. For instance, dreams or visions are supposed to have inspired Elias Howe’s 1845 design of the modern sewing machine, and August Kekulé’s discovery of the structure of benzene in 1862. A dramatic piece of evidence in favor of big-C consciousness existing all on its own is the life of self-taught Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan, who died in 1920 at the age of 32. His notebook, which was lost and forgotten for about 50 years and published only in 1988, contains several thousand formulas, without proof in different areas of mathematics, that were well ahead of their time. Furthermore, the methods by which he found the formulas remain elusive. He himself claimed that they were revealed to him by a goddess while he was asleep. The concept of big-C consciousness raises the questions of how it is related to matter, and how matter and mind mutually influence each other. Consciousness alone cannot make physical changes to the world, but perhaps it can change the probabilities in the evolution of quantum processes. The act of observation can freeze and even influence atoms’ movements, as Cornell physicists proved in 2015. This may very well be an explanation of how matter and mind interact. Mind and self-organizing systems It is possible that the phenomenon of consciousness requires a self-organizing system, like the brain’s physical structure. If so, then current machines will come up short. Scholars don’t know if adaptive self-organizing machines can be designed to be as sophisticated as the human brain; we lack a mathematical theory of computation for systems like that. Perhaps it’s true that only biological machines can be sufficiently creative and flexible. But then that suggests people should – or soon will – start working on engineering new biological structures that are, or could become, conscious. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Cypher by Ozel OfficeOzel Office is an interdisciplinary design firm creating spaces, objects and experiences at the intersection of architecture, technology and media. Team: Guvenc Ozel, Benjamin Ennemoser, Tyson Philipps Cypher is a sculptural installation that creates an interactive experience through robotics, virtual reality, sensor interaction and machine learning. By combining an interactive soft robotic body with a virtual reality interface, Cypher establishes a bridge between the physical and digital worlds, collapsing them into the same experiential plane by synchronizing a virtual reality simulation with human-robot interaction. Through an infrared sensor array and a LIDAR (similar to technologies in autonomous vehicles), the sculpture has an ability to detect the proximity of the audience and change its shape accordingly. The virtual reality headset tethered to the sculpture teleports the user to its interior, radically shifting the scale of experience from object to space. While in VR, the user has the ability to change the shape of the simulation through natural hand gestures. As the user changes the shape of the VR simulation, the robot moves real-time, aligning the physical and digital transformations. The relationship between VR and robotics is further negotiated through machine learning algorithms, allowing the sculpture to develop natural motions by learning to predict the way in which people are interacting with it. The AI component allows for the sculpture to get more “intelligent” the more it is exhibited, using the number of interactions it has with the audience to cumulatively shape its motion and behavior through time. Through the synthesis of these multiple technologies, the sculpture challenges the notions of what is real vs. virtual, allowing the viewer to travel between multitudes of realities simultaneously. With this combination of multiple technological systems working seamlessly, Cypher exists simultaneously in the digital and the physical worlds. It has an ability to respond to changes in its environment both as simulation and as material. By merging the worlds of virtual reality and robotics, Cypher has an ability to translate concepts and experiences that are traditionally seen as opposite domains: architecture vs. sculpture, object vs. space, digital vs. physical, real vs. virtual, visual vs. tactile, machine vs. organism. 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. The Future Now Show September 2018 Annegien Blokpoel from IsraelAnnegien Blokpoel presents her findings from DLD Tel Aviv Innovation Conference. The Future Now Showfeatures The Future Now Show Does Life = Intelligence ? By Peter Cochrane, OBEProfessor of Sentient Systems @ The UoS Ipswich UK Our planet and everything on it, including all forms of life, are made from the same ‘star dust’ with identical atoms configured to a finite number of molecular structures and purposes. In turn, all lifeforms including us, share the same starting point; the simplest of single celled creatures that mutated and banded together to form every plant, animal, human and fungi that ever existed. So the genetic strands of this vast library of life exhibit the same elements of code throughout. It is not so much that we are relatives of monkeys and apes, more, we are all related to fish, the earliest algae and fungi! To be so successful in creating such a vast abundance of life, this zoo of cells had to exhibit sufficient intelligence to seek, find, communicate and bind with others in order to realise the many complex organisms now in evidence. But it did not do so by design or some fixed algorithm; it was by way of a primordial soup of chance, trial and error, and the survival of what worked, and the most adaptable. Today <1% of all life forms that have ever existed on our planet remain as a result of the evolutionary processes spanning 4Bn years, tempered of course by 5 major extinction events. For historical reasons those engaged in the study of life, biology, intelligence and behaviours place each into isolated and disconnected boxes, but by looking at the whole and analysing as one leads to a surprising hypothesis: All living things exhibit intelligence <-> All intelligent things exhibit life This line of enquiry also leads to axioms that appear uniformly applicable to natural and man-made (unnatural/artificial) Lifeforms and Intelligences (AL and AI): – Life and Intelligence are emergent properties of complex systems– Not all complex systems exhibit life and/or intelligence– Life and Intelligence are inherently entropic and always involve communication (in the broadest sense)– Life and Intelligence systems always seek the lowest energy state– Living and Intelligent systems must have some form of input and an output (sensors and actuators)– Memory and processing power are not always necessary, but sensor and actuators are In turn we further postulate: – Sentience is a function of awareness and cognition, which in turn, is determined by sensors, actuators, communication, memory and processing power– Humans are highly unlikely to have the ability to recognise all forms of intelligence and life These axioms and postulates appear to apply to all forms of life and intelligence (natural and artificial) with some exacting implications for AI, AL and Robotics. Interestingly, philosophers, futurists, science fiction writers and engineers of such systems may be converging slowly on a series of similar conclusions. In turn, this is rapidly becoming of great concern in the fields of; self driving and flying vehicles; robotic surgery; AI medical diagnostics; AI legal system and barristers, judgments and sentencing; autonomous industrial robots with full mobility, and so on. Today AI and robotics struggle to understand us, but we have to start thinking anew: Ask not what AI and Robotics can do for you, but ask what you might do for AI and Robotics So what happens when something goes wrong and humans are hurt or killed, or robots are damaged or destroyed? Who or what is to blame and who pays the piper? To date we have chosen to ignore Azimov’s Laws of Robotics and we have used Artificial Intelligence, Life and Robotics in weapon systems. But, it is now time to pay attention; to lay down new laws for AI, AL and Robotics including ethical, moral and legal frameworks for a rapidly emerging ecosystem running parallel to that of Mother Nature. Right now we and we alone are responsible, but that will not obtain into the no too distant future! News about the Future Future of Transportation Report The Center for the Digital Future has released a first-of-its-kind study on the future of transportation, which explores a broad range of American behavior and views about their cars, public transit, reasons to give up driving, distracted driving, and the arrival of self-driving cars. RotoBeds Approved according to the latest European standards, the new generation of RotoBeds will go to a height as low as 32 cm above the floor – and holding a maximum user weight of 190 kg they are suitable for both overweight and tall or small users. Citizens with disorders such as dementia, Parkinson’s and sclerosis may also benefit from a RotoBed®. With a rotatable RotoBed®, it takes less than one minute from the citizen is lying down, until the citizen is standing up. It saves both time and money when it comes to transfers and, just as important, it makes the user more self-reliant and painless. Vortex Turbines Turbulent produces micro, mini and small hydro-power plants. The turbine Imagine you could use any kind of small head difference in a river or canal. The power those drops contain might surprise you. We created a technology that can make use of all these small waterfalls or rapids in a way that’s safe for the environment. Gone are the days that communities had to choose between having power or fish to eat. Our robust and fish friendly vortex turbines will generate energy 24/7 at an incredibly low cost of energy. That way you can have a project with high return on investment that improves the world just that little bit. Now, if you look at a river or canal, you’ll notice that it’s full of these small cascades, that’s how nature builds rivers. We have created a distributed turbine system that can combines a large amount of turbines into one big virtual hydropower powerplant. These virtual hydropower plants can be as large as 10MW in power output. That’s the power production of a small city! We can do this because our civil structures are designed to be easy to install, and the electronics and robust power take-offs are designed to keep working with minimal maintenance. The energy produced can be directly connected to your appliances or machinery, and at the same time connected to the national distribution grid, so you can inject the unused power to it, maximizing the revenue through a net billing connection. Recommended Book China and the Middle East: Venturing into the Maelstrom (Global Political Transitions) by James M. Dorsey This book explores China’s significant economic and security interests in the Middle East and South Asia. To protect its economic and security interests, China is increasingly forced to compromise its long-held foreign policy and defence principles, which include insistence on non-interference in the domestic affairs of others, refusal to envision a foreign military presence, and focus on the development of mutually beneficial economic and commercial relations. The volume shows that China’s need to redefine requirements for the safeguarding of its national interests positioned the country as a regional player in competitive cooperation with the United States and the dominant external actor in the region. The project would be ideal for scholarly audiences interested in Regional Politics, China, South Asia, the Middle East, and economic and security studies. When Lakshmi – our temple elephant ‘visited’ the grand park at Lyon by Arnab B. Chowdhury Our story starts with Lakshmi – our temple elephant who we all adore at the Manakula Vinayagar Koil, a vibrant temple dedicated to Ganesha, at the heart of Pondicherry. Ganesha is the Hindu god representing wisdom and wealth. Lakshmi the temple elephant blessing devotees of Ganesha, in front of the temple, Pondicherry, India One full moon night, Lakshmi starts dreaming. And what does she dream? She dreams of walking down Pondicherry’s beach and taking a dip into the silver shining waters of Bay of Bengal. And what does she find there? Waste, both in the form of plastic and industrial waste – on the sand and in the waters. Is this how we treat our Earth – our Mother – our Mother-Earth? She feel deeply anguished as to how we will face our future generations as to how we treated Mother-Earth? What follows is a conversation between Lakshmi the elephant and Om the ant, between the big and the small, wisdom and resilient action, the individual and the collective. The realisation that dawns is that there is a crucial need to collaborate between them. If we are survive on and with Mother-Earth, Transformation has to start within us, with the Lakshmi and Om, within us – NOW, and form an army of optimism. This is the message in the form of a musical tale that was presented at the end of Day 1 as the final concert of the 18th ‘Dialogues en Humanité’ (Dialogues on Humanity), an international 3 day conference initiated by La Grand Metropole, the city government of Lyon, Paris. The conference as always took place at the majestic park called Parc de la Tête d’or (“Park of the Golden Head”) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parc_de_la_T%C3%AAte_d’or) of 290 acres at the heart of Lyon on July 6th, 7th and 8th 2018. A footnote to add is that this parc also boasts a small zoo, with giraffes, elephants, deer and reptiles! The participants from over 30 countries including Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas consisted of a wide range of participants including the former prime minister of France – Mr. Jean-Marc Ayrault, policy makers, activists, social scientists, philosophers, artists, students and people from all walks of life! Weaving poetry, prose and music, this musical tale performed in front of about 500 member audience consisting people from all walks of life along with international delegates from various continents and cultures, it touched both the heart and the mind and became participative towards the end as everyone sang to express solidarity. A word about the uniqueness of ‘Dialogues en Humanité’ (Dialogues on Humanity, http://dialoguesenhumanite.org ): the objective is to get back to the apparently lost art of communication under the trees in a circle called the agora, which has its roots in most ancient cultures. Themes ranged from food security, climate change crisis, raising consciousness to a more humanised digital world. Over the years, the Dialogues movement has spread across 80 cities across the globe. Agora in progress at 18th Dialogues on Humanity conference, Lyon Meanwhile our dear elephant friend Lakshmi walks under the century old tall trees at the historic park at Lyon. At her temple, she is the one who blesses everyone after receiving a banana or a few rupees as offering. Perhaps for a change, she is being blessed by the grand trees. So while she takes a stroll, you may want to listen to: ‘The elephant and the ant where Wisdom leads to action’ http://dialogues.ninad.in Arnab presenting the musical tale under the grand trees at Parc de la Tête d’or, Lyon It does not matter to Lakshmi, if you do not follow French, the language of the famous reputed French poet, Victor Hugo whose poetry inspires her and Om the ant, to form an army of optimism. What matters to Lakshmi is that whether you feel the spirit of Dawn, of new Truth to emerge that the opening verses of Hugo’s poem expresses and what is transmitted by the music on the grand piano. What matters is that we all like stories, stories of animals who stand for something important, such as love and wisdom. And Laxmi certainly is among them. Tune in to listen to the musical tale that spans musical genres with Indian Classical vocal (Hindusthani) with tanpura and swaramandal and improvisations on the grand piano. Watch a little slideshow of photo-moments that spread across Lyon and Brussels which held its first edition of Dialogues the earlier weekend. Let us remain open from within and ready to be blessed like Laxmi, by the grand trees who sprouted from Mother Earth very many years before us. Arnab Bishnu Chowdhury is the composer, musician and writer of this musical tale. He is founder of ‘Know Your Rhythm’ (KYR) – a training program he has created that raises consciousness in a spirit of joy and collaborative productivity with paradigms of rhythm, music and musicality.www.ninad.in Lakshmi shares a selfie with Arnab Quadrocopter Ball Juggling, ETH Zurich The Flying Machine Arena (FMA) is a portable space devoted to autonomous flight. Measuring up to 10 x 10 x 10 meters, it consists of a high-precision motion capture system, a wireless communication network, and custom software executing sophisticated algorithms for estimation and control. The motion capture system can locate multiple objects in the space at rates exceeding 200 frames per second. While this may seem extremely fast, the objects in the space can move at speeds in excess of 10 m/s, resulting in displacements of over 5 cm between successive snapshots. This information is fused with other data and models of the system dynamics to predict the state of the objects into the future. The system uses this knowledge to determine what commands the vehicles should execute next to achieve their desired behavior, such as performing high-speed flips, balancing objects, building structures, or engaging in a game of paddle-ball. Then, via wireless links, the system sends the commands to the vehicles, which execute them with the aid of on-board computers and sensors such as rate gyros and accelerometers. Although various objects can fly in the FMA, the machine of choice is the quadrocopter due to its agility, its mechanical simplicity and robustness, and its ability to hover. Furthermore, the quadrocopter is a great platform for research in adaptation and learning: it has well understood, low order first-principle models near hover, but is difficult to characterize when performing high-speed maneuvers due to complex aerodynamic effects. We cope with the difficult to model effects with algorithms that use first-principle models to roughly determine what a vehicle should do to perform a given task, and then learn and adapt based on flight data. Futurist Portrait : Mark Pesce Mark Pesce is a leading futurist, author, entrepreneur and innovator. He has been at the forefront of the digital revolution for thirty-five years and is a sought-after keynote speaker for major conferences and leadership gatherings. Bringing clarity, understanding and insight. From virtual reality to education, finance, manufacturing, transportation and communication, Mark gives individuals and organisations the tools they need to think effectively about the future, its opportunities, and its disruptions. In a world where everything is recorded by everyone, what is left of our freedom when the state collects this information? Mark Pesce writes. “In some ways, I believe that we are moving into a post-historical period, for lack of a better term. A time when whatever functioned previously will cease to function, or at least will have to be re-thought and re-considered.”- Mark PesceSource/Notes: An Afternoon with Mark Pesce: The Uncut Version “I very much consider the Internet a garden, and I’m a gardener, and I plant things in it and I work within the framework of the soil, the seasons, the climate, and the temperature, to produce plants.”Source/Notes: An Afternoon with Mark Pesce: The Uncut Version Mark Pesce on the end of reality printable version
Club of Amsterdam Journal, October 2018, Issue 209
Content Why Industry 4.0 ? by Peter Cochrane Empower a Billion Lives The Future Now Show special : Arjen Kamphuis still missing in Norway 1.6 trillion litres of air cleaned so far. News about the Future: New Battery-Operated Train and Sets Standards for Sustainable Mobility / Biodegradable Plastics Amputees feel as though their prosthesic limb belongs to their own body by EPFL Recommended Book: The Next Step : Exponential Life by Aubrey de Grey Sound & Architecture The GRI Standards Futurist Portrait: Mark Stevenson Club of Amsterdam SearchSubmit your articleContactSubscribe Welcome to the Club of Amsterdam Journal. The Future Now Show Special: Arjen Kamphuis still missing in Norway Felix B Bopp, Founder & Chairman Why Industry 4.0 ? By Peter Cochrane, OBEProfessor of Sentient Systems @ The UoS Ipswich UK Unlike many of our technological programs Industry 4.0 is progressing quietly in the back-ground with none of the noise and ballyhoo associated with the likes of 5G. However, the importance of ID4.0 is inversely proportional to the ballyhoo, and our future really does depend on this transformation being a big success as it is a vital step in the direction of realising sustainable societies. For sure, our feeble attempts at recycling and green energy are just a drop in the ocean and insignificant step change in the grand scheme of things. Recycling bins, solar panels and electric vehicle have a great feel good factor, but that’s where it stops, most of them cost more than they save! The big and necessary gains demanded by the planet can only be realised by the transformation of industries and supply chains based on the creation of the new and novel. Merely polishing our existing technologies, processes and production facilities will not save us from the growing string of dire warning issued by the Club of Rome et al. since 1972. Despite understanding the ultimate cost of climate change and the denuding of planet earth of it’s raw materials at an alarming rate many individuals and nations choose to turn a blind eye to focus on personal wealth or the national interest. At the same time the human population continues to grow and we now consume over 1.5 planets worths of renewables every year. Food and water shortages invoked by climate change continue to promote wars and population migrations, and we can only expect worse if we do not find a solution. “We have to stop producing more and more for the few and start supplying sufficient for the many” At the core of these complex problems a prime solution focus occurs at the cusp of nano, bio, AI and robotics. It is here we will see the creation of new materials and processes that far exceed the performance of natural materials, and the amplification of limited human thinking, imagination and creativity. Most important of all is the ability to both recover materials for reuse whilst investing minimal energy for their manipulation and forming. The pulling of turbine blades from a single crystal, 3/4D printing of plastics, ceramics, and metals to create manifolds and other complex forms are now common examples. However, in the R&D labs engineers and scientists are striving to realise programmable materials using plastic and biological alternatives that can self repair, change colour, store energy and demonstrate a programmable shape on demand. The key here is unprecedented strength to weight ratios and performance with minimal processing cost and maximal material recovery, but there are potentially even bigger gains in the logistic chain. It is not uncommon for components to traverse the planet several time from producer to assembly shops and then the final system integrator. The electronics, vehicle, domestic and office white and brown goods industries definitely sit firmly in this bracket. Now, if we were to move the material printing and programming families close to, or onto, the customer site, we would only have to ship materials in solid, powder and fluid form and thus drastically reduce the number of trucks, ships, planes and trains required. To exemplify this another notch: we are close to being able to produce flexible mobile and wearable devices in a similar way we deal with sheet paper and plastic: A battery layer, a screen layer, a transducer layer with hanging electronics bonding the whole almost like the reinforcing in concrete. When we augment all this with vertical farms in cities and towns with food grown at the point of need, the dispersement of energy storage and supply, along with localised water sources and storage we will be far closer to real, than politically correct, sustainability. And how comfortably it all sits with the internet, IoT, BlockChain, GigEconomy, Publishing, eCommerce and Social Nets as part of a new dispersed economy. Empower a Billion Lives IntroducingIEEE Empower a Billion Lives IEEE Empower a Billion Lives is a global competition aimed at fostering innovation to develop solutions to electricity access. Solutions are expected to be scalable, regionally relevant, holistic, and leverage 21st century technologies with exponentially declining prices. Energy access is a global challenge There are 3 billion people in the world living in energy poverty, and over 1 billion people without any access to electricity. So far, only 1.8 million people have gained tier 2 energy access by using off-grid electric services. To address energy poverty, more of the same may not be the answer. New strategies are needed to scale energy access solutions 1000x. Energy access means opportunity Access to electricity is critical to health care delivery and to the overarching goal of universal health coverage. The WHO defines access to essential medicines and technologies as one of the key factors in ensuring universal health coverage. Most of these essential technologies require electricity, and without electricity, many health care interventions simply cannot be provided. Despite this, a study found that only 26% of health facilities in the Sub-Saharan Africa has access to reliable electricity. A different type of competition The IEEE Empower a Billion Lives competition is agnostic to energy sources, technologies, and business models. Solutions will be evaluated on both their technical innovation and business viability to rapidly and sustainably scale to one billion customers. The competition is completely open to all, including student groups, small- and medium-sized companies, research labs, international corporations, and non-profit organizations. The competition is organized by IEEE, an all-volunteer organization whose goal is to foster technological innovation and excellence for the benefit of humanity. 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. The Future Now Show Special October 2018 Arjen Kamphuis still missing in Norway For updates, please check the press. Nordland Police District, Norway, 5 September 2018: “Arjen Kamphuis was last seen when he checked out of Scandic Bodø hotel on the 20. of August. Kamphuis has still not been found and the case is open for different outcomes, but still we have not found anything that indicates that a crime has been committed. A phone who is linked to Mr Kamphuis has been turned on for a short while in an area outside of Stavanger on the evening of the 30. of August, but the police have no confirmed information whether it is Mr Kamphuis himself whom are operating the phone.” The Future Now Showfeatures September 2014Climate Change, Food, Social Revolution and …Kirsten van Dam, Arjen Kamphuis, Hardy F. Schloer and Lise Voldeng The Future Now Show 1.6 trillion litres of air cleaned so far. Graviky Labs innovated first in the world technique to indentify particulate carbon as a recyclable waste and created several processes to make high-grade, AIR-INK. This enables the pollution to be recycled into new materials and not end up in other streams. We have also developed KAALINK, a patent-pending end-of-pipe technology which captures ultra-fine carbon emissions from diesel exhaust and ambient pollution locations. The technology is still under development is open to licensing. News about the Future Bombardier Transportation Presents a New Battery-Operated Train and Sets Standards for Sustainable Mobility The new battery-operated train is the first of its kind and was developed for Germany over the course of the past 60 years. It does not generate any exhaust and sets the standards for smart mobility with peak values of 90 percent in the areas of efficiency and recyclability. It is also around 50 percent quieter than modern diesel trains. According to a comparative study by the Technical University of Dresden, the battery-operated train clearly has an edge with respect to the total costs across the service life of 30 years. Biodegradable Plastics A new analysis from IHS Markit reports that the current market value of biodegradable plastics exceeds $1.1 billion in 2018 and could reach $1.7 billion by 2023. These plastics — known more precisely as biodegradable or compostable polymers — are bio-based or fossil-fuel-based chemical compositions that undergo microbial decomposition to carbon dioxide and water in industrial or municipal compost facilities. A few of these polymers have the capacity to decompose in backyard compost bins or in soil, freshwater, or saltwater. Amputees feel as though their prosthesic limb belongs to their own body by EPFL In a breakthrough approach that combines virtual reality and artificial tactile sensations, two amputees feel as though their prosthetic hand belongs to their own body. Moreover, the scientists show that the phantom limb actually grows into their prosthetic han Recommended Book The Next Step: Exponential Lifeby Aubrey de Grey The Next Step: Exponential Life presents essays on the potential of what are known as – exponential technologies – those whose development is accelerating rapidly, such as robotics, artificial intelligence or industrial biology .considering their economic, social, environmental, ethical and even ontological implications. This book’s premise is that humanity is at the beginning of a technological revolution that is evolving at a much faster pace than earlier ones . a revolution is so far-reaching it is destined to generate transformations we can only begin to imagine. Contributors include Aubrey D.N.J. de Grey, Jonathan Rossiter, Joseph A. Paradiso, Kevin Warwick, Huma Shah, Ramon Lopez de Mantaras, Helen Papagiannis, Jay David Bolter, Maria Engberg, Robin Hanson, Stuart Russell, Darrell M. West, Francisco Gonzalez, Chris Skinner, Steven Monroe Lipkin, S. Matthew Liao, James Giordano, Luciano Floridi, Sean O Heigeartaigh and Martin Rees. Sound & Architecture Meyer Sound was a key collaborator for RESONATE: Thinking Sound and Space, a groundbreaking conference that brought together architects, acoustical engineers, sound artists, journalists, museum directors and students for a unique and wide-ranging exchange of ideas and inspiration. Focused exclusively on the role of sound in architectural space, the full-day program was co-organized by reSITE, a Prague-based nonprofit platform acting to improve the urban environment, and MAAT (Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology) in Lisbon, Portugal that hosted the event. Foster & Partners, Meyer Sound: Sound as Invisible Architecture | RESONATE The GRI Standards The GRI Standards are the first global standards for sustainability reporting. They feature a modular, interrelated structure, and represent the global best practice for reporting on a range of economic, environmental and social impacts. Futurist Portrait: Mark Stevenson Reluctant Futurist’ Mark Stevenson is an author, broadcaster and expert on global trends and innovation.Mark is a London-based British author, businessman, public speaker and futurologist, as well as a former semi-professional musician and comedian. He is founder of Flow Associates, a cultural learning agency and the cultural change practice We Do Things Differently. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce. Stevenson’s first book, An Optimist’s Tour of the Future, was released in the United Kingdom in January 2011 (February 2011 in the United States). His second, We Do Things Differently followed on 5th January 2017 Mark: “I’m not saying the future will be better … but there’s everything to play for.” When unexpectedly confronted with his own mortality, Mark Stevenson – a writer, deep-thinker, and stand-up comedian – began to ponder what the future holds for our species. Stevenson set out simply, asking, “What’s next?” and then traveled the globe in pursuit of the answers. His voyage of discovery took him to Oxford to meet Transhumanists (they intend to live forever), to Boston where he confronted a robot with mood swings, to an underwater cabinet meeting in the Indian Ocean, and Australia to question the Outback’s smartest farmer. He clambered around space planes in the Mojave desert, got to grips with the potential of nanotechnology, delved deep into the possibilities of biotech, saw an energy renaissance on a printer, a revolution in communications, had his genome profiled, glimpsed the next stage of human evolution … and tried to make sense of what’s in store. A meticulous researcher, Stevenson sifts the genuine concerns about new technologies from fear-mongering – offering up a balanced take on everything from nanotech ‘grey goo’ to worries about population and resource crises, pandemics, climate change and new forms of terrorism. “I’m not saying the future will be better,” he says “but I do know there’s everything to play for.” printable version