While anti-conformists may, at first, succeed in devising their own personal brand of sartorial rebelliousness, it’s followed by an inevitable, if unintentional, synchronization around a single appearance. Touboul’s study looks at how such people seem to inevitably become synchronized. He suspects that a major influence on the way it happens may be the speed of propagation of styles through a culture.
Category Archives: research
Artificial Intelligence and Biotechnology: Risks and Opportunities
Machine learning has the potential to truly unlock genetic editing capabilities and uses in everyday life, RAND’s study concluded. But that is going to require years of hard work to minimize the risks and maximize the opportunities—to balance restriction and regulation. With world-changing technologies, that’s always the case. “Cars kill tens of thousands of people every year,” Marler said. “That doesn’t mean they don’t also provide significant benefits, and even help save lives.”
https://www.rand.org/pubs/articles/2024/artificial-intelligence-and-biotechnology-risks-and.html?utm_campaign=randreview%2CAI&utm_content=1712345520&utm_medium=rand_social&utm_source=linkedin
How Not To Predict The Future
The first scientific study of judgmental1 forecasting was conducted in the 1960s by a gentleman at the CIA named Sherman Kent. Kent noticed that in their reports, intelligence analysts used imprecise phrases like “we believe,” “highly likely,” or “little chance.” He wanted to know how the people reading the reports actually interpreted these phrases. He asked 23 NATO analysts to convert the phrases into numerical probabilities, and their answers were all over the place — “probable” might mean a 30% chance to one person and an 80% chance to another. Kent advocated the use of few consistent odds expressions in intelligence reports, but his advice was largely ignored. It would take another two decades for the intelligence community to seriously invest in the study of prediction.
https://asteriskmag.com/issues/05/how-not-to-predict-the-future?ueid=c643ce38d00192ac3af250b1f893d410&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Today%20Explained%202024-03-12&utm_term=Sentences
The magic of the mundane
Goffman’s ‘microsociology’ reveals that even the most incidental of social interactions is of profound theoretical interest. Every encounter is shaped by social rules and social statuses; ‘whether we interact with strangers or intimates, we will find that the fingertips of society have reached bluntly into the contact’. Such interactions contribute to our sense of self, to our relationships with others, and to social structures, which can often be deeply oppressive. Never mind the dealings of the courtroom, the senate, or the trading floor, it is in the mundane interactions of everyday life, Goffman thought, that ‘most of the world’s work gets done’.
https://aeon.co/essays/pioneering-sociologist-erving-goffman-saw-magic-in-the-mundane
Culture Mapping | A Strategic Primer
A 2016 by Stephen Coulthart, PhD, found that about a third of intelligence analysts never applied structured analytic techniques in their work — yet it is at the core of their practice. The research revealed that the two factors affecting use were training received by analysts and perceptions of effectiveness and value.
In light of these findings, we began our Culture Mapping primer to foster a more productive perception of structured analytic techniques. We aspire to facilitate greater adoption of these valuable analytical tools into work practices, and hopefully leveraging the transformative potential unleashed by the advent of AI and machine learning,
Here is the introduction for early draft review.
If you are interested in learning more, please join our upcoming workshops in March.
Workshop One – March 12th – 14th 08:00 – 12:00 EST/NYC time
Workshop Two – March 19th – 21st 18:00 – 22:00 EST/NYC time
Bookings and information: https://lnkd.in/gaf2gpTJ
#culturemapping#livingforesight#foresight#designthinking#speculativedesign#culture#semiotics#anthropology#structuredanalytics
Using AI for developing foresight: reflections on an experiment
There has been much talk on the potential of AI in general and specifically on its potential for developing foresight both within the academic realm and in the corporate world. To evoke a better understanding of AI’s potential and application in the context of developing foresight, we conducted an experiment with a group of students in our Master Global Foresight & Technology Management at the Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt, Germany.
Working on the future of the German photo and imaging industry, the project followed the well-known and established Shell scenario planning approach. In the course of the seminar, students started with the research on trends, assessing the trends on a relevance/uncertainty matrix and eventually finalizing their projects by developing scenarios along a 2 x 2 matrix.
To assess the impact of using generative AI, the students participating in the research seminar were split into two groups; One group used as many generative AI tools as possible; the other group used an “old school” approach to scenario planning without AI. The project duration was three months.
While analyzing our data, which we gathered following a video-ethnographic approach, we followed the two groups, both of which were diverse in terms of participants’ cultural and academic background, language and gender. To publish rigorous research on this experiment, we want to share our first impressions.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/using-ai-developing-foresight-reflections-experiment-schwarz-gpikf/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_ios&utm_campaign=share_via
AIxDESIGN LIBRARY
A library of books on the topics of technology, AI, society, and design. Curated and recommended by members of the AIxDesign Community ↗ Designed and built by Fred Wordie ↗
https://aixdesign-library.mildlyupset.com/
Why More Physicists Are Starting to Think Space and Time Are ‘Illusions’
A concept called “quantum entanglement” suggests the fabric of the universe is more interconnected than we think. And it also suggests we have the wrong idea about reality.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/why-more-physicists-are-starting-to-think-space-and-time-are-illusions
Services like Google’s NotebookLM and Fabric are building AI experiences around analyzing your links, files, and personal notes.
Context can be hard to come by for the average person online, and there’s a real possibility that the proliferation of generative AI across the web and apps is the end of that context. If I can get Google to give me a direct answer to a question, why would I bother checking out other links?
What’s exciting about what I’ll call “AI notebooks” like NotebookLM, Fabric, and other similar services, is that their first priority isn’t removing that context. Really, their job is to help you create it, directing you to things you already have that you can dive deeper into, and highlighting how the things you’ve collected matter together.
It’s a better, more realistic implementation of AI as a tool, rather than the be-all replacement for how we’ll find and generate knowledge in the future. And it’s one that feels like it could genuinely change the way we experience all of the things we do with our computers in the next year, rather than in the next 10.
https://www.inverse.com/tech/google-notebooklm-fabric-generative-ai-personal-data
Nation Brands Index 2023 (IPSOS)
For the first time in Anholt-Ipsos Nation Brands Index history, Japan finishes in first place, completing its steady climb from fifth place in 2019. Germany drops down to second after a six-year reign, while Canada remains in third place overall. The United Kingdom and the United States climb the ranks and place fourth and sixth, respectively. Italy drops one rank and places fifth, while France sees the largest rank change within the top ten and falls from fifth to eighth place.
https://www.ipsos.com/en/nation-brands-index-2023#:~:text=For%20more%20than%2015%20years,to%20take%20the%20top%20spot
Analyzing Trends 