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“No.” Two letters, one word, an entire universe of meanings that I avoided pronouncing for a long time. Yet, this very word is changing my life, helping me make space for new possibilities and rediscover myself.I have always been competitive, driven by an idea of success measured by perpetual movement. I lived by saying many “yeses”: to my studies, to work, to every opportunity that could help me achieve my goals. However, I was also very lucky because, in some cases, when faced with opportunities with a high degree of uncertainty, outside my comfort zone, I was able to look up, evaluate them, and embrace them with a “why not?”. This approach took me far, opening doors I had never imagined. It was a powerful mechanism for breaking down prejudices and challenging myself, giving me important and transformative experiences.But now, I have made space for another tool: “no.” Not a refusal that shuts down, but an invitation to pause, to take a break and better observe what surrounds us.I have discovered a “no” that does not exclude; rather, it frees. A “no” that allows me to notice, to dedicate attention and time to what truly matters. Something impossible before, as I was always caught up in an endless race of commitments and obligations. Have you ever felt this way?It’s as if, since I was a child—since the time when, for no valid reason, I confidently stated that I wanted to become an accountant—someone had handed me a map, on which I was supposed to mark my future destinations. A map where you can move in different directions based on the decisions you make. There are those choices that push us forward toward our goal. They are the ones that seem obvious and logical, the ones we make without thinking too much. Even when they are difficult, we know they are necessary, and we find the willpower to take the longer but safer path. For example, when we commit to earning a degree necessary to access our dream job, or when we set an early morning alarm every day to go to the gym and stay in shape. These choices are, in a way, inevitable yeses.For instance, when I chose my high school, I would have happily pursued any subject based on my interests. But there was always one thing I struggled with: drawing. I found it so difficult that my middle school technology teacher created a separate program just for me, with more computer science and electrical circuits, just to spare both of us the agony of my continuous ink smudges. Therefore, logically, any path involving related subjects was excluded, and between the two options presented to me—scientific high school or classical high school—the latter won hands down. At that time, my goal, my destination on the map, was simply to study things that would allow me to make my next choice with maximum freedom. An easy “yes,” then.The same logic guided my university choice: I wanted to choose between chemistry, philosophy, and economics. The first was ruled out because a teacher advised against it. I trusted her. The second was where my heart wanted to go, but doubts about job prospects, reinforced by many voices around me, ultimately prevailed. Economics, on the other hand, was a certainty. Again, the most logical choice. The one everyone expected from me. Another easy “yes.”This brings us to graduation and my first job in strategic consulting. Another solid “yes.” Everything was falling into place according to the expectations shaped by my past choices: I was who I was expected to be, and I had become that person through a series of rational and perfectly logical decisions.These “yeses” are well-marked paths on our map, straight roads toward our goal. And they work: they make us progress. However, I have learned that they are not the only way to move through life.Because the map also allows for “why nots?”, for detours that end up completely changing our destination. I remember my first “why not?”: a coffee with a colleague that, from a simple conversation, turned into a proposal to work on a start-up together. That “why not?” pushed me out of my comfort zone, making me explore unknown territory. It was an uncharted path at the time, so much so that, for a while, I struggled to explain to friends and family what I did for a living. But then, when things started working out, people around me understood, they found a label for me and called me an entrepreneur. The unconventional choice from years earlier had kept me uncomfortable for a while, but in the end, it had fit into a path that had found its place on my precious map. And so, the “yeses” could resume. Though, as a small revenge, I did earn a degree in philosophy. In any case, at that point, without ever stopping, I moved from one project to another, from one challenge to the next. Logical choices, safe choices, choices that reinforced the idea of me as an entrepreneur.But the more I said “yes”, the more I lost sight of something fundamental: because, I don’t believe I am an entrepreneur. Yes, it’s one of the things I have done, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be something else too, that I can’t explore new spaces. That label started feeling too tight. I discussed it with a friend who, in turn, complained about being a slave to his sense of duty and about discovering the importance of saying “no”—at least occasionally—to understand himself. If it hadn’t been him telling me this, I would have thought it was just the complaint of a lazy person, but I knew who I was listening to, and I decided to pay attention.Thanks to him, I made a discovery: saying “no” is actually a pause. It’s the moment when you stop running and allow yourself the luxury of lifting your eyes from the map to observe the landscape. And then, you also allow choices that don’t seem logical to carve out space among the possible paths. It’s another way of opening up to new things, different from the “why not”, but unlike the latter, its power doesn’t lie in movement but in stillness. And it was precisely this pause that started allowing me to see things differently.First of all, I began to ask myself: Why am I making this choice? Does it serve to achieve my goal? But also, what is my goal? Am I doing it because it’s truly what I want, or just because it’s what others expect from me?This question changed everything.I realized that many decisions had been made just to please others, to avoid disappointing the expectations I imagined others had of me. After all, we are human beings, and to live in society, it is important to consider what others expect of us and how we imagine their opinions might influence our future. This is not only useful, but also necessary. But if taken to the extreme, it can become a trap—like a player so obsessed with winning points that they forget the joy of the game itself.James P. Carse wrote that there are two kinds of games: finite games, with fixed rules and a goal to win, and infinite games, played for the joy of continuing to play. My friend was telling me to stop chasing rankings and points and to start playing an infinite game—one that more closely resembles life, relationships, and personal growth.Saying “no” taught me this: the value of standing still, observing, discovering that even in stillness, new things appear on the horizon—things I couldn’t see before but that had perhaps always been there, waiting to be discovered.Now, standing uncomfortably still, I watch my desires and aspirations reshape. And I realize: I can take the time to enjoy my world before narrowing it again with the next ‘yes.’Originally published 25th January 2025, Sette.&nbsp; <a href="https://www.corriere.it/sette/25_gennaio_29/il-superpotere-di-prendersi-una-pausa-dire-no-ha-spalancato-il-mio-mondo-32280c6b-4905-490e-b9ce-a4634a71fxlk.shtml?refresh_ce" data-mce-href="https://www.corriere.it/sette/25_gennaio_29/il-superpotere-di-prendersi-una-pausa-dire-no-ha-spalancato-il-mio-mondo-32280c6b-4905-490e-b9ce-a4634a71fxlk.shtml?refresh_ce">https://www.corriere.it/sette/25_gennaio_29/il-superpotere-di-prendersi-una-pausa-dire-no-ha-spalancato-il-mio-mondo-32280c6b-4905-490e-b9ce-a4634a71fxlk.shtml?refresh_ce</a>

The Power of Saying No

two hands reaching for a flying object in the sky

AI+ED = Artificial Intelligence + Education

<h3>A practical guide&nbsp;</h3>Even though we live in a world where the internet is rich in content on a wide range of topics, the work of researching, analyzing, selecting, creating, reworking, and sharing digital educational materials is demanding and crucial for the success of educational practices that utilize digital tools.By implementing the right processes and paying attention to some fundamental elements, it is possible to tackle this challenge successfully.In general, I believe it is important to clarify that there are no universally applicable solutions. The proposed steps, like any educational practice and evaluation of educational pathways, should be considered a draft that needs to be adapted to the specific context. My advice? Modify it, improve it, critique it, and share your experiences with other schools: effective innovation is born only from collaboration and comparison.To bring innovation into the school context, all stakeholders (families, students, and school staff) must be involved and committed, and the objectives and responsibilities must be clear and transparent.Below, I suggest some steps to follow to initiate a process of digital innovation: <figure id="figure-t9lf0tslemlzu1b7kf"><img id="t9lf0tslemlzu1b7kf" src="https://cdn.durable.co/blocks/86Vo10auqgaHPDfohCoFy1Ir4Lh9fgPMDhzCe5QwqWbZU58pcHpKD60JnSmDZkF0.png" alt="Happy black public speaker during business conference in convention center looking at camera." title="Happy black public speaker during business conference in convention center looking at camera." class="object-cover bg-gray-100 rounded-sm md:rounded-md lg:rounded-lg" style="aspect-ratio: 1/1; object-position: undefined undefined;" data-corners="default" data-aspect="1:1" data-caption="" data-positionx="undefined" data-positiony="undefined" data-fullwidth="false" data-mce-src="https://cdn.durable.co/blocks/86Vo10auqgaHPDfohCoFy1Ir4Lh9fgPMDhzCe5QwqWbZU58pcHpKD60JnSmDZkF0.png" data-mce-style="aspect-ratio: 1/1; object-position: undefined undefined;"></figure> DEDICATED TEAM Identify a group of people who can lead the process and hold its members accountable for the objectives. The group should include representatives from each subject area and the digital facilitator. The objectives of this group might include:<table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 100.002%;" border="1" data-mce-style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 100.002%;"><tbody><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">Designing an action plan and monitoring its progress.</td></tr><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">Assessing the current and future availability of the best tools based on the context to initiate effective digital teaching.</td></tr><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">Identifying the most suitable ways to use and produce digital content to achieve the educational objectives and the technological resources of the school and involved families.</td></tr><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">Monitoring the quality, accessibility, and safety of digital content and the tools needed to access it.</td></tr></tbody></table>ASSESSMENT Before creating a plan, it is important to conduct an assessment of the starting point. Aspects to consider include:<table style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 100.002%;" border="1" data-mce-style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 100.002%;"><tbody><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">A mapping of the school's technological resources (computers, screens, digital whiteboards, headsets, etc.).</td></tr><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">A mapping of the students' technological resources.</td></tr><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">An evaluation of the minimum skills needed to use the tools available to both the school staff and students. For this, we suggest using frameworks such as DigCompEdu and DigComp or similar tools.</td></tr><tr><td style="width: 99.9975%;" data-mce-style="width: 99.9975%;">A mapping of any digital teaching materials already available to the teaching staff and the school.</td></tr></tbody></table> DEFINE OBJECTIVES AND PLAN First, the group should consider the ideal final outcome to be achieved over a medium-term period (e.g., 3 years). Based on this outcome, we suggest creating a series of steps with bimonthly or quarterly milestones to achieve the final result. Each goal should be ambitious but achievable and easily measurable/verifiable. ASSIGN RESPONSIBILITIES For each activity, responsible individuals must be identified: depending on the activity, this may involve individuals or groups, but it is helpful to always identify a single person to take charge of coordinating the activity, checking deadlines, and identifying any potential issues. INVOLVE FAMILIES AND STUDENTS Using digital content and innovative new pedagogical approaches means creating a collaborative pathway between all involved stakeholders. It will be important to involve families and students in the innovation project, keep them updated on progress, and periodically gather their suggestions and feedback on the selected content used in the activities that involve them. MONITOR AND ADAPT THE PLAN No plan, no matter how well designed, will perfectly reflect reality. Therefore, it is useful for the dedicated group to periodically spend time (every 2 months, for example) evaluating the plan itself to make any necessary adjustments based on real progress. These changes should be shared and communicated transparently to all involved stakeholders. <h3>ACTIVITIES OF THE DEDICATED TEAM</h3>Once the project is underway, the group will organize its activities, keeping in mind some key principles.Accessibility and Equity The content and tools used for accessing it must respect the principles of accessibility and equity from various perspectives.Special Needs and Cultural and Linguistic DiversityIt is important to ensure that all involved individuals can fully benefit from what is provided and achieve their learning objectives. For content, it is advisable to check that it is designed and presented according to the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL). SkillsBased on the assessments carried out, actions should be taken to ensure that all involved (students, teachers, and families) possess the necessary skills to effectively use the provided content. DevicesThe content should be accessible from different types of devices to ensure that everyone can access it without limitations related to the device they own. Internet Connectivity: If the content requires a connection to be accessed, it is important to ensure that connectivity is adequate in all contexts (e.g., avoiding assigning tasks and additional work at home to students who do not have access to fast internet at home). Inclusive Language and Bias-Free ContentIt is critical to monitor for gender, cultural, or any other type of bias, based on the context. Security and Sharing Content should be shared among all teaching staff and easily accessible through an effective storage and retrieval system, and should be evaluated and modified over time. To this end, internal systems can be designed or existing market platforms can be used. Some of these platforms also offer their own or third-party content. Whatever setup is chosen, it is important to choose an IT architecture or platform that:Ensures cybersecurity standards to protect content and usersEnsures standards for data and privacy protection for all involved users. Content Appropriateness Online, we have access to a wealth of content that can be used in the classroom or for classwork. However, not all of it is appropriate, even if it is high quality. Content is appropriate if it is designed for digital use and to be used in an educational context with a specific target audience in terms of school grade. Assessing the appropriateness of content is a fundamental principle for the success of a teaching program integrated with digital tools. Note that content may be appropriate for guided classroom use by the teacher and not for individual use, or vice versa. It is, therefore, useful to pay attention to this aspect as well.Trust and Quality It is important to choose sources and publishers you trust and establish open and collaborative contact. The beauty of digital is that content can easily be improved, expanded, and optimized. It is helpful to define the parameters and qualities sought in the content or sources used, establish guidelines and a list of recommended sources, and share them among teachers. The guidelines and sources can be constantly updated to account for actual effectiveness and any changes.Balance and Effectiveness Not everything needs to be digital, nor does everything need to be analog. The selected content is just part of the curriculum, and it is used where its format is effective or, ideally, more effective than other learning forms.Multimedia Digital educational materials can come in different forms: images, graphics, or photographs; audio and video clips; simulations and animations; and lessons. Each medium or mix of media has advantages and disadvantages, and it is important to choose the best application based on the context and content.Sociality and Interaction Ensure that materials and their use promote interaction and collaboration between students, between students and teachers, and among teachers.Teachers Training and Peer Learning It will be important to organize specific training sessions on researching, selecting, reusing, creating, and sharing digital educational content and to foster an environment of exchange and collaborative learning among teachers to spread the necessary skills. Training on the content and its use should be as integrated as possible with reflection on the different pedagogical approaches that can be adopted and the validity of the content in relation to them.User Generated Content (UGC) In cases where conditions are created for the production of content by teachers and its sharing with colleagues, it may be useful to incentivize this through mechanisms for recognizing the best content created.Measure, Evaluate, and Improve Content Periodically Digital content must be constantly evaluated and updated based on the context and the results achieved through its use.It will be important to establish specific periodic moments to carry out this activity with the help of all the teaching staff, taking into account students' feedback as well as shared and easily recognizable and measurable quality evaluation parameters over time. This goal can be achieved by organizing periodic evaluation questionnaires closely linked to the individual content used. The dedicated group should then set specific checkpoints 2–3 times a year or at the most suitable frequency for the context to continuously improve the available content.

Digital innovation for schools

My TEDx about AI and the paradigm shift we are living in is out! <figure id="figure-lebwtekrhxclzkzbysu" data-full-width=""><iframe id="lebwtekrhxclzkzbysu" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bP5fYGPaKQ8" class="w-full bg-gray-100 rounded-sm md:rounded-md lg:rounded-lg" style="aspect-ratio: 16/9;" allowfullscreen="" data-url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bP5fYGPaKQ8" data-corners="default" data-fullwidth="true" data-mce-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bP5fYGPaKQ8" data-mce-style="aspect-ratio: 16/9;"></iframe></figure> Here is a English translated transcript!&nbsp;______________________________It's a day like any other. You are heading to work, mentally going over all the news you want to share with your confidant as soon as you take a break with her.But then, when you enter the office, something feels off: whispers, smirks, faces... It almost seems like your colleagues are aware of the two or three secrets you shared just with her. Could she have betrayed you like that?&nbsp;And so, in an instant, you find yourself shouting at her, demanding explanations.However, these explanations cannot come because you are shouting at a wall... a digital one: that is, you are shouting at a screen. Well, this woman shouting at the screen exists because the traitor is ELIZA, and she is a chatbot, the first chatbot in history. It's 1966 at MIT, and our protagonist, the human one, is Professor Weizenbaum's secretary, the professor leading the ELIZA research project. Everyone in the lab could chat [with ELIZA] whenever they wanted, and of course, it was a test, so all conversations were recorded, analyzed, read, and reread by everyone. And so, she let herself go a bit and didn't realize she was actually sharing her personal matters with all her colleagues. However, the point isn't that she was careless. The point is that she was the first victim of what we today call the ELIZA effect: if we have something in front of us that expresses itself in natural language, we immediately tend to overestimate its intelligence. It must be human.&nbsp;After all, what other species have we found in the universe that express themselves with language like us? This is the power that language, this technology we have invented, has over us. And yes, of course, you might say, well, we were in 1955, now we are all a bit more used to these chatbots and algorithms, and we would never get involved in this way as it happened to her. Yet, in reality, exactly the same things happen. In 2015, 50 years after ELIZA, just a short time after voice had joined language, we found ourselves with our voice assistants in our pockets, at home, and we started conversing with them. And indeed, already in 2015, we read stories like the one Luis tells us in this review, where he says that Alexa helped him get over a breakup. But not only that, but he also adds that now that Alexa is at home, why bother going out with friends? He has her company. And this is the power that voice has over us. And yes, speaking of voice and company, today I brought it with me, let me introduce you to Kirobo, a Japanese companion robot, who, believe it or not, accompanied Japanese astronauts in space. It's a personal robot designed to dialogue with us and our technologies, with our smartphones. And above all, can we say it? ... Yes. How cute is it? This is its main feature! And it's cute for a reason: because at this moment, while we look at it, our bodies are producing oxytocin. It's a hormone also known as the love hormone because it can provoke behaviors of mutual care, genuine love, trust, and even happiness in us. It makes us feel good, so good that other robots like it, specifically designed for this purpose, like the seal Paro, are used to combat depression. So, it's an effect absolutely studied to make us feel good. And this is the power of design when it's intended for this purpose. And it's no coincidence that this design often comes from Japan because the way technology is perceived is also influenced by the way it is talked about, and in Japan, take artificial intelligence, the narratives are completely different because intelligence in the term artificial intelligence is more akin to wisdom, a wisdom that, according to Japanese culture, resides not in the brain but in the heart, and for this reason, it is impossible for an artificial intelligence project not to also have a body. Whatever its form, an animal, a little robot like this, or a humanoid body. That body is needed because that kind of intelligence cannot be separated from emotions, empathy, imagination, consciousness, and what is built, in fact, is a harmony, an interaction between human and machine where there is also a certain mutual respect. Well, it’s a completely different story compared to the dichotomy we are used to between technology and human. And think, all this just for the power of the words we choose and that then accompany us in our narratives, in the values they evoke in us, and in the emotions we feel.&nbsp;Amazing. And speaking of things that can excite us and catch our attention, the truth is that yes, robots like these are very cute and well-designed, but sometimes much less is needed for us humans. Sometimes even a well-designed mechanism with just a few pixels is enough. And perhaps for those of my age, you will remember a famous hit of the '90s. Do you?&nbsp;The Tamagotchi: a digital alien pet to carry with us always, and that occasionally notifies us because it wants to go for a walk, play, eat, drink, be cuddled, or sleep, and our goal is to keep it alive, healthy, and happy. It's a game. Eh, but a game if well-designed..., and indeed I add, a digital service of any kind like many of those we use today, if well-designed as if it were a game, and therefore gamified as we say today, well, a game is powerful. And then again, if a game requires us to cooperate: oxytocin, we start producing it. But not only. A lot of things happen in our body: adrenaline, dopamine, endorphin, just to name a few. Everything that happens in us ensures that our attention, motivation, excitement, sense of pride, and again our happiness increase. And all this sense of well-being somehow also creates a certain dependency. I mean, who wouldn't want to repeat such a positive experience? And this happens in our bodies, and it's the power that games have over us, which, after all, touch fundamental levers in us humans. But there is something that not only touches fundamental levers of humans but also manages to modify us significantly. And these are intellectual technologies: all those technologies that we somehow use in our cognitive activities. Thinking, solving a problem, reading, writing, learning, but also media, communicating, and collaborating.&nbsp;And here you see Nietzsche writing on a typewriter because when they pointed out to him that since he started using this medium, his prose was changing, well, he expressed very well how these technologies impact us, because he said that these technologies participate in the formation of our thoughts. Today we would say they are part of our extended mind that relies on external objects. And today we know they also physically change our brain. That is, when we train our brain to perform certain activities, it physically modifies itself and therefore maybe dedicates entire areas to doing something we deem important, or it converts other areas that are no longer useful to us. And so today, well, if we need to find information or solve a problem, the first thing we activate is not what in our brain digs into our knowledge, we activate what goes to seek outside towards search engines. And on the other side, we are excellent at multitasking, jumping from one place to another, from a link to a notification, constantly dividing our attention. We have become less good at concentrating on one thing, reflecting, because this requires us a lot of time and few distractions. And this is the power that intellectual technologies have over us, which doesn't stop here because it is so strong that we could, if we wanted, also construct a sort of timeline where, depending on the cultural paradigm, we find different intellectual technologies at our disposal. And then in antiquity, where much was based on orality also because the supports were cumbersome to consult, carry around, rare, expensive... well, what would you have done if you were lucky enough to have in your hand a writing of Aristotle or Pythagoras? One thing: learn it all by heart. So, when you needed it, you could bring it to mind and use it to support your reasoning by appealing to the good old principle of authority, that is, IPSE DIXIT, he said it, word for word.Then came the book, came paper, printing, and suddenly the tools to carry around culture became much less rare, less expensive, easier to carry in our pockets but, above all, also easier to consult again to maybe find the mark.And so, I can dedicate a little less space to memory because I can rely on the book.And above all, I add, even the movement we make when we read a book facilitates a consequential reasoning, a reasoning much closer to the scientific one. Here we are ready for a new paradigm. Today our filter is artificial intelligence, we access and disseminate culture with search engines, social networks, analytical tools, predictive tools, today even with generative artificial intelligence. Well, we are in the new AI Dixit paradigm and in this new paradigm, I believe it is very explicit that we dialogue with these technologies, we converse, and they participate in the formation of our thoughts. They participate in our reasoning and will participate more and more in what becomes a dialogue also useful to be more creative, to try to look at things from different points of view, to structure our reasoning. If we use them well, they can do this, so, they almost become a kind of... I don't know, an inner voice? Maybe in the future, we will talk about the “Talking Cricket Effect”. A synthetic digital talking cricket that participates in our cognitive activities and after all, just as the talking cricket helped Pinocchio become human, in some way this new synthetic talking cricket is helping us humans become different humans who express their intelligence differently. It therefore participates in the construction of our memory, our identity, the image we have of the world, and therefore also of the role we humans have in that world. And so, it is also changing the way we give meaning to our existence. Well, this is the power and impact that culture has on us, it is a change of the cultural paradigm. And so: language, voice, design, words, game, intellectual technologies, now even generally all culture… the fact is that all these levers, these powers, are converging today into a single space, an enormous space of power that, like all powers, we can choose to delegate more or less to third parties. Third parties who can also be very few people managing the technological companies leveraging all those powers we have seen. But the point is that this is not the path, there are others we can inhabit both individually and collectively in this space. We can make it our own as a space of freedom of action and therefore I would also say a bit of resistance.How?Well, bringing on board this space always different points of view questioning the tools and content bringing cultures, viewpoints, ideas, visions, futures all things in the plural that express the wonderful diversity of us humans. And at this point, it will become a space of sharing. You know, Michael Tomasello showed that this very ability to share, to focus attention together on a single concept, and therefore to learn from each other, to change our points of view, well, this is what was the key to the cognitive leap that in fact made our species evolve. So, I say: this is the most important power of all because this is what allows us to direct all the other levers, all the other powers, and to participate in the construction of this new cultural paradigm. In short: this, after all, is the power of being human.

AI Dixit: our new cultural paradigm and how to navigate it

<blockquote>Alice: How long is forever? White Rabbit: Sometimes, just one second.</blockquote>LEWIS CARROLL, Alice in wonderland It took me a while between putting offs and excuses to tackle this new edition of Futurethics. Normally as soon as I finish writing a newsletter, I immediately start having a thousand ideas about the next one. I take some time to think about it, I already throw some notes, I draw up a list and then in the end I see them all there, the ideas, which try to emerge, get noticed more than the others and get the better of them. [For those who are fans, an image is enough to understand what I mean: “Pick me, Pick me!” My ideas would say if they could talk just like Donkey who wants to accompany Shrek on his adventure.]But then, after a few weeks of apprehension, on February 24, 2022, all those ideas faded away, and, as if frozen, they stopped jumping and waving in front of my eyes. How do you think of anything else? Due to an inequitable geographic and geopolitical mechanism, this war worries us much more than the many others in progress in the world [and I will not go into the merits of the fact that we should have equal indignation in the face of ALL wars]. This one hits us straight like a punch in the stomach and prevents us from looking up.I guess it is a feeling that not only I have experienced since on March 12 even Tim Berners Lee, the creator of the web, replaced the awaited letter that he should have shared on the future of the web on the 33rd anniversary of his birth, with a fundraiser for Ukraine.<figure id="figure-v7cskqvdnolxuijl8h"><img id="v7cskqvdnolxuijl8h" src="https://cdn.durable.co/blocks/17dlAd0B6DvAwFBsp15xD8Le4JoHYDLaKmzV9y7ax7pNpvbdP1ehCL5N9aS8Atyi.jpg" alt="" title="" class="object-cover bg-gray-100 rounded-sm md:rounded-md lg:rounded-lg" style="aspect-ratio: 16/9; object-position: center center;" data-corners="default" data-aspect="16:9" data-caption="" data-positionx="undefined" data-positiony="undefined" data-fullwidth="false" data-mce-src="https://cdn.durable.co/blocks/17dlAd0B6DvAwFBsp15xD8Le4JoHYDLaKmzV9y7ax7pNpvbdP1ehCL5N9aS8Atyi.jpg" data-mce-style="aspect-ratio: 16/9; object-position: center center;"></figure>&nbsp; &nbsp; And yet, even if all ideas ran away at some point, I realized that one of the topics of my reflection remained timidly at hand. Discreetly and on tiptoe it whispered in my ear: “The future is frozen. Again”.Let’s start from here then and take up some of the reflections made with Andrea Dusi on the subject in our latest book. [1]The future is frozen.Time is suspended in an eternal present.We live constantly waiting for something to arrive, a faint ray of sunshine capable of warming the cold that blocked us there, in a timeless place.That’s how we experienced the first lockdown linked to the covid-19 pandemic and, some of us more and some others less, how we are experiencing the tragic news about the war between Russia and Ukraine.We await and postpone the future that is unthinkable in its infinite possibilities when an event so great and so impactful is redefining its boundaries every moment that passes.“Time doesn’t exist!” some physicists peremptorily affirm, taking to the extreme consequences the theories that have revolutionized our conception over the last century. And yet, its weight in such a moment makes itself very well felt. Whether it exists or not in the field of physics, right now does not matter because the way we perceive time defines profound aspects of human nature and the way we evolved to live on this planet. It is worth talking about.Kant, Leibnitz and quantum physicsThe theme of time is fundamental for us human beings and it is no coincidence that to answer the great questions of philosophy about reality and how we know it we had to deal with this concept. For Kant, for example, time and space are two categories in our mind, two lenses through which we conceive and see the world around us, and which consequently interfere with the perception of the world. In this sense, time and space are a filter that does not allow us to know things as they really are, adapting them to the forms of our intuition. I have already said [2] that, drawing a reductive parallel with respect to the extraordinary complexity that characterizes our brain, and the human being, space and time would in this sense be the operating system of thought. And if for Kant space is not conceivable without the time to be perceived, for Leibniz instead time and space are not conceivable except by inserting another pillar into the equation: matter, paving the way for insights that evolve up to modern quantum physics. [3]Personal timeAt this moment, however, we are especially interested in the phenomenological aspect of time. How we perceive it and how it affects our lives: we could say our sense of time.And in these two years our sense of time has really been tested.Instants that last an eternity expanding for anguish, moments of great emotions pleasant, and years that pass in a moment, without history alternate following the sobs of events that suddenly change our way of living, working, communicating, travelling.In the first lockdown, spent alone, I lived in a kind of fast pace made up of strict rules and habits that helped me not to lose heart. 6:30 wake up, 30 minutes of physical movement while the roomba cleans one part of the house, breakfast and shower while the roomba goes wild in the other, 9:00 20 minute good morning meeting with colleagues, work, 13: 00 lunch on the terrace and reading until 2.00 pm, work until around 7.00 pm and again some reading outdoors, dinner, TV series and go to sleep. In this well-defined rhythm, I inserted all my activities, measuring their duration much more precisely than usual. I remember one day I made a shocking discovery: apparently emptying a full dishwasher doesn’t take me more than 3 minutes. Oh yes, only 3. Yet, I like it so little that it seems like an eternity, and I often postpone it telling myself that I’m late. The fact is that time is a measure of our thoughts. The way we feel it is influenced by many factors, primarily by emotions. Each of us lives an inner life made up of completely personal times, dictated by the things we like, those that bore us or that annoy us.It is normal that this very aspect of time has emerged as a collective discussion at a time when the whole world, which used to be in such a hurry, has found itself on a hiatus.Reflection on time, even personal time, is not a novelty in the contemporary world. Indeed, we could say that it has been a real constant in the attempt to investigate the world that has developed since the industrial revolution. Right then, in fact, a huge change took place: our society moved from an organic-based to a mineral-based economy. An organic-based economy depends on raw materials and energy from the earth such as silk, linen, cotton, wood, leather, skins, wool, charcoal … Raw materials and energy sources that are renewed over time and which are consequently limited by production cycles that the earth and nature dictate to us.Those cycles and those rhythms characterize the whole society by marking the hours, calendars, seasons. A mineral-based economy, on the other hand, is based on non-renewable but abundant raw materials such as iron and hard coal. This step has allowed the company to completely change the pace, its rhythms, the way of life. Electricity lengthens the days, work is punctuated by machines, cities move away from nature and its rhythms, clocks are spread to allow us to measure even the smallest fragment of time and mark our actions during the day.All this has the most disparate effects on the psychology of individuals and on families and society in general.Thus, our time-filter acts as an instrument of order, as a shared and collective image that not only measures but puts into perspective and gives meaning to what we feel and do.The art and literature of the contemporary world have faced in many ways this relationship with the changing time, this acceleration that seems to overwhelm us.From work in the factory in which time is subtracted from the power of the worker who undergoes production time instead of guiding it as the craftsman did that we find in the reflections of Marx and Simone Weil, to the iconic image of Modern Times by Charlie Chaplin where man is an integral part of a gear. From the avant-gardes and movements such as Futurismo that make this fast time a myth to be pursued, to poetry and literature that modify the linear time of the narrative to explore the inner discourse with its breaks and temporal leaps that follow only the mental connections of our synapses.Thus, for example, Emily Dickinson expressed herself in one of her poems:<blockquote>By Clocks, ’twas Morning, and for NightThe bells at Distance called –But Epoch had no basis hereFor Period exhaled. (1159) &nbsp; &nbsp;</blockquote>And the future?But even if we are immersed in this frenetic, crazy, and subjective time of our society, the future has remained one of the pillars of time. Even if too little and often unconsciously, what we imagine may happen in the future influences and guides us.At least this is the case in times that with a little effort we can call normality.While now, in the face of war, as well as in the midst of the pandemic, the future is frozen and there is no way to think about it.In our book we tried to graph what happened to the future and our ability to imagine it, in the case of the lockdown.<figure id="figure-xgx4kjnkjrlxuiobft"><img id="xgx4kjnkjrlxuiobft" src="https://cdn.durable.co/blocks/2fNyLFJxoUryRhkYaWVIJyetFhPTT7e8iUTv9OJoSRocJI1taVHowTTwBNSlGTkS.jpg" alt="" title="" class="object-cover bg-gray-100 rounded-sm md:rounded-md lg:rounded-lg" style="aspect-ratio: 16/9; object-position: center center;" data-corners="default" data-aspect="16:9" data-caption="" data-positionx="undefined" data-positiony="undefined" data-fullwidth="false" data-mce-src="https://cdn.durable.co/blocks/2fNyLFJxoUryRhkYaWVIJyetFhPTT7e8iUTv9OJoSRocJI1taVHowTTwBNSlGTkS.jpg" data-mce-style="aspect-ratio: 16/9; object-position: center center;"></figure>&nbsp; &nbsp; SOURCE: After, Il mondo che ci attende. CRISTINA POZZI, ANDREA DUSI, Bompiani, 2021 In the vertical axis we have the time that passes: at first, during the initial emergency, in the transformation and after the covid-19. In the horizontal axis, on the other hand, we have our collective vision of the future, the possible futures that we evaluate and consider in our daily actions, the horizons.We immediately notice how the initial moment is precisely what deprives us of the future and leaves us stunned in a world in pause. In this phase we tend to project the situation in the emergency phase into the future and imagine that it will remain so, that this is the new reality. A tragic situation also described by the words of Camus: «In truth, everything became present for them; it must be said, the plague had deprived every one of the faculty of love and also of friendship; love, in fact, requires a bit of the future, and for us there were only moments». [4]And again: «The plague had covered everything: there were no longer individual destinies, but a collective history, the plague, and feelings shared by all.» [5]A very strong psychological impact, a sudden, collective, and shared feeling of mourning. The breaking of our securities, of our anchors, the loss of our loved ones, distant relationships, an endless present in front of us, a time without time and without hope.The individual merges into the community and forms of solidarity emerge between neighbors, strangers and distant friends and relatives.So many of us if we think back to the two years that have passed we find ourselves confusing the many days all the same, without history, and to perceive as if 2019 were yesterday.A time like the one we find in the words of poets and poets like Dickinson, Montale, T.S. Eliot: waiting for those slivers of time, those moments that can come from any element of nature or object. Moments of enlightenment that make sense of a meaningless time.A new time, a new world: notes for future reflectionsBut then we move on to the next stage, something starts to move, and a lot of news arrives. Of these, whether positive or negative, some are destined to remain, others will be abandoned as soon as the emergency ends.This is the decisive moment, the transformative one, in which everything (or almost everything) seems possible to us, to really define what will be.“Though we see the same world, we see it through different eyes,” wrote Virginia Woolf between 1937 and 1939.Are we in a similar situation? Of course history does not repeat itself and the pandemic is a very different animal from war. And if they have in common this effect of freezing the future as they unfold, they have a characteristic that differentiates them: usually a pandemic creates division and mistrust and leaves behind a fragmented society. The war, on the other hand, once it is over leaves hope. A precious feeling for which we must fight, every day, even now that we are in this seemingly clear-cut darkness.«Hope in the dark», says the title of a wonderful book by Rebecca Solnit [6], a darkness that opens up many possibilities that we can explore with the power of hope. And time in all its dimensions is a fundamental element that helps to nourish hope and give meaning to our lives. It is no coincidence that many of us, just in the face of a change and a break in time, are today faced with new search, previously dormant, which was waiting to return to the surface to ferry us towards a new world.What we will do with these reflections is up to us alone.NOTATIONS [1] After. Il mondo che ci attende (Bompiani, 2021)[2] https://cristinapozzi.com/ethics-and-reflection-on-the-future-why-we-should-become-futuremakers-cd18cbc08300[3] For those who’d like to know more I recommend this beautiful book: TEMPO, Il sogno di uccidere Chrònos. GUIDO TONELLI, Feltrinelli (2021).[4] ALBERT CAMUS, La peste, Bompiani (32 edizione), 2013[5] Ibidem[6] https://www.amazon.it/Hope-Dark-Canons-Book-English-ebook/dp/B002VM7FRQ/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&amp;qid=1647245075&amp;sr=8-1

Defrosting the future

Middle Eastern Girl with short braided hair jumping of a stack of blocks on a  construction site wearing gray and black fitness outfit on a hot bright sunny day.   

<h3>Observing the present with a look from the future</h3>A few days ago, I was asked a question, with an apparently trivial answer, but which gave me to think for a while.It was the third question of a short digital interview that would introduce a speech by the philosopher Luciano Floridi at the IAB Forum. Now, you need to know, to really understand how I took the question, that I am an aspiring philosopher. More precisely, a few years ago I enrolled in a three-year degree to avoid giving myself superficial answers in the face of the challenges of our time and above all to ask myself the right questions.I felt a bit like the Maneskin hired to warm up the audience before the Rolling Stones concert.When I recovered, I continued to reflect on the fateful question.Prof. Floridi after me, they told me, would have praised, and described a sort of XXI century vocabulary with truly impressive words and neologisms considering the research work behind the selection he would have proposed.So, I was asked to indicate a word (only one!) To describe our time.In short, a small thing.As often happens when I start mulling over something, I used to think about it while pedaling to the office, while getting up for a break from my place at work, while having an aperitif with friends. And I started taking it very wide and thinking about words like freedom, futures, hope, work, hybrid, learning, democracy, decentralization, metaverse (which is now so fashionable), fraternity, crisis, deception, reality, conscience, responsibility, (obviously also “digital”, but I immediately regretted knowing who would come after me).In the end, a few minutes before setting foot in the recording studio where the interview took place, I realized I had the solution in front of me.Meanwhile, a small note, if the other words have also tickled your reflections, don’t worry, let’s not throw them away. They will find their place in the next newsletters.But let’s get back to us. I decided: my word would be transepochal.In 2019 my book Destination 2050 came out with BUP in which I enjoyed writing a sort of (was) tourist guide for those who suddenly find themselves living in the future starting today. At that time, I argued that a transepochal journey should have been undertaken, a journey through time between one era and another, which would have projected us into a new world. However, contrary to the approach of techno-optimists like Ray Kurzweil, the radical change in my opinion would not have been dictated by artificial intelligence technologies, which according to the definition of the concept of Technological Singularity, by then would have become so superior to the human being that make the world incomprehensible to us. Using the metaphor of Vernor Vinge, the inventor of this concept, which was deepened and disclosed by Kurzweil, it would be a world as incomprehensible to us as our civilization is for a goldfish.If there is a singularity that will affect us between now and 2050, it is instead, in my opinion, a cultural singularity, and it is precisely what happens when a transepochal journey takes place.The point is that our world is changing so fast and profoundly that we are confronted with a radically new reality, and this is happening because our paradigms are changing just as rapidly. Such a change often occurs when the way human beings communicate changes and transforms with the technologies we invent. Language, writing, printing, the network (outside of us), voice commands, thought commands (with neurotechnologies integrated into our bodies (???)). Human society is so deeply linked to the communication between its members and to our sense of identity that it changes profoundly with them and with these perspectives we can truly imagine radical changes in our near future.But that’s not all, if in 2017/2018 when I was writing the book, I was thinking above all about this, today I cannot but add the effect of what is called a wild card in future studies: the Covid-19 pandemic that has caused us affected.This is relevant for two reasons: the most evident is that it creates a space of change, a vortex that suddenly disturbs the already choppy waters of the sea in which we are traveling. The second reason is that if we go to see how we are dealing with it, it is evident that we have already entered the new era. Start from here.Epidemics and pandemics are constant in the history of humanity.We could spend seas of words to show that great human upheavals have always been dictated by natural factors such as the struggle for resources, climate change and disease. If we want to look back, we will notice how the pandemic usually arrives and brings with it some consequences: famine, often linked to the lack of people who work the land, total breakdown of relations, blocking of businesses, jobs stop, school it is closed, tension on the health system and, in the worst epidemics, on that of burials. Another constant is that public opinion tends to look for a scapegoat, a certain human type who would be the greaser to bear the responsibility of an inexplicable tragedy.It is true. At a quick glance all these things repeated themselves in 2020 as if they were following a macabre script. If we look closer, however, there have been enormous differences compared to the past. There was no famine, many were able to continue working in a previously unthinkable dimension, from home via the internet. The school did not stop and even if it did not live up to its normal performance, the effects we feel and will suffer are less bad than those we would have seen with a total stop. Not to mention the reaction speed that we have been able to put on track globally with research, analyzes using artificial intelligence algorithms, forecasts on the evolution and movement of the virus and many other answers that we have not been able to put on track. they were never seen before.We are therefore here, in a new phase of humanity, digital, characterized by technologies that we call intelligent, which seems to be moving towards an intelligent use of the resources that nature offers us.&nbsp; &nbsp; Let’s go back for a moment to our two reflections related to the pandemic. We were saying that there is also something that has messed up the cards: with what effects? On the one hand, some trends have undergone a great acceleration, others have slowed down, and still others have arisen having been made possible by the new conditions. Everyone agrees on this analysis. The temptation to think about things as they are today and as they will be with the models of the past remains strong and somehow therefore reassures us to think that the impacts can be explained by accelerations and slowdowns. But we risk looking at things in the wrong way because we do not consider what has been highlighted above, of that transepochal passage that is interesting to us and that is why this word is so central to me. Being aware of this allows us to look at things differently.To explain the concept, we can take an example that is very fashionable these days.Someone better than me at thinking words with effect thought of calling it The Great Resignation. It is a question of the fact that since the pandemic hit us, millions of people have voluntarily resigned from their jobs to change their lives, seek new rhythms and new balances. This happens in the USA, China, Europe and mainly affects people between 25 and 40 years old.This trend is certainly not temporary, it is not a novelty that arose as a reaction to the pandemic and lockdowns, it is something much deeper, it is one of the great paradigms shifts in our society that occur in transepochal journey.To get an idea, we can add two other phenomena to our analysis that allow us to look at the topic from a broader point of view.The Tang Ping revolution in ChinaTang Ping a philosophy that has been spreading even before the pandemic among young people in China which, also as a form of freedom from state control, focuses on a model of frugal life. Those who follow this philosophy rebel against the race for production and consumption, against the idea of progress and dedication to work at all costs as tools for living a fulfilling life.Protests against big tech companiesFor some years now, employees of companies such as Google or Amazon have been striking or taking to the streets to demand a company value alignment and a more sustainable approach to the market (as well as, when needed, to fight for their rights at work). Workers no longer just want a career, an adequate salary, a welcoming workplace, job security, etc.… but they want their commitment to have a positive impact on the planet. If not, they are ready to fight.&nbsp; &nbsp; If we connect these points to the great resignation, what is happening in the post-pandemic is not new, but it is something more profound, of a cultural singularity that if approached as the consequence of Covid-19 betrays a gaze rooted in the past.The transition we are experiencing is radical and requires taking time to think about it, to study, to investigate. It requires an anthropological effort: we must abandon the prejudices of the observer who takes for granted that work, career, family, well-being mean the same thing they mean to him.Transepochal means therefore making an anthropological exercise that we can only do with the curiosity of an explorer and opening a dialogue with the new generations.Link to some articles for further information:· The Great Resignation: https://www.repubblica.it/commenti/2021/11/12/news/covid_lavoro_dimissioni_great_resignation-326021948/· Tang Ping: https://formiche.net/2021/08/comunisti-e-sdraiati-la-rivoluzione-dei-giovani-cinesi-nel-segno-di-mao/· Googl: https://www.businessinsider.com/google-pentagon-bid-is-already-riling-some-employees-2021-11?r=US&amp;IR=T· Google: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/03/technology/google-pentagon-artificial-intelligence.html· Make Amazon Pay: https://www.businessinsider.com/make-amazon-pay-campaign-staffers-will-strike-on-black-friday-2021-11?r=US&amp;IR=T