Transcript Document

Catalyzing the Symbiotic Age:
Discovering, Predicting, and Creating our Next Era of
Accelerating Change
Las Vegas Future Salon
John Smart, President, ASF
(accelerating.org/slides.html)
Presentation Outline
1. Definitions
2. Futuring I: Intro to Accelerating Change
3. Futuring II: Globalization, Information, Service Age
4. Futuring III: The Symbiotic, Intelligence Age
5. Activism: Accelerating Positive Change
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© 2005 Accelerating.org
1. Definitions
Acceleration Studies Foundation
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
ASF (Accelerating.org) is a nonprofit community of scientists,
technologists, entrepreneurs, administrators, educators,
analysts, humanists, and systems theorists discussing and
dissecting accelerating change.

We practice “developmental future studies,” that is, we seek to
discover a set of persistent factors, stable trends, convergent
capacities, and highly probable scenarios for our common future,
and to use this information now to improve our daily evolutionary
choices.

Specifically, these include accelerating intelligence, immunity,
and interdependence in our global sociotechnological systems,
increasing technological autonomy, and the increasing intimacy
of the human-machine, physical-digital interface.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Systems Theory
Systems Theorists Make Things Simple
(sometimes too simple!)
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
— Albert Einstein
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Discovery, Prediction, and Creation:
Yin, You, and Yang of Accelerating Change
Equally Important Life Processes:
Ends, Philosophy, and Means
Nurture, Organism, and Nature
Destination, Life, and Journey
Development, Complex System, and Evolution
Discovery, Prediction, and Creation
What you manage to achieve in life (innovation, productivity) is a
serendipitous synthesis of what unexpected benefits and
catastrophes come to you (discovery), what you aim for
(prediction), and the unique things you make along the way
(creation).
Innovation is a synthesis of discovery, prediction, and creation.
Lack of interest in the unexpected (good or bad), short-term thinking (and
“the future can’t be predicted”), and resistance to the new are also
discovery, prediction, and creation choices.
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The Evo-Devo Paradigm
May Explain Many Natural Polarities
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Evolution
Development
Creativity
Novelty-Seeking
Female
“Right Brain”
Democratic
Freedom
Experimentation
Play
Entropy Creation
“Watch a Movie at 1am”
“Sleep at 1pm”
Discovery
Truth-Seeking
Male
“Left Brain”
Republican
Justice
Optimization
Work
Entropy Density Maximization
“Sleep at 1am”
“Watch a Movie at 1pm”
As complex systems, we each have both of these qualities.
Their best use always depends on context.
Use them both. Keep the balance.
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Replication & Variation
“Natural Selection”
Adaptive Radiation
Chaos, Contingency
Pseudo-Random Search
Strange Attractors
Evolution
Complex Environmental Interaction
The Left and Right Hands of
“Evolutionary Development”
Left Hand
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New Computat’l Phase Space Opening
Selection & Convergence
“Convergent Selection”
Emergence,Global Optima
MEST-Compression
Standard Attractors
Development
Right Hand
Well-Explored Phase Space Optimization
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How Many Eyes Are
Developmentally Optimal?
Evolution tried this experiment.
Development calculated an operational optimum.
Some reptiles (e.g. Xantusia vigilis, and certain skinks)
still have a parietal (“pineal”) vestigial third eye.
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How Many Wheels are Developmentally
Optimal on an Automobile?
Examples: Wheel on Earth. Social computation device.
Diffusion proportional to population density and diversity.
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The Symbiotic Age
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A time when computers “speak our language.”
A time when our technologies are very
responsive to our needs and desires.
A time when humans and machines are
intimately connected, and always improving
each other.
A time when we will begin to feel “naked”
without our computer “clothes.”
© 2005 Accelerating.org
The Start of Symbiosis: The Digital Era
With the advent of the transistor (June 1, 1948), the
commercial digital world emerged.
New problems have emerged (population, human rights,
asymmetric conflict, environment), yet we see solutions
for each in coming waves of technological globalization.
“The human does not change, but our house
becomes exponentially more intelligent.”
We look back not to Spencer or Marx and their
human-directed Utopias, but to Henry Adams,
who realized the core acceleration is due to
the intrinsic properties of technological systems.
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Michael Riordan, Crystal Fire, 1998
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2. Futuring I:
Intro to Accelerating Change
Acceleration Quiz
Q: Of the 100 top economies in the world, how
many are multinational corporations and how
many are nation states?
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Acceleration Quiz
Q: Of the 100 top economies in the world, how
many are multinational corporations and how
many are nation states?
51 MNC’s and 49 Nations.
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Acceleration Quiz
Q: Disney and Sony (respectively) produce and
launch one new product every _________?
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Acceleration Quiz
Q: Disney and Sony (respectively) produce and
launch one new product every _________?
Once every three minutes for Disney.
Once every twenty minutes for Sony.
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Acceleration Quiz
Q: How much of Hewlett Packard’s revenue
comes from products launched in the last
year?
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Acceleration Quiz
Q: How much of Hewlett Packard’s revenue
comes from products launched in the last
year?
70%
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Elizabeth Debold, What is Enlightenment?, March-May 2005
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Acceleration Quiz
Q: How many of the lowest net-worth Americans
would it take to approximate Bill Gate’s net
worth?
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Acceleration Quiz
Q: How many of the lowest net-worth Americans
would it take to approximate Bill Gate’s net
worth?
Roughly 110 million Americans in 1997,
when his net worth was $40 billion. At $30
billion presently (2005), Mr. Gates ranks
roughly as the 60th largest country (of 280)
and the 55th largest business. When MSFT
went public in 1986, Bill was worth $230
million.
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NYU economist Edward Wolff, Top Heavy, 2002
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Something Curious Is Going On
Unexplained.
(Don’t look for this in your physics or information theory texts…)
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Henry Adams, 1909:
The First “Singularity Theorist”
The final Ethereal
Phase would last
only about four
years, and
thereafter "bring
Thought to the
limit of its
possibilities."
Wild speculation
or computational
reality?
Still too early to
tell, at present.
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The Technological Singularity
Each unique physicalcomputational substrate
appears to have its own
“capability curve.”
The information inherent in
these substrates is apparently
not made obsolete, but is
instead incorporated into the
developmental architecture of
the next emergent system.
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From Biogenesis to Intelligent Technology:
The “Accelerating Phase” of Universal ED
Carl Sagan’s
“Cosmic
Calendar”
(Dragons of
Eden, 1977)
Each month is
roughly 1
billion years.
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Brief History of Accelerating Change
Billion
Years Ago
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Generations Ago
12
Big Bang (MEST)
11.5
Milky Way (Atoms)
8
Sun (Energy)
4.5
Earth (Molecules)
3.5
Bacteria (Cell)
2.5
Sponge (Body)
0.7
Clams (Nerves)
0.5
Trilobites (Brains)
0.2
Bees (Swarms)
0.100
Mammals
0.002
Humans, Tools &
Clans Co-evolution
100,000
Speech
750
Agriculture
500
Writing
400
Libraries
40
Universities
24
Printing
16
Accurate Clocks
5
Telephone
4
Radio
3
Television
2
Computer
1
Internet/e-Mail
0
GPS, CD, WDM
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Eric Chaisson’s “Phi” (Φ):
A Universal Moore’s Law Curve
Free Energy Rate Density
Substrate
Ф
(ergs/second/gram)
time
Galaxies
Stars
Planets (Early)
Plants
Animals/Genetics
Brains (Human)
Culture (Human)
Int. Comb. Engines
Jets
Pentium Chips
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0.5
2 (“counterintuitive”)
75
900
20,000(10^4)
150,000(10^5)
500,000(10^5)
(10^6)
(10^8)
(10^11)
Source: Eric Chaisson, Cosmic Evolution, 2001
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Big Picture
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Outer Space
2025: Sustainability, Transitioning to Nuclear, Hydrogen and Solar
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Human Space
2025: Advanced Globalization, Transparency, Early Symbiotic Age,
Linguistic User Interface, Early Valuecosm
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Inner Space
2025: Synthetic and Computational Biology, Early Technocellular
Substrate (Silicon Photonics, Spintronics, Nuclear Energy, etc.)
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Cyber Space
2025: GPS/LPS, Local Search, Persistent and Mirror Worlds, Early
Artificial Life and Hyperreality
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Hyper Space
2025: Bio-Inspired Computing, Early Personality Capture/DT
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Virtual Space:
Is Inner Space the Final Frontier?
Mirror Worlds, David Gelernter, 1998.
Real structures in spacetime (very large and very small) are:
• Computationally very simple and tractable (transparent)
• A vastly slower substrate for evolutionary development
• Rapidly encapsulated by our simulation science
• A “rear view mirror” on the developmental trajectory of
emergence of universal intelligence?
versus
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Non-Autonomous ISS
Autonomous Human Brain
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Smart’s Laws of Technology
1. Tech learns ten million times faster than you do.
(Electronic vs. biological rates of evolutionary development).
2. Humans are selective catalysts, not controllers, of
technological evolutionary development.
(Regulatory choices. Ex: WMD production or transparency,
P2P as a proprietary or open source development)
3. The first generation of any technology is often
dehumanizing, the second is indifferent to humanity,
and with luck the third becomes net humanizing.
(Cities, cars, cellphones, computers).
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The Prediction Wall and
The Prediction Crystal Ball
What does hindsight tell us
about prediction?
The Year 2000 was the
most intensive long range
prediction effort of its time,
done at the height of the
forecasting/ operations
research/ cybernetics/
think tank (RAND) driven/
“instrumental rationality”
era of Futures Studies.
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(Kahn & Wiener, 1967).
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Moore’s Law
Moore’s Law derives from two predictions in 1965 and
1975 by Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel, that computer
chips (processors, memory, etc.) double their complexity
every 12-24 months at near constant unit cost.
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This is one of several abstractions of Moore’s Law, due to
miniaturization of transistor density in two dimensions.
Others relate to speed (the signals have less distance to
travel) and computational power (speed × density).
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Relative Growth Rates are
Surprisingly Predictable
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Brad DeLong (2003) noted that memory density predictably
outgrows microprocessor density, which predictably outgrows
wired bandwidth, which predictably outgrows wireless.
Expect: 1st: New Storage Apps, 2nd: New Processing Apps, 3rd: New
Communications Apps, 4th: New Wireless Apps
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Some Tech Capacity Growth Rates Are
Independent of Socioeconomic Cycles
There are many natural cycles:
Plutocracy-Democracy, Boom-Bust,
Conflict-Peace…
Ray Kurzweil first noted that a
generalized, century-long Moore’s
Law was unaffected by the U.S.
Great Depression of the 1930’s.
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Conclusion: Human-discovered,
Not human-created complexity here.
Not many intellectual or physical
resources are required to keep us on
the accelerating developmental
trajectory. (“MEST compression
is a rigged game.”)
Age of Spiritual Machines, 1999
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Ray Kurzweil: A Generalized Moore’s Law
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Hans Moravec, Robot, 1999
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Four Pre-Singularity Subcycles?
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A 30-year cycle, from 1990-2020
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A 20-year cycle, from 2020-2040
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LUI personality capture (weak uploading), Mature
Self-Reconfig./Evolutionary Computing.
2050: Era of Strong Autonomy
–
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LUI network, Biotech, not bio-augmentation,
Adaptive Robots, Peace/Justice Crusades.
A 10-year cycle, from 2040-2050
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1st gen "stupid net "/early IA, weak nano, 2nd
gen Robots, early Ev Comp. World security begins.
Progressively shorter 5-, 2-, 1-year tech cycles,
each more autocatalytic, human-centric, invisible.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Ephemeralization: The Accelerating Efficiency
of Physical-Computational Transformations
In 1938 (Nine Chains to the Moon), poet and polymath
Buckminster Fuller coined "Ephemeralization,” positing
that in nature, "all progressions are from material to
abstract" and "every one of the ephemeralization trends..
eventually hits the electrical stage."
(And today, due to principles like superposition,
entanglement, negative waves, and tunneling, the world of
the quantum (electron, photon, etc.) appears even more
ephemeral than the world of collective electricity.)
In 1981 (Critical Path), Fuller called ephemeralization, "the invisible chemical,
metallurgical, and electronic production of ever-more-efficient and satisfyingly
effective performance with the investment of ever-less weight and volume of
materials per unit function formed or performed". In Synergetics 2, 1983, he
called it "the principle of doing ever more with ever less weight, time and
energy per each given level of functional performance”
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This trend has also been called “virtualization” and Matter, Energy, Space,
Time (MEST) compression, efficiency, or density by other theorists.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
MEST Compression: Managing
Technological Development
Since the birth of civilization, humanity has been
learning to build special types of technological systems
that are progressively able to do more for us, in a more
networked and resilient fashion, using less resources
(matter, energy, space, time, human and economic
capital) to deliver any fixed amount of complexity,
productivity, or capability.
We are faced daily with many possible evolutionary
choices in which to invest our precious time, energy, and
resources, but only a few optimal developmental
pathways will clearly "do more, and better, with less."
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Unreasonable Effectiveness/Efficiency:
Eugene Wigner and Carver Mead
The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the
Natural Sciences, Nobel Laureate Eugene Wigner, 1960
After Wigner and Freeman Dyson’s work in 1951, on symmetries
and simple universalities in mathematical physics.
F=ma
F=-(Gm1m2)/r2
E=mc2
W=(1/2mv2)
Commentary on the “Unreasonable Efficiency of Physics
in the Microcosm,” VSLI Pioneer Carver Mead, c. 1980.
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In 1968, Mead predicted we would create
much smaller (to 0.15 micron) multi-million
chip transistors that would run far faster and
more efficiently. He later generalized this
observation to a number of other devices.
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Example: Holey Optical Fibers
Lasers today can made cheaply only in some
areas of the EM spectrum, not including, for
example, UV laser light for cancer detection
and tissue analysis. It was discovered in 2004
that a hollow optical fiber filled with hydrogen
gas, a device known as a "photonic
crystal," can convert cheap laser light to the
wavelengths previously unavailable.
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Above: SEM image of a photonic crystal fiber. Note periodic
array of air holes. The central defect (missing hole in the middle)
acts as the fiber's core. The fiber is about 40 microns across.
This conversion system is a million times (106) more energy
efficient than all previous converters. These are the kinds of
jaw-dropping efficiency advances that continue to drive the
ICT and networking revolutions.
Such advances are due even more to human discovery (in
physical microspace) than to human creativity, which is why
they have accelerated throughout the 20th century, even as we
remain uncertain exactly why they continue to occur. © 2005 Accelerating.org
Acceleration Awareness
What do you see
accelerating around you?
What do you see
remaining constant?
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Many Accelerations are Underwhelming
Some Modest Exponentials:
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Productivity per U.S. worker hr has improved 500%
over 75 years (1929-2004, 2% per yr)
Business investment as % of U.S. GDP is flat at 11%
over 25 years.
Nondefense R&D spending as % of First World GDP
is up 30% (1.6 to 2.1%) over 21 years (1981-2002).
Technology spending as % of U.S. GDP is up 100%
(4% to 8%) over 35 years (1967-2002)
BusinessWeek, 75th Ann. Issue, “The Innovation Economy”, 10.11.2004
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Different Kinds of Accelerations:
Efficiency vs. Transformation
Business Week’s First Edition, October 1929:
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IBM has an ad for “electric sorting machines.”
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PG&E has an ad announcing natural gas
powered factories in San Francisco.
Could we have predicted that one of these
technologies would continually transform itself
while another would experience accelerating
efficiencies but, on the surface, be
unchanged?
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Physical Space:
Is Biotech a Saturated Substrate?
21st century neuropharm and neurotech won’t
accelerate biological complexity!
– Neural homeostasis fights “top-down” interventions
– “Most complex structure in the known universe”
Strong resistance to disruptive biointerventions
– Ingroup ethics, body image, personal identity
We’ll learn a lot, not biologically “redesign humans”
– No human-scale time, ability or reason to do so.
– Expect “regression to mean” (elim. disease) instead.
Neuroscience will accelerate technological complexity
– Biologically inspired computing. “Structural mimicry.”
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Physical Space: Accelerating
Public Transparency (“Panopticon”)
David Brin,
The Transparent Society, 1998
Hitachi’s mu-chip:
RFID for paper currency
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Punctuated Equilibrium (in Biology,
Economics, Politics… and Technology)
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Eldredge and Gould
(Biological Species)
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Pareto’s Law (“The 80/20 Rule”)
(income distribution  technology, econ, politics)
Rule of Thumb: 20% Punctuation (Development)
80% Equilibrium (Evolution)
Suggested Reading:
For the 20%: Clay Christiansen, The Innovator's Dilemma
For the 80%: Jason Jennings, Less is More © 2005 Accelerating.org
Three Hierarchical Systems
of Social Change
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Technological (dominant since 1950!)
“It’s all about the technology” (what it enables, how
inexpensively it can be developed)
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Economic (dominant 1800-1950’s, secondary now)
“It’s all about the money” (who has it, control they gain with it)
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Political/Cultural (dominant pre-1800’s, tertiary now)
“It’s all about the power” (who has it, control they gain with it)
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Developmental Trends:
1. The levels have reorganized, to “fastest first.”
2. More pluralism (a network property) on each level.
Pluralism examples: 40,000 NGO’s, rise of the power
of media, tort law, Insurance, lobbies, etc.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
3. Futuring II:
Globalization, Information, Service Age
Our Greatest Strategic Interest:
Managing Globalization
“America has had 200 years to
invent, regenerate, and calibrate
the balance that keeps markets free
without becoming monsters. We
have the tools to make a difference.
We have the responsibility to make
a difference. And we have a huge
interest in making a difference.
Managing globalization is… our
overarching national interest today
and the political party that
understands that first… will own the
real bridge to the future.”
- Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and
the Olive Tree: Understanding
Globalization (2000).
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Globalization Eras
Globalization I: 1800’s – WWI
Mechanism:
Industrial Revolution, cheap transportation
Backlash Ideologies:
Communism, Socialism, Fascism
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Globalization Eras
Globalization II: 1980’s – Present
Mechanism:
Information Revolution, cheap communications
Backlash Ideologies:
Fundamentalism, civil disobedience, crime, ecoactivism
Examples: Sem Teto, Hugo Chavez
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© 2005 Accelerating.org
Globalization Eras
Backlash forces have to be kept in check by
•
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•
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global economic growth
accountability
transparency
fair policies
minimal government (maximizing economic
and technological development)
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Information Age:
Closing of Global Divides
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Digital divide is already closing fast. 77% of
the world now has access to a telephone*.
Innovation leader: Grameen Telecom
Income divide may be closing the next
fastest. First world plutocracy still increasing,
but we are already “rationalizing” global
workforce wages in the last decade*.
Education divide may close next (post-LUI)
Power divide likely to close last. Political
change is the slowest of all domains.
*World Bank, 2005
© 2005 Accelerating.org
U.S. Transcontinental Railroad:
Promontory Point Fervor
Built mostly by hardworking immigrants
The Network of the 1880’s
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IT Globalization Revolution (2000-20):
Promontory Point Revisited
The more things change,
the more some things
stay the same.
The intercontinental internet will be built
primarily by hungry young programmers
and tech support personnel in India, Asia,
third-world Europe, Latin America, and
other developing economic zones.
In coming decades, such individuals will outnumber the First World
technical support population between five- and ten-to-one.
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Consider what this means for the goals of U.S. business and
education: Global management, partnerships, and collaboration.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Empire Progression
(Note the West-Far East Trajectory)
Japan
(Temporary: Pop density,
Few youth, no resources.
East Asian Tigers
(Taiwan
Hong Kong
South Korea
Singapore)
American
India
China
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Expect a Singapore-style “Autocratic Capitalist”
transition. Population control, plentiful resources,
stunning growth rate, drive, and intellectual capital.
U.S. science fairs: 50,000 high school kids/year.
Chinese science fairs: 6,000,000 kids/year. For now.
BHR-1, 2002
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Our Generation’s Theme
First World Saturating,
Third World Uplifting.
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The Pentagon’s New Map
A New Global Defense Paradigm
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Shrinking the Disconnected Gap
The Computational “Ozone Hole”
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© 2005 Accelerating.org
Examples: Iraq
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Communications (cellphones)
Lighting (digital solid state)
Energy (centralized economies of scale, subsidized
deflationary prices; decentralized storage and
generation)
Example: Donkey cart generators
Security (networked cameras; camera traps)
Culturally-dependent: Britain vs. S. Africa vs. U.S.
Portable CD Players/local music ($10 at Wal-Mart)
Public access radio and TV stations
Food storage, culinary, and women’s needs
Sports / Youth Fads
© 2005 Accelerating.org
The Say-Do Development Gap
2,600 Iraqi Development Projects Promised
160 under way presently. (Time, July 2004)
Of all of these, communications has been our
biggest shortcoming (“failure to communicate”).
We wired ourselves superbly (CPOF) but we never
wired in to the populace, or even helped them to wire
themselves, in exponential fashion.
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Example: DARPA/USC ICT Tactical Language project.
Top-down thinking. Avatars vs. Persistent Worlds.
We could have had scores of Iraqi/Arabic youth teaching
our incoming soldiers tactical culture in massively
multiplayer online worlds, and using those worlds for
their own benefit as well. A tipping point among the
youth (like Satellite Television in India, etc.). © 2005 Accelerating.org
Immune Recognition vs. Rejection
The phenomenon of immune recognition (and
immune tolerance) vs. rejection.
The honeymoon period.
Rejection, if no measurable exponential value
within the host network.
We did not pass this test (in fairness, we may
never have passed).
Nevertheless, there were many missed
opportunities for deploying MEV strategy.
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© 2005 Accelerating.org
Automation and the Service Society
Our 2002 service to manufacturing labor ratio,
110 million service to 21 million goods workers, is 4.2:1
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© 2005 Accelerating.org
Understanding Process Automation
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Perhaps 80% of today's First World
paycheck is paid for by automation
(“tech we tend”).
Robert Solow, 1987 Nobel in Economics
(Solow Productivity Paradox,
Theory of Economic Growth)
“7/8 comes from technical progress.”
Human contribution (20%?) to a First
World job is Social Value of Employment
+ Creativity + Education
Developing countries are next in line
(sooner or later).
Continual education and grants
(“taxing the machines”) are the final job
descriptions for all human beings.
Termite Mound
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Oil Refinery (Multi-Acre Automatic Factory)
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Tyler, Texas, 1964. 360 acres. Run by three operators,
each needing only a high school education.
The 1972 version eliminated the three operators.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Automation and Job Disruption
Between 1995 and 2002 the world’s 20 largest economies lost
22 million industrial jobs.
This is the shift from a Manufacturing to a Service Economy.
America lost about 2 million industrial jobs, mostly to China.
China lost 15 million such jobs, mostly to machines. (Fortune)
Despite the shrinking of America's industrial work force, the
country's overall industrial output increased by 50% since
1992. (Economist)
“Robots are replacing humans or are greatly enhancing human performance in
mining, manufacture, and agriculture. Huge areas of clerical work are also
being automated. Standardized repetitive work is being taken over by
electronic systems. The key to America's continued prosperity depends on
shifting to ever more productive and diverse services. And the good news is
jobs here are often better paying and far more interesting than those on we
knew on farms and the assembly line.” (Tsvi Bisk)
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
"The Misery of Manufacturing," The Economist. Sept. 27, 2003
"Worrying About Jobs Isn't Productive," Fortune Magazine. Nov. 10, 2003
“The Future of Making a Living,” Tsvi Bisk, 2003
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Creative Destruction: Creating a Legal
and Social Culture of Innovation
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Of the top 25 companies in each country 25
years ago, how many are still the same?
France, Germany, Japan: Almost all.
Europe: Most
United States: Roughly half
Taiwan, Hong Kong: Very few
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree, 2000
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Taiwan’s Example
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Taiwan requires all university undergraduates
to take courses in Futures Studies.
Taiwan owns 46,000 contract factories in
China (mutually assured economic
destruction).
Taiwan has become the IT hardware
manufacturing capital of the world.
Taiwan has the highest degree of economic
creative destruction in the world.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
U.S. Innovation/Competitiveness/Acceleration
has flagged in recent years
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
China surpassed the U.S. this year as the largest recipient of
foreign direct investment.
In 2002, US Corporate R&D declined by $8 billion, largest
percentage drop since 1950.
Five countries (Japan, South Korea, Sweden, Finland, Israel)
spend more GDP on R&D than the U.S.
Foreign owned companies and foreign born inventors now count
for nearly half of all U.S. patents, with Japan, Korea, and Taiwan
accounting for more than one fourth.
Federal R&D funding is now 1/2 of its 1960's peak of 2% of GDP.
Total scientific papers by American authors peaked in 1992 and
have been flat ever since.
Services are the fastest growing sector of many technology
companies, yet much of our service sector, now more than half the
U.S. economy, traditionally does little R&D on business process
design, organization, and management.
Innovate America, NII, Council on Competitiveness, 2004
© 2005 Accelerating.org
National Innovation Initiative
Recommendations (sample)
Talent
Investment
Politics
Expedited, expanded
sci-tech immigration
3% of federal R&D for
“innov. accel.” grants
Cabinet-level or NEC
interagency group
National sci-tech
scholarship fund, tax
credits to contributors
3% of DoD budget
must go back to scitech, 20% of this at U’s
New innovation
metrics, national
innovation agenda
Portable graduate tech
fellowships similar to
NSF fellowships
Develop “services
science” as a new
academic discipline
National innovation
scorecard, prizes.
Better patent office.
Matching funds for
postsecondary MS
programs in tech and
innovation
Reward ten regional
“innovation hotspots”
with 5 yrs of funding
Improved IP, tort law,
intangible disclosure
law.
Our Biggest Opportunity: Innovation partnerships with the 3 billion
new workers who weren’t in the global economy ten years ago.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Innovate America, NII, Council on Competitiveness, 2004
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Innovation/Competitiveness/Acceleration vs.
Efficiency/Cooperation/Sustainability
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
The first of these macro processes of change is
evolutionary, the second developmental.
Ideally each must be equally prioritized, in
general (yet not in specific contexts).
Asia presently overweighted to the former,
Europe is overweighted to the latter.
The U.S. has fallen behind in the former in
recent years.
Innovate America, National Innovation Initiative, Council on Competitiveness, 2004
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Studies in Innovation
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Amar Bose (Bose Suspension System)
Bill Gates (Microsoft IPTV)
Sergey and Larry Brin (Google)
Jeff Bezos (Amazon)
Helen Greiner (iRobot)
© 2005 Accelerating.org
4. Futuring III:
The Symbiotic, Intelligence Age
An ICT Attractor:
The Linguistic User Interface
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Google’s cache (2002)
Watch Windows 2004 become
Conversations 2020…
Convergence of Infotech and Sociotech
© 2005 Accelerating.org
AI-in-the-Interface (a.k.a. “IA”)
• AI is growing, but slowly (KMWorld, 4.2003)
― $1B in ’93 (mostly defense), $12B in 2002
(now mostly commercial). AGR of 12%
― U.S., Asia, Europe equally strong
― Belief nets, neural nets, expert sys growing
faster than decision support and agents
― Incremental enhancement of existing apps
(online catalogs, etc.)
• Computer telephony (CT) making strides
(Wildfire, Booking Sys, Directory Sys).
ASR and TTS improve. Expect dedicated DSPs
on the desktop after central CT. (Circa 2010-15?)
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
• Coming: Linguistic User Interface (LUI)
Persuasive Computing, and
Personality Capture
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Infotech: Digital Ecologies
Key Questions: Public access? Subsidized? Education?
Strong network effects. Intrinsically socially stabilizing.
“There is no digital divide.” (Cato Institute)
Radio
Low Power TV
Groupware
Internet
IM/SMS
Avatars
Email
Cell Phones
Cordless Phones
Game PCs
Newspapers
(Program Guides)
Desktop PCs
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
PDAs
Social Software
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Today: Gmail
Free, search-based webmail service with 1,000
megabytes (1 gigabyte) of storage. Google
search quickly recalls any message you have
ever sent or received. No more need to file
messages to find them again.
All replies to each retrieved email are
automatically displayed (“threaded”). Relevant
text ads and links to related web pages are
displayed adjacent to email messages.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Tomorrow:
Social Software, Lifelogs
Gmail preserves, for the first time, everything we’ve ever
typed. Gmailers are all bloggers (who don’t know it).
Next, we’ll store everything we’ve ever said. Then
everything we’ve ever seen. This storage (and
processing, and bandwidth) makes us all networkable in
ways we never dreamed.
Lifeblog, SenseCam, What Was I Thinking, and
MyLifeBits (2003) are early examples of “LifeLogs.”
Systems for auto-archiving and auto-indexing all life
experience. Add NLP, collaborative filtering, and other
early AI to this, and data begins turning into wisdom.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Robo sapiens
“Huey and Louey”
AIST and Kawada’s HRP-2
(Something very cool
about this algorithm…)
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Aibo Soccer
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Personality Capture
In the long run, we become seamless with our machines.
No other credible long term futures have been proposed.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
“Technology is becoming organic. Nature is becoming
technologic.” (Brian Arthur, SFI)
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Your “Digital You” (Digital Twin)
“I would never upload my consciousness
into a machine.”
“I enjoy leaving behind stories about my life
for my children.”
Prediction: When your mother dies in 2050,
your digital mom will be “50% her.”
When your best friend dies in 2080, your
digital best friend will be “80% him.”
Successive approximation, seamless
integration, subtle transition.
When you can shift your own conscious
perspective between your electronic and
biological components, the encapsulation
and transcendence of the biological will feel
like only growth, not death.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
We wouldn’t have it any other way.
Greg Panos (and Mother)
PersonaFoundation.org
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Phase Transitions: Web, Semantic
Web, Social Software, Metaweb
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Nova Spivak, 2004
© 2005 Accelerating.org
The Valuecosm
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Microcosm, Telecosm (Gilder)
Datacosm (Sterling)
Valuecosm (Smart)
Recording and Publishing DT Preferences
Avatars that Act and Transact Better for Us
Mapping Positive Sum Social Interactions
Much Potential For Early Abuse (Advice)
Next Level of Digital Democracy (Holding
Powerful Plutocratic Actors Accountable)
Early Examples: Social Network Media
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Long Term Future: Solar Energy
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Twenty to fifty year development horizon.
5-10% efficiencies at present. Need 50%.
Need good, cheap energy storage systems.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Long-Term Future: Hurricane Control A New NASA/NOAA Mission?
Hurricane Ivan: $11B in property
damage. 11 named storms in 10
months in 2004, 7 have caused
damage in U.S.
NOAA expects decades of
hurricane hyperactivity.
Ross Hoffman, use Solar Powered Satellites (SPS’s).
In 1968, Peter Glaser, microwave-relay SPS’s for
power on earth, tuned away from climate. These would
be tuned to water vapor (like microwave oven). Low
pressure centers disruptible by atmospheric heating.
Very sensitive to hi pressure side steering. Cyclones,
monsoons, blizzards, possibly even tornados.
Research: Russian mylar mirrors, 1993, 1999 (failed).
23 m mirror (above), 5 km light circle on the ground.
Arrays would raise surface temp. several degrees.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Controlling Hurricanes, Scientific American, 10.2004
© 2005 Accelerating.org
5. Activism:
Accelerating Positive Change
The Future is Already Here
We need a pragmatic optimism, a can-do, change-aware attitude. A
balance between innovation and preservation. Honest dialogs on
persistent problems, tolerance of imperfect solutions. The ability to
avoid both doomsaying and a paralyzing adherence to the status quo.
- David Brin (paraphrased)
We have two options:
Future Shock or Future Shaping
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Some Tools for Shaping the Future
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Palo Alto
Education
Investment
Environmental Literacy / Scanning
– Technological
– Business
– Social/Political
Culture of Foresight
Culture of Innovation
Culture of Competition (fair, creatively destructive)
Culture of Leadership
Local Commitment
Global Perspective
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Leadership Questions
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Palo Alto
Are you sharing your future visions or keeping
them quiet?
Are you getting critiques and feedback, and is this
changing your perspective?
Are you responding respectfully, adequately, yet
concisely to your critics?
Are you looking for others who also want to work
toward a common vision?
Is this a mutual appreciation society or is your
group affecting real change?
Are you tolerant of parallel, pluralist approaches?
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Education Questions
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Palo Alto
How do we improve the critical early years of
child education (e.g., Zerotothree.org)?
How do we educate our youth and ourselves
to have a futures perspective?
How do we learn to see the value of local
commitment and global compassion?
How do we learn how to create a better
individual future through collective action?
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Investment Questions
Are you practicing socially responsible and
technologically responsible (acceleration
aware) investing?
Supporting companies, products and services that are
increasingly:
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Global
Intelligent
Interdependent
Immune/Transparent
Efficient
Innovative
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Literacy Questions
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Are you computer, web, and communications
savvy?
Do you use social network media (blogs, web
communities, etc.)?
Do you subsidize online and technological
innovation (leading, not bleeding edge)?
Are you reading and interpreting what’s going
on in the world?
See ASF Community Directory
(accelerating.org/community.html)
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Futuring Questions
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Do you take time to consider the past,
present, and future of your personal and
professional life?
Do you use strategic planning, scanning,
competitive intelligence, trend extrapolation,
forecasting, scenario generation, or other
futures tools?
Do you read the opinions of key future
thinkers in your areas of professional interest?
Are you supporting the emergence of a
professional futures community?
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Innovation Questions
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Are you thinking about innovation across the
spectrum (products and services, offline and
online)?
Do you know which of your employees,
business partners, and customers is the most
innovative, all else equal? Do you reward that
in your business model?
Are you working with a global and virtual
innovation team?
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Activism:
Good Leadership Attributes
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The best are passionate about 1) creating community,
and 2) making it easy for users to find their voice.
Stephen Covey,
The Eighth Habit, 2004
“Find your voice and
inspire others to find theirs.”
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
They are slow to criticize, ego-minimizing, always
striving to be nice, modelling good behavior,
empathic, yet responsive to communication problems.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
Civic Space (Online Community Platform)
Now:
Website Mgmt/Blogging
Forums
File Storage
Photo Galleries
Polls and Surveys
Social Networking
Calendaring
Event Organizing
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Coming:
Contact Management
Mass Mailing
Donation Management
“CivicSpace enables bottom-up people-powered campaigns to operate on a more
level playing field with more traditional top-down organizations, and, similarly,
allows top-down organizations to leverage the power of grassroots organizing.”
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
LinkedIn (Business Networking)
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
Skype (Internet Telephony)
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
Videoconferencing and Groupware
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SOHO Web and Video Conferencing
WaveThree: $199. Max of 10, 128 Kbps/user.
Linktivity: $1,500 + dedicated server. Max of 5 users.
VoiceCafe: $75/month. Max of 5 users
Viditel: $35/month/person, unlim. meetings
iChat AV: $150 webcam, OS X, broadband
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Dramatic improvements over the last year.
Groupware
Groove Virtual Office: $69/person, one time cost.
Just purchased by Microsoft. Robin Good: Best
SOHO groupware solution for PowerPoints, file
sharing, IM, private spaces, and project development
tools. No audio or video capacities at present.
Drawback: Need a fast computer.
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
Groove Virtual Office (Groupware)
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
Groove Virtual Office (Groupware)
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
Nokia Lifeblog
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
User-Created 3D Persistent Worlds
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Digital Activism:
User-Created 3D Persistent Worlds
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
Future Salon in Second Life
Streaming audio for main speaker, chat for others.
Streaming video (April 2005).
Cost: $10 for life + fast graphics card ($180)
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Activism:
IdeaShare
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Los Angeles
Palo Alto
A global shareware ideas bank
Unleashing the ingenuity of students
Improving innovation and entrepreneurship
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Brief Survey of U.S. Problems
and Some Potential Partial Solutions
Problem: Crime-ridden inner cities
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
U.S. Problems & Solutions
Problem: Crime-ridden inner cities
Solution: Subsidized front-lawn cameras
(camera traps) photographing all
neighborhood activity, car drive-bys, people,
etc. 97% of several hundred thousand
surveillance cameras in Manhattan are
privately owned.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
U.S. Problems & Solutions
Problem: Widening income gaps, loss of middle
class weakens democracy
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
U.S. Problems & Solutions
Problem: Widening income gaps, loss of middle
class weakens democracy
Solution: This is pendular, no middle class 100
years ago, maximum middle class 50 years
ago. How do we reverse the current trend?
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
U.S. Problems & Solutions
Problem: Underfunded, archaic, and overregulated public schools
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
U.S. Problems & Solutions
Problem: Underfunded, archaic, and overregulated public schools
Solution: Digital kids. More online education.
Home schooling resources. Young teacher
recruitment. Technology internships.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
The Extraordinary Present
“There has never been a time more
pregnant with possibilities.”
- Gail Carr Feldman
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org
Action Items
1. Free Accelerating Times e-news (Accelerating.org)
2. Attend Accelerating Change 2005
September 16-18 at Stanford, Palo Alto, CA
3. Send feedback to [email protected]
Thank You.
Los Angeles
Palo Alto
© 2005 Accelerating.org