057 - Strength and Weakness

"The strengths and weaknesses of any system are reflected in the systems connected to it."

These are both observable and quantifiable, but may only become possible to accurately grasp the meaning of when integrating data of three or more types.

Weaknesses in a local supply chain become visible when the same store in a different country doubles the price of a particular good or service.

Strengths in the ecosystem dynamics of empathy within a local culture are reflected in the behavior of street cats looking upon random passersby with curiosity rather than fear.

Sources of extreme inequality, social unrest, and instability are reflected in the graffiti on a rundown building for rent positioned next door to a luxury goods shop.

Strengths and weaknesses in the information ecosystem are visible on maps, showing regions where local stores are very well documented and updated, as well as zones where they are not.

Every one of these represents either the opportunity to learn and spread a new strength or address a weakness that impacts the local quality of life and the economy.

To integrate this kind of information globally, while tailoring it at a local level, and integrating each interacting system in such a way that it benefits, or at least doesn't harm, adjacent systems is monumentally complex. However, the technology exists to make that happen.

It isn't something trivial like the trashbot technology that OpenAI and Google peddle, and it won't rewrite your favorite song to parody a sitcom, but the world will begin to change more quickly once it is deployed commercially.

Humans today may largely have TikTok attention spans, but the systems we design need not parrot that. For the sake of society, we can and must do better.