special about rebels we’ve always had
rebels misfits risk-takers dreamers
visionaries people trying to undermine
the structures of our society and
throughout history we have given these
people many names and today we might
call them entrepreneurs really when you
think of it that’s what entrepreneurs do
they undermine the structures that
dominates certain markets and like being
a rebel being an entrepreneur is not a
job it’s a calling however in my
particular case I was originally
compelled by a very different calling
I’ve studied theology I wanted to become
a priest that was my calling
tragically my wife was diagnosed with
breast cancer and she died only 28 years
old I buried her myself
and then I was alone with our four year
old daughter I really needed to do
something entirely different with my
life so I literally asked myself what is
the exact opposite of theology you know
this hippie kind of role where you’re
trying to do what’s right and have no
ego and live a life in humble servitude
I needed to find the opposite something
selfish something ego driven something
ruthless ingredie almost devilish and
the answer was obvious I should go into
business
well it turned out that businesspeople
are just as kind and helpful as
everybody else
in fact the worlds of business and
theology are not as far apart as we tend
to think maybe that’s why I always seem
to get the same question from people
what are the similarities between
business and theology and as I started
reflecting over the question a pattern
emerged you see back when I was studying
theology I was very much inspired by a
contemporary Italian philosopher called
Gianni VAT emo who claimed that being
which is just a word for everything
there is has what he calls a nihilistic
vocation it presents itself in weaker
and weaker forms and he based his
thoughts and his readings of heated and
itchy and Heidegger and these are
probably some of the most difficult
books to read in the entire world so
I’ll try to explain this as simple and
down-to-earth as possible you see the
weakening of being is present in the
concept of the Christian God first you
have God the Father and Almighty God the
creator of everything a Supreme Being
eternal all-knowing this is an extremely
strong structure then God incarnated
himself in Jesus God the Son this is God
in human form with all the attributes
that characterizes us as humans doubt
and pain and ultimately mortality this
is a much much weaker form of God a much
much weaker concept and finally you have
the holy spirit this is the history of a
church this is the history of salvation
this is an even weaker concept of God
so throughout Christianity the concept
of God the idea of God undergoes a
process of weakening from a very very
strong structure God the Father
two-weeker structure god the son to an
even weaker
the Holy Spirit now in the world of
philosophy the same pattern can be
observed in Plato for instance truth is
seen as something above and beyond its
absolute it’s eternal it’s a very very
strong structure much like out the
father later in the history of
philosophy the concept of truth
undergoes a process of weakening with
the Immanuel Kant for instance truth is
literally incarnated into human form we
realize that we cannot speak about truth
without taking our human existence into
consideration how we understand the
world depends on how we perceive the
world today in post modernity there are
no truth only interpretations and mean
that that’s no truth that’s just an
interpretation this is an even bigger
form of truth now the interesting part
is that this exact same pattern can be
observed in the world of business for
strong structures dominating markets are
being challenged or replaced by weaker
structures look at the telecom industry
for instance it’s dominated by large
telcos running massive infrastructures
this is a very very strong structure
then companies like Skype and Viper in
my own company bug stream came along and
enabled people to call each other for
free bypassing the telecoms altogether
this is a weakening of the structures
defining the telecom industry and it is
important this development cannot solely
be contributed to the technological
progress in fact the technology behind
Skype is a lot lot simpler than the
technology running the great telcos so
something else is at stake here namely
the weakening of being and when you
think of it there are numerous of
examples take the whole industry
revolving investments in companies
it has undergone a process of booting so
that we now have concepts like
crowdfunding look at the hotel industry
we now have Airbnb look at the taxi
industry we now have uber and yes we
still have over they’ll be back look at
the banking industry banks are an
extremely strong structure it’s a highly
regulated market it is undergone a
process of weakening so that we now have
concepts like bitcoins where people can
transfer money directly to each other
bypassing the banks altogether now the
million-dollar question remains how do
you use this knowledge as a tool of
innovation is there a nihilistic
vocation to innovation and I believe it
is
if being has a building tendency of
presenting yourself in weaker and weaker
forms then we can become entrepreneurs
that look to markets that are dominated
by strong structures and introduce new
products and new business models that
helps beginning the structures of those
markets then we will not be working
against the history of being but kind of
like riding the wave and as we undermine
the structures that dominates businesses
industries markets and ultimately
society we can free the world from the
dominance and violence of strong
structures large structures are getting
weaker day by day but this does not lead
to destruction but opportunity as
structures collapse rebels will rise I’m
a rebel are you thank you
Oh
[Applause] [Music]