there’s an old Greek proverb that says a
society grows great when it’s old men
plant trees and know that they will
never get to sit in the shade of them
interesting Here I am an old man 70 and
I want to plant some trees with your
help metaphorical ones of course and
what would I want to plant trees to
protect to shade to nurture I’d like to
plant trees to nurture and protect the
future but the future is not a word is
not an idea the future is our children I
am a grandfather a father and a great
grandfather and a citizen who feels that
I have some responsibilities to my
children my grandchildren and any
children and with whom I come in contact
and that responsibility in my mind is to
help protect them against the future to
me in my mind there’s some kind of a
threat in the future let me address that
but to do that let’s just say this much
I think the threat to our future is what
the future will bring to us as humans
through technology the worry that sits
resident in my mind is well will that
future alter inexorably my children and
my grandchildren so they are no longer
fully human will it eat away at what is
their essential humanity so let’s take a
look at the threat let’s go right back
to the very beginning the garden where
somebody gave somebody a piece of the
fruit of the tree of knowledge they had
computers back then too you know I hear
it was an apple but unfortunately I a
crashed after one bite
but through my lifetime I’ve actually
seen things changed considerably in
terms of technology that is and before I
started in this world in 1900 let’s say
at the beginning of the 20th century a
thinker of the time named Buckminster
Fuller talking a little bit about the
future said he believed that knowledge
and information which is what we’re
really looking at for looking at the
future will double completely in a
hundred years Wow everything man has
ever learned to that point doubling in
hundred years but by the end of the of
the Second World War they were saying oh
yes things have changed now all
information and knowledge the man has
ever ever discovered is doubling every
25 years but now now information is
doubling every 13 years and what’s
making that possible is computers a
little bit better than that original
apple I must say but computers computers
and technology have become our health
aids in life and so how are computers a
threat well one of the noted futurist
sub today is a man by the name of
Raymond Kurzweil look him up k you r ZW
e IL this man’s a scientist i think ur a
creator an inventor of note and the man
who’s actually inspired three presidents
so far to give him the award as being
the most important technological
advancements came from his mind during
the years of their in office so he’s
somebody and Raymond Kurzweil has taken
a look at this constant increasing
knowledge and also paired it with the
evolution and miniaturization of
computers of which he’s actually quite
an expert because at age 15 where there
weren’t that many computers around he
built his own computer and taught it how
to write music pretty impressive so here
he is a man closing on my age and he
says when he looks into
the future with the rapidly increasing
level of a technological advancement and
miniaturization computers our knowledge
levels are going to want us to become
better what’s always been that that need
since we started and we bit that Apple
decided how delicious it was to get new
information that noon information on
that growth of knowledge will lead to he
believes in the Year 2045 a different
kind of human being that kind of human
being will be necessary he thinks to
keep up with at least the incredible
rate at which knowledge will be growing
in fact computer experts like himself
are saying that by that time 2045
information all information known about
men and his development to this point
will be increasing every 12 hours if you
could just imagine that kind of
informational flooding into your life it
will create a changed person so he
thinks that we need to prepare ourselves
for that singularity when humans and
machines become less different from each
other we become part machine and we’ll
need to do that because how can we
otherwise deal with this at a level of
information they’ll be coming it will
change us totally so our brains will
have to be much better than they are now
so they’ll be augmented by by nano
computers resident in our skulls that
will increase our ability to think and
her speed of an thinking by four times
nanobots floating through the air will
be able to create food out of nothing
just like Star Trek and nanobots being
tiny will be living and swarming through
all our bloodstream killing disease
stopping disease and and actually
attacking the ravages of aging so that
we will become effectively immortal long
aged people so I think that’s the threat
if I as a father and a grandfather and a
great-grandfather now want to be of any
help to my children and grandchildren I
really have to think of this time far
ahead of now and start thinking what can
I do now so first of all the problem
advancing technology
what is it that we can do about that
well first of all if we’re going to lose
our humanity if I’m worried about losing
what is the essential the ark or
humanity it would make some sense to
understand what that means what value is
it that’s human so I went to the best
source i could think of my 11 year old
grandson he’s smart i was keen to hear
what he might think about future and
just want you to think for a minute
about the very far future may even
involve you where people are going to
become part machine we may live to a
very great age and this will threaten
the sort of key things that we actually
prize and value now as being humans so
if you knew that this was coming and you
knew you could do something now to make
that a better life in the future to
preserve humanists if we can what things
about humanity would you want to save so
we put on his little thinking cap he
said caring about other people I like
that intelligence and in my mind I added
keeping in touch and being present with
other people and imagination and
creativity yes those are very good
things we would need to save so let’s
look at each one of these things
individually if we may caring caring is
something if I wanted to try and protect
and nurture caring I’d plant the tree of
caring with my children my grandchildren
but I couldn’t say you’ve got to be more
caring with other people words are
useless I’d have to model it kids are
not stupid you know they you can say
something as an adult but if you don’t
live it they they know the difference
they know it immediately and they
therefore shut it out they don’t listen
to what you’re saying because there’s a
dissonance between what you’re saying
and what you’re doing you know you got
to do what you promised so this will be
the hardest tree for me to actually
plant because if I’m to be a good model
grandfather person in the
world I want to show it to them by
modeling how I care for them and their
parents so they have something they can
look at say well yeah okay that’s how
grandpa does it in their minds maybe
maybe not but carrying is important
because with caring we actually are of
great value to each other because
without carrying the world would be a
very empty place I believe so the thing
with intelligence unfortunately and with
supreme intelligence it might lead to
humans thinking that they’re better than
each other my kids my grandkids are very
intelligent and so it’s a very important
human trait but i would like to hope
that they don’t look upon others that
aren’t as intelligent of themselves as
being less because we as humans consider
ourselves to be at the top of the
pyramid and it’s part because of this
little bit of frontal lobe up here that
helps us actually think better and so it
makes us think we’re better than the
animals and as a result we’ve often
treated animals with very little caring
so I think intelligence is great but
intelligence must be tempered with
caring so that you if you have
intelligence use it well the user well
to help other people to help the world
around you don’t just you know wallow
and then great fact that you’re smart so
caring and intelligence good things to
protect trees we need to plant I think
but we need to do it by example what
else okay being present well you can
walk in almost any opens public space in
the world right now surprisingly even in
very poor countries too and you see
will you see you will see people who are
texting on their phones talking on their
phones listening on their ear buds these
people are virtually not they’re not
present if you try to talk to them you
have really have to get their attention
because they’re concentrating on
something else
they’re elsewhere and this is actually
the part of technology that I’m more
fearful more fearful because if you take
a look at the future that has been
promised us by science fiction writers
for a long time some of them have said
well there will come a point there’s
this point the rakers well calls the
singularity there’s going to be this
point where a machine becomes self-aware
so intelligent that it realizes these
puny human beings that maybe are lesser
than I understand myself and therefore I
will need to scourge get rid of the
scourge on the earth and end humanity so
I can create a perfect environment for
myself as a machine that’s a scary
prospect for my grandchildren but I’m
actually of the mind now that that’s not
how it’s going to happen what’s
happening as I believe it is sort of a
gradual process from the very beginning
of that faulty apple in the garden to
now we have been sort of invited into
the world of technology the ads have
been wonderful and colorful right back
to showing a woman how she doesn’t have
to wash in a tub anymore we can now do
it with an automatic washing machine
what a wonderful gift you’ll have more
time to do all the other things that
women have to do of course that was in a
very male-dominated society we don’t
think like that anymore but the ease of
which we can live our lives thanks to
technology is a cushion that we lean on
quite often and we’re becoming more and
more dependent it’s a slow and subtle
process of us being taken over and our
lives being altered by our existence in
and with technology it’s a love affair
of sorts okay I liken it to the storied
frog I’m sure you’ve heard the story if
you’re a fraud if you were to take a
frog and drop it into a pot of hot water
what would the Frog do it would jump out
sure frogs not stupid but if you put
that frog in a nice cool pool of water
sitting in a pot on the stove and just
subtly and and ever so gently you
increase the temperature frog doesn’t
notice that accommodates gently teacher
those temperature changes until
all of a sudden it’s too hot frog is
cooked frog is dead I’m not saying we’re
going to die from being leaning on this
gentle and increasing pressure of
technology that’s coming to help us in
our everyday lives but I am saying that
it is altering who we are essentially
this change is starting now we see it as
I say as we walk amongst the crowds will
go into restaurants we see people
sitting around a table hopefully having
a family dinner but everybody’s on their
phones it’s insidious so if I want to
plant a tree for my grandchildren of my
children to help them survive this in
creating incremental incursion into
their lives by technology what will I do
I’ll plant a tree of a sort that gives
them opportunities to experience life
without technology will have dinners
without any kind of technology there
will go for a walk in the forest kids
who are deeply immersed in the virtual
world I think need to have a taste of
reality to actually get out where it’s
real leave all those phones and those
earbuds and everything at home and smell
the grass feel the breeze see a
waterfall and be amazed be stunned by
the color of a small flower in these
quiet moments of appreciation when all
of a sudden a deer walks across the path
kids love this it’s it’s like a WoW
experience for them that they haven’t
had before and if they have they want
more of it I want to plant that tree so
that the kids that I’m influencing in
their future will remember these points
of time when they’re with other people
and their present they’re not totally
immersed in the virtual world they’re
actually with people they could smell
them are the expression they can see the
little tells that they have when they’re
talking which gives you far more
information about it a communication
than just seeing a little tiny screen
and a face
I’m suggesting okay so getting down to
making all these things work we have a
factor out there that actually
interferes with everything we just
talked about and it’s fear we are living
in a fear-filled society we’re afraid
our children out in the streets we don’t
let the play like we used to when I was
a kid we are afraid to eat foods that
are because we could get poisoned by
them in fact there’s so much fear oh
they’re the reason even is a fear of
fear itself a phobia of phobias so we’re
getting very good at this fear game and
children like adults have fears and fear
is the death of creativity and
imagination and it is also the death of
intelligence in fact as as an aside when
a psychologist wants to test you for
your intelligence they need to know if
you’ve been undergoing any stressful
emotional experiences recently because
that will actually down your
intelligence by measurable amounts so we
need to actually plant a different kind
of a tree for kids who are fearful and
there are a lot of them around everybody
has fears we have to show them that we
as adults have fears too but we are
doing things to cope with the fears we
have to model to the kids that we are
responsible to that fears okay we know
it’s out there but let’s use it to our
best advantage let’s model to them that
we are making actions to cope and use
our fear to help us rather than hurt us
and you look around the news even our
governments know they’re in fears a tool
if people are fearful they’re far more
malleable and easy to control less
likely to be intelligent thinking and
people who are actually demonstrating
against the power of the government so
as an old man planting trees to try and
protect our youth my kids my grandkids
from what may happen in their future I’d
like to invite you all to expert to join
my last experimental treat please all
stand up so only go take a few seconds I
want you to turn to the person next to
you and give them a hug
okay don’t get too much into that
because time is running out this is the
last and the easiest of all the trees
you can plant because the best way to
demonstrate to another person that you
care is to give them a hug go out there
plant your trees make a forest protect our future protect our children join me