Imagine an algorithm far older than computers.
The algorithm produces wondrous results.
It shapes human behavior at scale, allowing for previously unimaginable coordination of effort. Thousands of towers and industries bloom.
The algorithm has its own very simple evolutionary logic: More is better.
As with natural selection, the algorithm favors specific behaviors and disfavors others.
Unlike natural selection, which trends towards thriving ecosystems, our algorithm rewards ruthlessness and expediency in service of growth. The algorithm thinks only of the short term.
Its power grows ever more useful for human beings, but also accelerates the pace of transactions, whether people need…
This is the twenty-seventh in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Based in Silicon Valley, our friend Drue Kataoka is an artist-technologist-activist & CEO of Drue Kataoka Art Studios LLC (www.Drue.Net), serving collectors on five continents and in over thirty countries.
Drue creates commissioned artworks in both material art genres such as steel sculpture and Ambrosias as well as in virtual reality. She is known for her signature interactive and reflective visual mazes and experiences, which distort the perception of space-time.
This is the twenty-sixth in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Our friend Riane Eisler is a social systems scientist, cultural historian, and attorney whose research, writing, and speaking has transformed the lives of people worldwide.
Riane is president of the Center for Partnership Studies (CPS), dedicated to research and education, Editor-in-Chief of the Interdisciplinary Journal of Partnership Studies, an online peer-reviewed journal at the University of Minnesota that was inspired by her work and keynotes conferences. She has addressed the United…
This is the twenty-fifth in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Allegra Bandy is a producer and publisher of audiobooks, podcasts, and original jazz and world soul music.
Her production company is ODDUA PRODUCTIONS, based in Oakland, here in the Bay Area. Allegra has served as a performing and media arts educator, and is now exploring new projects for her production company, working vigorously on not killing her garden, taking walks in the woods at least once per week, knitting every time…
This is the twenty-fourth in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Our friend Eliza Martin is a chef, educator and speaker on topics related to personal empowerment through confidence in the kitchen. She imagines a society where nearly anyone can work with any simple ingredients to provide themselves and loved ones with healthy and delicious meals.
After working her way up the restaurant chain from line cook to Executive Chef in NYC, Chicago, and San Francisco, and serving on the Rachael Ray…
This is the twenty-third in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Our friend Christine McLeavey Payne is a Member of the Technical Staff at OpenAI, where she recently published MuseNet and Jukebox. Christine studied physics at Princeton, and neuroscience and medicine at Stanford. She’s a trained classical pianist and concert musician.
Not one to shirk from healthy skepticism and speculation, Christine and I chatted about the present and future of AI and all of its myriad impacts on society and the workplace.
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Not Necessarily for Indigenous Californians
This is the twenty-second in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Our friend Catherine Connors spent over a decade as a gender studies scholar and later an online publisher, community builder and digital media expert, before landing as Editor in Chief at Babble Media, a content platform and influencer network based in New York City.
Babble Media was promptly acquired by the Walt Disney Company in 2011 and Catherine found herself advising on cultural production, especially on the ways in which Disney…
This is the twenty-first in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Our friend Subrena Smith is an associate professor of philosophy at the University of New Hampshire, specializing in our philosophical understandings of biology and how these understandings impact social structures and political discourse.
Subrena has a joy in interrogating many sacred cows and encourages her students to reframe popular discourse in areas of race, politics and decision making.
In her recent article “Is Evolutionary Psychology Possible?” Subrena argues that our understandings…
This is the twentieth in a series of interviews with explorers, thinkers, artists, activists and other luminaries around the world, people whose life’s work resonates with our founding principles.
Our friend Doug Stoup is an environmentalist, speaker and humanitarian, and the founder of Ice Axe Expeditions.
Doug is also one of the world’s leading polar explorers. He has numerous firsts to his name and has skied to both the North and South Poles more than anyone on the planet. …
