The Edge Annual Question 2008: What have you changed your mind about?

Edge.org is the website maintained by The Edge Foundation to highlight the works and ideas of “those scientists and other thinkers in the empirical world who, through their work and expository writing, are taking the place of the traditional intellectual in rendering visible the deeper meanings of our lives, redefining who and what we are.” Every year, since 1998, Edge has put forth a single question to a number of such scientists and other thinkers, presenting a comprehensive look into the brains of some of today’s most forward thinkers.

When I say comprehensive, I mean it. The contributors run the gamut from particle physicist to evolutionary psychologist to philosopher to magazine editor to economist to curator (and so many more). This year, over 150 people responded, and I challenge everyone to not find at least one answer interesting.

(My favorite answer was neuroscientist Stanislas Deheane’s, who had his mind changed on the existence of a unified Theory of Everything for the mind.)

Relevant to the general direction of this blog, Douglas Rushkoff reports his mind has been changed about the internet:

I thought that it would change people. I thought it would allow us to build a new world through which we could model new behaviors, values, and relationships. In the 90’s, I thought the experience of going online for the first time would change a person’s consciousness as much as if they had dropped acid in the 60’s.

I thought Amazon.com was a ridiculous idea, and that the Internet would shrug off business as easily as it did its original Defense Department minders.

Profit has clearly become at least the cornerstone of the internet, if not the central crux; in Rushkoff’s words, “cyberspace has become just another place to do business.” He obviously does not believe all the internet has to offer is another space for business, but instead sees the capitalism overtaking the idealism. In general, the internet has not become a transformative elixir, but has simply provided new ways to do old things (e.g., share photos, find friends, make money).

I agree with Rushkoff in throwing away the belief that “the experience of going online for the first time would change a person’s consciousness as much as if they had dropped acid in the 60’s,” but disagree that the internet has (or can have, or is going to have) no effect on worldview. The specifics (e.g., description, range, stability) of any changes will take awhile to be parsed out, but just off the top of my head: imagine the effects Wikipedia and citizen journalism have had on our notions of intellectual authority.

For now, any effects seem to be beyond quantification, but I predict them emerging in palpable ways in the future. (Always good to end the year’s first post with a prediction, right?)

One Response to “The World Question Center 2008”

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