1. This was a rather personal perspective, but all I can say about my work at Google is that (1) WE WANT TO BE PART OF THE SOLUTION and have very active deliberations about what responsible innovation means (--> efforts on digital wellbeing) (2) in the more than 9 years there, I have become convinced that GOOGLE‘‚ CAPABILITIES ARE VASTLY OVERSTATED by outside commentators (Ferrari vs Spagetti Monster)
1.1. Especially for AI I see Google as leading in terms of responsible R&D and deployment (note: AI Principles, AI Partnership, support of academic research including here in Germany)
2. Techno-Moral Cultivation & Governance
2.1. Explore the good (digital) life and CULTIVATE OUR TECHNO MORAL SELFE —> moral awareness and self control, empathy (Shannon Vallor)
2.2. WE ALL NEED NET SMARTS (Howard Rheingold): Attention, Critical consumption
2.3. AI-enabled coaching for behavior change NUDGING needs close community oversight
3. Alphabet and Technology
3.1. Technology has always CONDITIONED our lives and societies - it is not only modern tech but also language and a hammer
3.1.1. to understand the digital sift we have to distinguish between the transformations caused by the Digital as Medium and what impact that has on the accessibility and creation of Meaning (McLuhan)
3.2. I will focus mostly on the emergence of the Virtual and AI on a philosophical level but there is a very concrete "technological craft"perspective too: semantic interoperability or the standardization of how we describe our digital reality as our SHARED DIGITAL ONTOLOGY is at the heart of making the Internet of EveryThing a reality
3.3. TECHNOLOGICAL SOLUTIONISM WAS NAIVE! We must not see people as nodes in a network or consumers
3.3.1. Noam Chomsky - A humanistic conception of Education --> each individual is like a plant
3.4. To use and be truly augmented by technology we need to become "TECH LITERATE"
3.4.1. The first challenge of mastering digital reality is to ACCEPT THE NEW VIRTUAL BEING, which acts like an alter ego, a digital doppelgänger, the augmented digital manifestation of your Self (SPIDER MAN), but at the same time as an independent ghost or spirit (HER), or even a remote controlled trickster (PUCK)
3.4.2. There is no dusk or dawn in cyberspace - we are always "on"and for this and many other reasons we need to develop our "technologies of self" and learn to "take care of ourselves" (Foucault)
3.4.3. Technology binds us all together - in fact the Virtual is the ultimate cosmopolitan space for SPEECH ACTS and source of transnational discourse
3.4.4. Google gives us access to the knowledge of the world at our finger tips. In fact it also gives us tools to co-create and consume our BRAINFOOD
3.5. Technology is the scaffolding of our lives - TECHNOLOGY IS OUR OPERATING SYSTEM
4. Intro - core questions:
4.1. What is a good life and how can I live my life well? What should I pursue?
4.2. What is progress and How can we shape it?
5. Artificial Intelligence as forcing function for a Paradigm Shift to a new literacy -- because it unsettles our conception of what human qualities are
5.1. Life and intelligence have evolved into a wide spectrum of complexity -- single cells (mitochondria), to polyps, to complex mammals and a SLIGHTLY MORE INTELLIGENT HOMO SAPIENS
5.1.1. Michael Graziano from Princeton has a very convincing theory (and that‘s not only because he uses a ventriloquist doll to explain it): Consciousness And The Social Brain
5.2. Daniel Dennett "competence without comprehension”
5.2.1. David Cope - Creativity is easy but comprehension is HARD