Protect Humanity & Democracy From Big Tech
Simple Version: Technology gives us the power of gods. Without the wisdom and love of gods, we will destroy ourselves.
My Unfiltered Thoughts: Nuclear weapons marked the first time that technology enabled humans to irreparably harm both the project of civilization and the earth itself. Entire world systems were built to safeguard against the unwise use of that technology. Today, we face more potentially catastrophic technologies and social/ecological dynamics than most people are even aware of, nevermind having global systems of safeguard for: artificial intelligence, biological gene editing, social media driven polarization, insect die-off, the list goes on, yet the inadequacy of existing systems to protect us from these risks is barely on the radar of our political discourse.
We need both systems (institutions, legal frameworks, infrastructure etc) and virtues (wisdom, compassion, resilience etc) to protect us from our own insatiable urge to innovate, which drives change faster than we can create protections, or even understand. If technology is changing faster than government can even keep track of, never mind regulate, then we need fundamentally new thinking about both the design of government and the responsibilities of individuals.
This is not a time to elect people wanting to score points in a culture war, or seeking to make life a bit better at the margins with promises only as bold as “more broadband”. This is a time to kindle a renaissance. We ought to elect someone who acknowledges this need and the crises that have illuminated it.
Priorities:
Convene our wisest and most trusted minds ↓
… to help map the root causes of our predicament, and outline the possible avenues of mitigation. Particularly, focus should be applied to ameliorating the multi-polar trap pertaining to the paradigm shifting competitive advantage given to the first developer of winner-take-all-enabling artificial intelligence.
The difference between this convention and the closest parallel we might recognize from history, (the constitutional convention or the Bretton Woods convention), is that this should be recorded for public transparency, and open to public comment and input.
If I could suggest a few wise minds, Daniel Schmachtenberger, Charles Eisenstein, Jordan Hall, Marianne Williamson, Rupert Sheldrake, John Vervaeke, and Bill Plotkin would certainly make the cut.
Steward the info commons (ie - regulate social media) ↓
…to foster empathy, good faith, substantive debate, and stronger emphasis on shared values and common ground. (This does not mean promoting censorship.)
Get much better at learning and teaching how to deal with incredibly complex problems ↓
-Pronto!
-particularly the "collective action" problems of tragedies of the commons, arms races, and prisoner's dilemmas