(2023-12-20) Johnson How To Decide

Steven Johnson: How To Decide. The headlines reporting the events of September 26, 2009 suggested that the day was generally speaking a slow news day

something momentous was happening all around the world that day. In 38 different countries, groups of roughly a hundred people were gathering to have an informed discussions about a global strategy for combating climate change. They were not experts in atmospheric science or policy makers; they were just ordinary citizens selected as a representative sample of their native country’s overall population.

The day of conversation — officially called World Wide Views on Global Warming—had been several years in the making

The timing for an international conversation was promising, because a major United Nations conference on climate change had been scheduled for December of 2009 (COP-15). World Wide Views could potentially deliver useful guidance to the elites that would gather at that event

On the actual deliberation day, the citizens met all around the world, breaking up in tables of 5-8 people, each with a moderator trained to guide the discussion.

After hours of discussion, the citizens then voted on the various questions, resulting in a clear set of climate objectives and priorities that were presented to the United Nations conference a few months later.

I find something immensely moving about this kind of exercise. It is humanity at its best

I’m such a believer in the World Wide Views format that I’ve come to think we should do them once a year, that they should become international media events on the order of athletic competitions like the World Cup or the Olympics. Each year some sort of global panel selects a World Question for that year. (cf Grand Challenge)

It is true that we have existing institutions designed to play this kind of steering role already, in the form of regulators working inside democratically elected governments

But the decision-making control that connects a voter to a government regulator is indirect at best. The system often fails to keep up with the pace of scientific and technological change, leaving regulators more often than not stuck fighting the last war.

But at least the regulators have the force of law on their side

World Questions might indeed produce something like global wisdom. But wouldn’t they lack authority?

That remains an open question, but there is a surprising amount of precedent of well-designed consensus agreements managing to have a major impact in the world, without initially being encoded in law or regulation

famous Asilomar Conference on Recombinant DNA held in 1975

Similarly, the LEED standard for environmentally sustainable building design, developed by a coalition of groups in the early 90s, emerged outside of traditional legal or regulatory channels

the very act of defining an agreed-upon set of practices—in this case, to reduce the carbon footprint of a building—created a ripple effect that altered both private and public sector behavior

And we are at the perfect juncture for a World Question on immortality.

the idea of reversing the aging process is no longer just a fantasy.

Dolly was proof that we could duplicate complex organisms. But it was also an early clue that another power had entered the adjacent possible of science: rejuvenation.

All of which is to say: if we want to have a global conversation about the ethics of the immortality project, we had better get started on it now. The future is coming at us much faster than we realize.

two principles would seem to be worthy ones to push for.

First, we should ensure that just as much funding—if not more—is devoted to endeavors in both medicine and public health targeting health inequalities

second, if the optimists are right and we can “flip a switch” and turn aging into a treatable disease, we should put in place guardrails that keep those therapies out of circulation until they can be globally distributed to all who want them.