As you know I come from a country where even the reindeers and wolves are always online, telling their whereabouts to all concerned. We also have cows, but our farmers nowadays are no earlybirds. Modern cows have robots to milk them and reward them. If something goes wrong they send SMS-messages to wake us up. Mostly SMS is used between people – almost like telepathy. Last year one billion SMS messages were sent in Finland. September 11, I was in the middle of a tense negotiation when many of us got SMS-messages from our close ones. It was impossible to believe the first message, but very soon some called their relatives in New York. Rest of the day most spent with their families and TV. ---------------
75% of all Finnish people have mobile phones with integrated SMS-capability. Average price of one text message is 10 cents. Receiving a message is free just like receiving a call. Extension to the GSM network was just rolled out. – This is a three-band GPRS and Bluetooth phone. With GPRS a message may cost less than one cent if it does not contain pictures or music. Perhaps with these prices we might have five to ten billion SMS-messages per five million people within the next five years. That would already be ten times more than paper mail and no need to fear anthrax.
What you see in the background now is Helsinki modelled in 3D and parts of Tokyo and Bremen and the notheastern Finnish province of Kainuu that have also been modelled by Arcus Software. I showed a small part of this Helsinki model when I was here last time in 1997. Then Linda Stone wanted life in the virtual streets but as you see, the streets are still empty. Real life Helsinki is not. I hope it stays like that.
We use these models currently like maps for route guidance. We can produce and send 3D route animations to current GSM and Japanese I-Mode phones. And on this Palm the models are much better. If you ever try to view a regular map with your mobile phone or even a Palm – I have a map here – clearly it is not possible.
Modelling of 25 square kilometers – about 10 square miles – the downtown Helsinki - cost about 1 million dollars. Modelling the whole province of Kainuu – mostly wilderness – cost about the same but there we did not put all the trees in their correct places – only the wolves and the reindeer. In Helsinki we were concerned with buses and trams until the initial commercial model became even simpler.
You could do all sorts of things with these models – household robots could go to the groceries very accurately and easily comparing camera view with the model. Blind people could be helped. Combined with positioning devices in mobile phones you could remove all street signs and traffic signs as people could see them from their windshields or their mobile phones. You could even shut down the streetlights if nobody is around. That is what our house does when the rooms are empty.
Few weeks ago when the movie Artificial Intelligence started in Finland I was asked to preview it and comment it on the national TV. I know that I should be talking about virtual persons and David was a physical robot. It is however much easier start to get a physical robot to understand and learn how the world works. As scholars have pointed out – physical robots experiment on the real world. A virtual bot needs a programmed model of the world to grok anything but the ideas discussed with it.
AI (eiai) was not realistic. We have feelings; many animals clearly have deep feelings - even signs of culture and concepts of right and wrong. Marvin Minsky says that feelings are very efficient way of thinking. They are also necessary for efficient learning and motivation. It is likely that our robots and virtual bots have sentiments much before they properly pass the Turing’s test for intelligence – before they even can discuss with us in a natural manner.
We will get learning and talking bots. They should not be considered things if they learn and if hurting their feelings would change their behaviour for the worse. If we believe in the theories of chaos, general Darwinism and meme theory – we could also believe that our God would not say that life is only based on DNA.
Bill Joy has been afraid that machines could make us needless or useless. This could only happen if we started loving our machines more than our children and if there was nothing useful that we could do for other people better than their machines. There are signs that this is happening. Many people seem to like machines so much that they do not need children. Perhaps with pleasant bots in virtual reality they do not need friends. If this happens, perhaps we do not deserve to live further.
I would believe however that our genetic machinery is wise enough to favour genes that enjoy children. Somehow I also agree with professor Stephen Hawkings who said that we must develop our capabilities technologically to compete with our bots.
If the bots evolve into a learning and thinking lifeform, we should however be tolerant. I remember well an old story by Robert Heinlein where monkeys were genetically engineered to become servants. Jerry could speak fluently and had creative talent. The story ended with a court session where based on the US constitution Jerry was declared a Man with full citizen rights. Heinlein’s egalitarian visions and philosophy are now more important then ever.
Last week I was asked by the governor of the Bank of Finland to give a five-minute presentation to the global top executive of IMF. I was supposed to tell him in five minutes how these networks affect world economy. I feel that many poets could have squezed it in 2:45 but I am so proud of my five minutes that I want to share it with you too – it has actually taken me five years to prepare for the five minutes.
Transaction costs continue to decrease - empowering people both in good and bad. Faceless people hide behind anonymity. Distancies reduce and cultures get mixed – this leads to growing complexity with chaotically different outcomes.
Governments try to control the turbulence by surveillance and limitations. This adds tensions, strengthens hierarchies and possibilities to abuse this power. Trust between citizens and their organizations is necessary for any complex networked economy. Lower transaction cost requires lower per item cost of trust.
People are globally afraid of big corporations and even their own governments. Anonymity is appreciated. In Scandinavia, where governance is more transparent and corporations cannot abuse personal information, anonymity is not so highly valued. We allow nobody to spy on us but we do allow logging information as a precaution.
Perhaps the only way to retain both our societal trust and freedom may be a transparent society where we would have to give up much of our privacy. The Greek word for private is idiotiko as opposed to democracy – perhaps this is wisdom. Perhaps privacy is a hedonistic value and hiding not necessary either for economical success or societal stability. Sadly Internet helps both concealment and openness.
A crucial issue here is the potential rise of electronic cash. If someone can send me a blackmail letter - fulfill the threat anonymously in Internet - and also anonymously collect the money over internet – this could not be controlled without massive global NSA-type organizations - if the net doesn’t support tracing and logging. With societal transparency, spying is not necessary – and civil rights remain strong, society free.
When Georg Soros’s teacher, philosopher Karl Popper wrote his grand opus - Open Society, there were very few really global networks. Still he maintained that no one should have hierarchical power over all issues. As more and more issues become global, most citizens feel too detached from the centers of power. Perhaps the world should not be divided just geographically. Perhaps we could be citizens of several states simultaneously - one physical and several virtual, based on our interests. Currently the physical state has all responsibilities and global matters are governed by organizations getting their mandate from local governments Internet ICANN being among few exceptions. If we wish that people could feel they really can affect global issues within their interest, we perhaps should consider virtual localities and some sort of semi-independent democracy within these.
Another issue is - our growing capability through networks and automated production lines to manufacture copies of just about anything. Value is in bits and the one who gets them copyrighted or patented first gets all the profit. One could claim that the first has created the added value but this is mostly not true. More and more often this leads only to greater profits for economically developed countries and poverty for the countries that could have invented the same things later.
If all the positive benefits of networking could be harnessed – developing nations could prosper and sustainable growth could be reached as much of the material production can be replaced by virtual systems with decreasing energy consumption.
But now back to Camden from virtual reality and developing worlds. I drove here from Boston – perhaps next time we could already come with Mollers Skycar. It has already taken off the ground briefly. My wife Kaija sitting there amongst you - has order number 162 and learns to fly it – I am too much afraid of high places. Pentagon has presumably ordered the first one hundred. Nasa is designing a system where all these are allways online and directed from the ground. With this system you could ask your mother in law to sit in the car and tell the car – please take her home.
In conclusion I thank you and hope we all have a grand future online with virtually augmented senses and even some virtual friends but emphasis on physical life and human friendship like here in Camden.