imagine the most powerful and
Vance military that you could find in
500 AD the Eastern Roman Empire got into
a time machine and went 500 years into
the future and faced off against the
most advanced military that they could
find in 1000 AD the Byzantine Empire who
wins we don’t know even though there was
a 500 year difference between these
armies not one of them is a clear Victor
let’s do it again but instead we’re
gonna go 500 years further into the
future the Ming Dynasty was the most
powerful and advanced military of 1500
what would happen if the Ming Dynasty
got into a time machine and went 500
years into the future and faced off
against the most advanced military that
they could find be a little bit of a
different story why well if you were
from 1500 AD and you took a time machine
to 2000 AD forget just military
everything would be unconscionably
different trains communication devices
airplanes the internet you wouldn’t be
able to imagine the world that you would
see in 2000 AD that’s called exponential
rate of change in this talk I’m going to
be discussing how exponential rate of
change will affect our future and I hope
to show you that unless we make a
significant and fundamental change in
our behavior now we will not be able to
navigate that future successfully my
favorite example of exponential rate of
change was done by Ray Kurzweil who’s
the director of engineering at Google
and he did this in 2001 he took a chess
board and on the first square of the
chessboard you put down just one grain
of rice every subsequent day you double
the grains of rice this is what happens
on the first line of the chessboard
nothing significant and then by the time
we hit the first half of the chessboard
this is what happens numbers start
doubling getting pretty big we have two
billion grains of rice and then it gets
crazy
in the second half of the chessboard we
go from four billion
– 18 quintillion grains of rice it’s
hard for us to think about that number
so I want to visualize it for you if you
were to weigh 18 quintillion grains of
rice it would weigh far more than all of
the Manhattan combined all the people
all the buildings all the water all the
food all of the Manhattan combined here
are the fundamentals of the chessboard
we start on square one with just one
grain of rice and by the end of the
first half of the chessboard we’re at
two billion grains of rice then it only
takes one more square to get two billion
more grains of rice onto the chessboard
and then of course we’re at 18
quintillion grains of rice and number
that we can’t even imagine what does
this mean for us though well we’re here
we are at the beginning of the second
half of our chessboard
only our chessboard is not measured in
grains of rice its measured in rate of
change and in time and my incredibly
unscientific documentation shows that
the first three examples I gave from 500
AD 1000 ad and 1500 AD well different
still exist on the first half of this
chessboard naturally we think okay what
is the rest of the first half of our
chessboard look like what is the 18
quintillion grain of rice equivalent at
the end of the second half of this
chessboard I don’t know here’s what I do
know though problems during the second
half of our chessboard will arise more
quickly than than they’ve ever arisen
before because the rate of change is
more quick than it has ever been before
due to that fact we will need to solve
those problems faster are we good at
this in society up to this point have we
solved problems fast
let’s see here are a couple examples
early American history the Articles
Confederation proved to not work so well
we had to create the Constitution the
United States did so remarkably quickly
it took to constitutional conventions to
create the most enduring Democratic
document in civilizations history
1854 cholera outbreak in London is
killing people an incredible map maker
named John snow figures out the location
of the outbreak and addresses it in
remarkable speed he reacts to the
problem very very quickly whether you
like it or not whether it’s good or bad
World War two America wanted to create a
weapon in a very very short amount of
time through the Manhattan Project
created the deadliest weapon in human
history during the Cold War America got
to the moon pretty damn quick in the 80s
as a society we realized that we had an
existential threat on our hands there
was a hole in the ozone layer but in two
years through the Montreal Protocol
society came together very quickly and
addressed this and now that hole is
patched and then I would argue more
recently the international community
responded to the Ebola crisis quite
quickly these are all examples of
society coming together to react to a
problem here’s the issue I just showed
you
damage control why we responded to all
of these threats because it’s in our
human nature that once there is a
problem that is manifested live in the
present we can come together and address
it quite quickly Total Annihilation has
a way of sharpening our minds we can’t
keep doing this though we’ve gotten to
this point Darwinistic we because the
rate of change has been slow enough that
we can just react but unless we are now
unless we become a proactive society now
not just a reactive society during the
second half of our chessboard unless we
start solving problems before they
affect our day-to-day lives we’re not
going to navigate the second half of the
chessboard quickly enough are we
starting to navigate the second half of
the chessboard proactively now sort of
here are a couple examples
twenty-three-year-old Boyan slat is
slated to in the next five years clean
up about half of the Great Pacific
Garbage Patch which is over a trillion
pieces of trash currently in our oceans
this is not a problem that affects all
of us today you can sure as hell bet
then the fee
this is not solved it will affect our
lives let’s go to climate change
an incredible company called climb Works
has built a technology that can suck and
sequester or separate carbon dioxide out
of ambient air and then make products
from it and sell it this is an
incredible effort that is proactively
taking on a problem which we are not
being affected by on a day-to-day basis
you can sure as hell bet that if we
don’t address climate change now we will
be affected in a day to day basis these
are incredible examples and they should
be supported but they are individual
examples there are small groups of
people taking on a problem if all we do
during the second half of the chessboard
is address problems through supporting
individual examples it won’t be good
enough we need to do something greater
the reason why is that group decisions
will dominate the second half of the
chessboard the next square of our chess
for the next 50 years will unleash
possibly the most consequential
decisions we’ve ever made as a human
race those decisions will not be made by
individuals they will be made by groups
so when we think about navigating the
second half of the chessboard we need to
think about navigating group decision
making and changing group decision
making it is the processes by way we
make our decisions that we need to
fundamentally think about when we think
about processes groups of people making
decisions what do we think about
institutions governments think tanks
intergovernmental organizations the UN
NGOs unfortunately today when we think
about our institutions though these are
the types of moments that jump into our
minds well if so how do you sustain a
business model in which users don’t pay
for your service the senator we run out
it’s funny of its a little depressing
here’s the issue with this this is a
bipartisan problem but if our
institutions are represented by folks
who at times don’t understand the
technologies of today how the hell are
we gonna rely on these people to support
decision-making that is proactive for
the future I don’t think we can unless
we make some fundamental decisions about
our institutional thinking our group
decision-making we’re screwed
I don’t think we need to be screwed
though I’ve been thinking about this for
a short amount of time I’ve been alive
for a short amount of time but I think
there are three areas that we should
focus on when it comes to group
decision-making through institutions
imagine I was pitching you the solution
for all these problems the archetype
will the perfect 21st century’s second
half of the chessboard institution and I
got to the part of my slide in my deck
that talked about how that institution
would meet and communicate and I had
three bullet points in the first bullet
point said this institutions gonna take
a four-month break before it goes back
in session the second bullet point said
it’s gonna focus on in-person speeches
and orations and hearings because we
have to disseminate our messaging to
people and the third bullet point said
it’s gonna focus on a yearly gathering
you would say yeah that’s built for the
first half of the chessboard but we have
the internet we don’t need in-person
hearings we can disseminate information
to billions of people we need to meet
more frequently because the rate of
change is quicker screw the once a year
meeting we should do working groups
between small groups of people to
operationalize our thinking it’s a funny
example but if we were to rebuild our
institutions that we rely on today for
the 21st century we wouldn’t like it
so we should change the institutions
that we are currently relying on in the
21st century as well the second thing is
power power is different in the 21st
century and in the second half of the
chessboard than it has ever been I’m
focusing on one area of power though
which is age three of the four largest
tech companies in history by size were
all founded by people 25 years old or
younger two of the most recent Nobel
Peace Prize winners were 18 and 25 year
old women
even our celebrities are becoming far
more powerful for our age Taylor Swift
through one Instagram is able to change
an entire senatorial race people like
chance the rapper have larger platforms
through social media than most prime
ministers and Congress thought it was
important enough to Hall Mark Zuckerberg
a young guy to create an entire day to
focus on this business but everybody on
this slide at this age a lot of them
couldn’t actually make it into our
institutions today they couldn’t become
members because there are barriers to
entry by age these are the people that
are endemic to the second half of the
chessboard they’ve created the thinking
the technologies the social movements
that are dominating our society today
yet they aren’t encouraged to be parts
of our institutions that make the
decisions of the day in the decisions of
the future this needs to change at a
fundamental level the third area is
intellectual diversity if we don’t have
intellectual diversity to solve our
problems we’re going to have a problem
there are 535 Congress people in the
United States one of them is a PhD in
science our biggest problems of today
and tomorrow are going to be dominated
by complex scientific issues we need to
represent the greatest minds in these
fields not just in science and the arts
as well and many many different
decision-making fields in our
institutions or else we are not going to
bring the brightest minds together to
enact change and solve the problems of
tomorrow and today these are three areas
we need to fundamentally think about
changing now let’s go back to the
chessboard if you were to ask somebody
on square one of the chessboard to
imagine what it would be like at the two
billion grain of rice level the end of
the first half of the chessboard they
wouldn’t be able to do it that numbers 2
to unconscionably large for them think
about where we are though we’re at the
beginning of the second half of our
chessboard we’re at the 4 billion mark
we shouldn’t be spending our time
forecasting to think what the end of our
chessboard is going to look like that 18
quintillion number is to exponentially
large it’s a sink of our resources
instead we can do something simple now
we can go against our own human nature
and we can start defining the second
half of the chessboard now
the reactive half but is the proactive
half thank you [Applause]
Vance military that you could find in
500 AD the Eastern Roman Empire got into
a time machine and went 500 years into
the future and faced off against the
most advanced military that they could
find in 1000 AD the Byzantine Empire who
wins we don’t know even though there was
a 500 year difference between these
armies not one of them is a clear Victor
let’s do it again but instead we’re
gonna go 500 years further into the
future the Ming Dynasty was the most
powerful and advanced military of 1500
what would happen if the Ming Dynasty
got into a time machine and went 500
years into the future and faced off
against the most advanced military that
they could find be a little bit of a
different story why well if you were
from 1500 AD and you took a time machine
to 2000 AD forget just military
everything would be unconscionably
different trains communication devices
airplanes the internet you wouldn’t be
able to imagine the world that you would
see in 2000 AD that’s called exponential
rate of change in this talk I’m going to
be discussing how exponential rate of
change will affect our future and I hope
to show you that unless we make a
significant and fundamental change in
our behavior now we will not be able to
navigate that future successfully my
favorite example of exponential rate of
change was done by Ray Kurzweil who’s
the director of engineering at Google
and he did this in 2001 he took a chess
board and on the first square of the
chessboard you put down just one grain
of rice every subsequent day you double
the grains of rice this is what happens
on the first line of the chessboard
nothing significant and then by the time
we hit the first half of the chessboard
this is what happens numbers start
doubling getting pretty big we have two
billion grains of rice and then it gets
crazy
in the second half of the chessboard we
go from four billion
– 18 quintillion grains of rice it’s
hard for us to think about that number
so I want to visualize it for you if you
were to weigh 18 quintillion grains of
rice it would weigh far more than all of
the Manhattan combined all the people
all the buildings all the water all the
food all of the Manhattan combined here
are the fundamentals of the chessboard
we start on square one with just one
grain of rice and by the end of the
first half of the chessboard we’re at
two billion grains of rice then it only
takes one more square to get two billion
more grains of rice onto the chessboard
and then of course we’re at 18
quintillion grains of rice and number
that we can’t even imagine what does
this mean for us though well we’re here
we are at the beginning of the second
half of our chessboard
only our chessboard is not measured in
grains of rice its measured in rate of
change and in time and my incredibly
unscientific documentation shows that
the first three examples I gave from 500
AD 1000 ad and 1500 AD well different
still exist on the first half of this
chessboard naturally we think okay what
is the rest of the first half of our
chessboard look like what is the 18
quintillion grain of rice equivalent at
the end of the second half of this
chessboard I don’t know here’s what I do
know though problems during the second
half of our chessboard will arise more
quickly than than they’ve ever arisen
before because the rate of change is
more quick than it has ever been before
due to that fact we will need to solve
those problems faster are we good at
this in society up to this point have we
solved problems fast
let’s see here are a couple examples
early American history the Articles
Confederation proved to not work so well
we had to create the Constitution the
United States did so remarkably quickly
it took to constitutional conventions to
create the most enduring Democratic
document in civilizations history
1854 cholera outbreak in London is
killing people an incredible map maker
named John snow figures out the location
of the outbreak and addresses it in
remarkable speed he reacts to the
problem very very quickly whether you
like it or not whether it’s good or bad
World War two America wanted to create a
weapon in a very very short amount of
time through the Manhattan Project
created the deadliest weapon in human
history during the Cold War America got
to the moon pretty damn quick in the 80s
as a society we realized that we had an
existential threat on our hands there
was a hole in the ozone layer but in two
years through the Montreal Protocol
society came together very quickly and
addressed this and now that hole is
patched and then I would argue more
recently the international community
responded to the Ebola crisis quite
quickly these are all examples of
society coming together to react to a
problem here’s the issue I just showed
you
damage control why we responded to all
of these threats because it’s in our
human nature that once there is a
problem that is manifested live in the
present we can come together and address
it quite quickly Total Annihilation has
a way of sharpening our minds we can’t
keep doing this though we’ve gotten to
this point Darwinistic we because the
rate of change has been slow enough that
we can just react but unless we are now
unless we become a proactive society now
not just a reactive society during the
second half of our chessboard unless we
start solving problems before they
affect our day-to-day lives we’re not
going to navigate the second half of the
chessboard quickly enough are we
starting to navigate the second half of
the chessboard proactively now sort of
here are a couple examples
twenty-three-year-old Boyan slat is
slated to in the next five years clean
up about half of the Great Pacific
Garbage Patch which is over a trillion
pieces of trash currently in our oceans
this is not a problem that affects all
of us today you can sure as hell bet
then the fee
this is not solved it will affect our
lives let’s go to climate change
an incredible company called climb Works
has built a technology that can suck and
sequester or separate carbon dioxide out
of ambient air and then make products
from it and sell it this is an
incredible effort that is proactively
taking on a problem which we are not
being affected by on a day-to-day basis
you can sure as hell bet that if we
don’t address climate change now we will
be affected in a day to day basis these
are incredible examples and they should
be supported but they are individual
examples there are small groups of
people taking on a problem if all we do
during the second half of the chessboard
is address problems through supporting
individual examples it won’t be good
enough we need to do something greater
the reason why is that group decisions
will dominate the second half of the
chessboard the next square of our chess
for the next 50 years will unleash
possibly the most consequential
decisions we’ve ever made as a human
race those decisions will not be made by
individuals they will be made by groups
so when we think about navigating the
second half of the chessboard we need to
think about navigating group decision
making and changing group decision
making it is the processes by way we
make our decisions that we need to
fundamentally think about when we think
about processes groups of people making
decisions what do we think about
institutions governments think tanks
intergovernmental organizations the UN
NGOs unfortunately today when we think
about our institutions though these are
the types of moments that jump into our
minds well if so how do you sustain a
business model in which users don’t pay
for your service the senator we run out
it’s funny of its a little depressing
here’s the issue with this this is a
bipartisan problem but if our
institutions are represented by folks
who at times don’t understand the
technologies of today how the hell are
we gonna rely on these people to support
decision-making that is proactive for
the future I don’t think we can unless
we make some fundamental decisions about
our institutional thinking our group
decision-making we’re screwed
I don’t think we need to be screwed
though I’ve been thinking about this for
a short amount of time I’ve been alive
for a short amount of time but I think
there are three areas that we should
focus on when it comes to group
decision-making through institutions
imagine I was pitching you the solution
for all these problems the archetype
will the perfect 21st century’s second
half of the chessboard institution and I
got to the part of my slide in my deck
that talked about how that institution
would meet and communicate and I had
three bullet points in the first bullet
point said this institutions gonna take
a four-month break before it goes back
in session the second bullet point said
it’s gonna focus on in-person speeches
and orations and hearings because we
have to disseminate our messaging to
people and the third bullet point said
it’s gonna focus on a yearly gathering
you would say yeah that’s built for the
first half of the chessboard but we have
the internet we don’t need in-person
hearings we can disseminate information
to billions of people we need to meet
more frequently because the rate of
change is quicker screw the once a year
meeting we should do working groups
between small groups of people to
operationalize our thinking it’s a funny
example but if we were to rebuild our
institutions that we rely on today for
the 21st century we wouldn’t like it
so we should change the institutions
that we are currently relying on in the
21st century as well the second thing is
power power is different in the 21st
century and in the second half of the
chessboard than it has ever been I’m
focusing on one area of power though
which is age three of the four largest
tech companies in history by size were
all founded by people 25 years old or
younger two of the most recent Nobel
Peace Prize winners were 18 and 25 year
old women
even our celebrities are becoming far
more powerful for our age Taylor Swift
through one Instagram is able to change
an entire senatorial race people like
chance the rapper have larger platforms
through social media than most prime
ministers and Congress thought it was
important enough to Hall Mark Zuckerberg
a young guy to create an entire day to
focus on this business but everybody on
this slide at this age a lot of them
couldn’t actually make it into our
institutions today they couldn’t become
members because there are barriers to
entry by age these are the people that
are endemic to the second half of the
chessboard they’ve created the thinking
the technologies the social movements
that are dominating our society today
yet they aren’t encouraged to be parts
of our institutions that make the
decisions of the day in the decisions of
the future this needs to change at a
fundamental level the third area is
intellectual diversity if we don’t have
intellectual diversity to solve our
problems we’re going to have a problem
there are 535 Congress people in the
United States one of them is a PhD in
science our biggest problems of today
and tomorrow are going to be dominated
by complex scientific issues we need to
represent the greatest minds in these
fields not just in science and the arts
as well and many many different
decision-making fields in our
institutions or else we are not going to
bring the brightest minds together to
enact change and solve the problems of
tomorrow and today these are three areas
we need to fundamentally think about
changing now let’s go back to the
chessboard if you were to ask somebody
on square one of the chessboard to
imagine what it would be like at the two
billion grain of rice level the end of
the first half of the chessboard they
wouldn’t be able to do it that numbers 2
to unconscionably large for them think
about where we are though we’re at the
beginning of the second half of our
chessboard we’re at the 4 billion mark
we shouldn’t be spending our time
forecasting to think what the end of our
chessboard is going to look like that 18
quintillion number is to exponentially
large it’s a sink of our resources
instead we can do something simple now
we can go against our own human nature
and we can start defining the second
half of the chessboard now
the reactive half but is the proactive
half thank you [Applause]
Please follow and like us: