WEBVTT

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Good evening.

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Hello, hello.

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Welcome, one and all.

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I'm John Ochsendorf,
the Founding Director

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of the Morningside
Academy for Design.

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And we're thrilled to
have all of you here.

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And this evening, we will begin
with a land acknowledgment.

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The Morningside
Academy for Design

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acknowledges Indigenous peoples
as the traditional stewards

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of the land and the
enduring relationship

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that exists between them and
their traditional territories.

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The land on which
we sit is the home

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of the Massachusetts (Moswetuset), the
Pequossette and Shawmutt,

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and the Mashauwomuk.

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In the 19th century, the
traumatized remnants, refugees,

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and survivors of these
groups and others

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formed the Wampanoag to
consolidate their position

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and become the
inheritors of the land.

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We acknowledge this
painful history of genocide

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and forced occupation
of their territory,

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and we honor and respect
the many diverse Indigenous

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people connected to this
land on which we gather.

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We are here today
in this evening

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to discuss designing
climate futures.

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At the Morningside
Academy for Design,

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we are excited to elevate
design as a process,

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as a way of tackling
the world's challenges.

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In two years, we'll move into a
new building, across Mass Ave,

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in the Metropolitan Warehouse
that's being remodeled.

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Until that building opens,
we're doing this nomadic wander

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around the MIT campus.

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And so this evening, we're
in the MIT Welcome Center.

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We're thrilled to
have you here with us.

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And I point out
this is something

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of a climate week at MIT.

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Tomorrow, there are two
events, the MIT MSCS and LCAU--

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MIT, we love our acronyms.

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These are both full-day
conferences on climate,

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with some aspects of design.

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And it's also
important to highlight

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that six months ago, when our
new president Sally Kornbluth

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was introduced at her
inauguration, she made climate

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and the climate
crisis the centerpiece

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of her administration.

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She said this is what we have to
work on for the next 10 years.

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When we launched
MAD a year ago, we

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had a whole series of
inspiring presentations,

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and we didn't have as
much audience interaction.

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So today, this
afternoon, we just

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came out of a series
of three workshops.

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Many of you were
in the workshops.

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How were the workshops?

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Good, right?

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OK.

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Could we just have
round of applause

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for the workshop
facilitators, organizers?

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[APPLAUSE]

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They were on preserving,
producing, and engaging.

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And we'll hear a little bit
more about them in our panel

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this evening.

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Before we jump right in, I also
want to Thank the entire MAD

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team here, and in particular,
Marion Cunningham, Adelaide

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Zollinger, Roi Salgueiro
Barrio, and Jen Spungin,

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and many others.

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We have the whole team here.

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So please join me in
thanking the whole team that

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put on the event.

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[APPLAUSE]

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There's a whole lot
more I could say,

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and it's always dangerous
putting a professor

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in front of a microphone,
but we're just

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going to try to jump right in.

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And tonight's forum, we're
going to hear from four really

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dynamic thought leaders,
and then we're going to have

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a chance for discussion,
interaction, and Q&A.

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And we have action items from
the workshops on the wall,

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so check those out
if you haven't.

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So to kick us off, I'm going to
introduce tonight's moderator

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who will help us run the forum.

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And this is my colleague,
Professor Maria Yang.

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She is a Professor of Mechanical
Engineering, Associate

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Director, works very
closely with us for MAD,

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and also she's the Deputy
Dean of Engineering

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across all of MIT.

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So Deputy Maria
Yang, over to you.

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[LAUGHS]

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[APPLAUSE]

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Thanks, John.

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Thank you.

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So I am-- I have
the wonderful task

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of introducing our incredible
lineup of speakers today.

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And our format
today is we'll have

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each of the speakers come up
and speak briefly, maybe 10

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minutes or so.

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And then at the
end of the talks,

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we'll have a moderated
panel session

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where we'll have a couple
of questions for the panel.

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And at the end, we'll open
it up for the audience

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to ask questions for the
last 15 or 20 minutes.

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And I think--

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I-- OK.

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Where are the-- there it is.

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Sorry.

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So this is our wonderful
panel of speakers.

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And I will introduce
each one individually,

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and they can come up and
speak from the slide panel.

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So first up, I'm delighted
to introduce Paula Ehrlich.

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Paula J. Ehrlich is the
president and CEO of the E. O.

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Wilson Biodiversity Foundation.

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She's the cofounder of
the Half-Earth Project

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and has led the development
of the Half-Earth Project Map.

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So please join me
in welcoming Paula.

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[APPLAUSE]

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In 2016, E. O. Wilson wrote
a book called Half-Earth,

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and in that book was a
promise that if we protected

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half the Earth's land and
sea, that we would manage

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sufficient habitat to safeguard
the bulk of biodiversity

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and living Earth, all of it,
could continue to breathe.

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Half-Earth aimed to solve a
problem, the thing we need

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to turn our attention to
beyond the changing climate,

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and that is the very loss
of the fabric of our planet,

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the loss of biodiversity.

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Now, the extinction
of biodiversity

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has become a crisis
because the extinction

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rate is a thousand times
higher than in any time

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in human history.

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In May 2019, the United Nations
issued an apocalyptic report

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about mass extinction.

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The report warned that one
million plant and animal

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species were at risk of
extinction, one million.

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And of course, when
the story hit the page,

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it mattered because somewhere
in the core of our humanity,

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we recognize these creatures.

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When we're touched
by this story,

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we naturally feel
compassion for them.

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These big, inconceivable numbers
also grabbed our attention

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because they matter
even more personally.

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They matter because the
species of our planet

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don't exist in isolation.

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If we lose species, we lose
ecosystems, the intricate web

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of life that sustains nature and
sustains us as part of nature.

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When the author Sam Anderson
wrote about the last two

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northern white rhinos in The New
York Times, he drove this home.

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He said a rhino is
not just a rhino.

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It's a load-bearing strand in
an elaborate ecological web.

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A rhino is not just
part of the world.

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It is a world.

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It mows and plows fields.

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Its dung feeds
colonies of insects,

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and birds come to
feed on the insects,

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and other predators
come to catch the birds.

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An ecosystem of its own.

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And we, too, are
part of that web.

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And sooner or later,
our strand will be cut.

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A more complete understanding of
all the species of our planet,

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a more complete understanding
of their locations

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and interconnections, allows
us to avoid this mistake.

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It allows us to avoid
the unintended disruption

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of the ecological web that
sustains us and sustains

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all of life.

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Having this insight
also allows us

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to connect more fully with
each other and all of life

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and to support a more enduring
ethic to care for our planet.

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But as the French writer
Jean Bruller said at the brink

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of World War II, all man's
troubles are due to the fact

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that we do not know what we
are and cannot agree on what

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to become.

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More often than not, we stumble
forward into hopeful chaos,

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trusting that the
light on the horizon

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is the dawn and
not the twilight.

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So with Half-Earth, 
E.O. Wilson's intention

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was to create a goal
of human endeavor

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that united the best of
ourselves, our unique insights,

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our unique expertise,
to work together

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to achieve a grand
goal and to ensure

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that we left no species behind.

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This is not just
important conceptually.

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It's important inspirationally
because if you look at history,

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this is the sort of
moonshot ambition

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that drives humanity, that
inspires us to lean in and do

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something extraordinary.

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Remember, when John F. Kennedy
announced the space program,

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he didn't say by the
end of this decade,

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we'll make good progress towards
landing a man on the moon

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and getting him home.

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He said, by the
end of this decade,

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we'll send a 300-foot
rocket on an untried mission

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to an unknown celestial
body 240,000 miles away

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and return it safely to Earth.

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And our collective
imagination exploded, right?

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We can do it.

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We can solve this
immense problem.

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So why half?

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Why the goal of half?

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Well, habitat size
and the number

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of species it can
sustainably support

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are mathematically
related, not linearly

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but by the fourth root.

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15%, our current level of
global protections-- not good.

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Half Earth is ideal
because the math

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allows us to predict,
as a principle,

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that it will allow us to save
the bulk of biodiversity.

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As a solution, it's also
got just the right mix

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of simplicity and latent
power to embody hope.

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But not all places are equally
effective at protecting

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biodiversity.

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Each species has its own
important place in the world

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that we need to keep in mind.

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So how do you design
for conservation?

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And how do you do
that at a scale that's

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relevant locally while also
addressing global conservation

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goals?

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Well, in the same way that
a surgeon can't do surgery

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without an intimate knowledge
of anatomy and physiology,

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knowing every single
species, their location,

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is fundamental to
the way that we

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can be proper stewards of
our planet, every single one.

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Having this knowledge
will inevitably

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transform our
human understanding

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and allow us to reimagine
how to care for our planet.

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So the Half-Earth
Project's ambition

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is to map the geospatial
location of all the species

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of our planet at
a high resolution

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to inform what places offer
the most effective path forward

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for protection of endangered
species and endangered

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ecosystems.

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We call these places for a
half-Earth future, places

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that are high priorities
for conservation,

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places with
extraordinary species

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richness and rarity, that
are currently unprotected.

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But to achieve our
targets for conservation,

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we need a way to measure
and nurture success.

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We need a way of
understanding how well we're

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doing in protecting nature
as we conserve places,

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a way of ensuring that
the lives of people

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connected to those
places, the people--

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the places that
they call home, will

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be empowered through the
information that we share.

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To help identify these
places, our teams

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developed what we call a Species
Protection Index, an SPI, which

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is like a FICA score
for biodiversity

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and which has been
adopted recently

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by the Convention on
Biological Diversity.

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Right now, you can go to
the Half-Earth Project Map

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and see an SPI National
Report Card for the protected

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places of every nation.

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You can get a score
from 0 to 100,

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depending upon how many
species groups are protected

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in your country and how
they contribute globally

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to overall species protection.

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And this makes a difference.

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For example, both
Chile and Mongolia

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have protected about
20% of their countries,

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and Chile's SPI is 39, which
is about the average score

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for countries around the world.

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And Chile's conservation efforts
have biodiversity outcomes

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commensurate with the aerial
additions that they're making,

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which is great.

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But Mongolia has embraced
spatial conservation planning

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to achieve better
biodiversity representation

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in its protected areas,
and it has an SPI of 81.

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By selecting additional
conservation areas carefully,

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Mongolia has done a fabulous job
of efficiently and effectively

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protecting the species
of their place,

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and in turn has made a
fabulous contribution

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to global species protection.

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So what do places need
to do to raise their SPI

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and better protect the
species of their place?

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Well, the Half-Earth
Project also

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shows where to go next, places
for a half-Earth future,

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with the possible configuration
of additional areas

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that should be protected as
priorities for conservation

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in order to achieve the best
outcomes for biodiversity

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globally.

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The map also offers
a glimpse into where

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there are opportunities
for carbon cobenefits.

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The Half-Earth Project Map
combines all this information

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with layers of information
about current conservation

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efforts and human activities.

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You can spend a lot of
time looking around,

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and in four different
languages, currently.

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The Half-Earth Project
Map democratizes

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this information
for every country,

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gives everyone the power,
the information they

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need to know what to do, where.

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As we continue to
build this out,

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we aim to engage, not
just decision makers,

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but people everywhere
to imagine together

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what this could look like
and how they can participate

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through their lives
and their careers

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as stewards of our
home, our planet.

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Isaiah Wilson said, we will
be wise to listen carefully

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to the heart, then act with
rational intention and all

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the tools we can gather
and bring to bear.

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We stand on the shoulders of
giants, and from that perch,

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in this moment, we
have our fingertips

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on geospatial
information that allows

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us to see farther and more
clearly than we have ever

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before about what we need to
do to best care for our planet.

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I'm particularly
excited as countries

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are inspired by Half-Earth
to adopt their own targets

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for conservation, such as
has been recently adopted

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by many countries,
the goal of 30x30.

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I'm excited that they
now have the opportunity

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to use this kind of
information to know what to do,

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where, and reimagine the way
that we care for our planet.

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So can we decide together
to get to half Earth?

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Well, of course we can,
if we want to, right?

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And living Earth, all of
it, can continue to breathe.

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Thank you.

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[APPLAUSE]

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That was wonderful.

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Thank you so much.

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Thank you so much, Paula,
for that inspiring and also

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hopeful talk.

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Such a great message
for everyone.

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I'm going to keep
things moving, and I'm

18:05.060 --> 18:08.180
going to welcome Benjamin
Bratton to the stage.

18:11.150 --> 18:13.940
Benjamin Bratton is the director
of the Antikythera Program

18:13.940 --> 18:16.280
at the Berggruen Institute
and former director

18:16.280 --> 18:19.418
of the Terra-Forming Program
at Strelka Institute for Media

18:19.418 --> 18:20.294
Arts and Design.

18:20.294 --> 18:23.330
Bratton's current work
focuses on the potential

18:23.330 --> 18:25.820
of planetary
computation to tackle

18:25.820 --> 18:27.692
planetary-scale problems.

18:27.692 --> 18:29.525
Please, let's welcome
Benjamin to the stage.

18:29.525 --> 18:32.720
[APPLAUSE]

18:35.082 --> 18:35.790
Thank you, Maria.

18:35.790 --> 18:37.415
Thank you very much
for the invitation.

18:37.415 --> 18:39.440
My talk is going to be
a little bit different

18:39.440 --> 18:43.250
in that instead of going through
a really wonderful project

18:43.250 --> 18:46.670
in detail, I'm going to go
through a bit about a design

18:46.670 --> 18:49.520
program that I run
and how it works

18:49.520 --> 18:51.740
to generate lots
of projects that

18:51.740 --> 18:54.172
may have a certain kind of
force multiplier effect.

18:54.172 --> 18:55.880
I'm also not going to
talk about my work,

18:55.880 --> 18:58.850
but just to give you a
little bit of background,

18:58.850 --> 19:01.520
as mentioned, a lot of my work
is on the political philosophy

19:01.520 --> 19:03.090
of planetary-scale computation.

19:03.090 --> 19:04.520
A book called The
Stack came out--

19:04.520 --> 19:05.120
MIT.

19:05.120 --> 19:06.800
I did a book on the pandemic.

19:06.800 --> 19:09.110
I've got a book coming
out later this year

19:09.110 --> 19:11.000
on the history of AI in China.

19:11.000 --> 19:13.250
But what I really
want to start with

19:13.250 --> 19:15.290
is this book, The
Terraforming, which

19:15.290 --> 19:18.630
came with a design
program attached to it.

19:18.630 --> 19:21.380
Part of the argument
is that technically

19:21.380 --> 19:24.890
speaking, we don't want to
stop climate change, exactly.

19:24.890 --> 19:29.690
We need to alter planetary
geochemistry in such a way

19:29.690 --> 19:31.530
to change it.

19:31.530 --> 19:33.910
And this is a huge
change of the climate.

19:33.910 --> 19:34.890
It's not a policy.

19:34.890 --> 19:36.130
It's not a project.

19:36.130 --> 19:39.240
It's a terraforming-scale
initiative.

19:39.240 --> 19:40.770
But in this case,
the terraforming

19:40.770 --> 19:43.320
is not one of Mars.

19:43.320 --> 19:46.200
The project is to terraform the
Earth's cities, technologies,

19:46.200 --> 19:49.980
and ecosystems so that it
may be capable of supporting

19:49.980 --> 19:51.510
Earth-like life.

19:51.510 --> 19:53.970
Part of the entry
points we have into this

19:53.970 --> 19:56.910
is an understanding that
the most viable responses

19:56.910 --> 19:59.280
to anthropogenic
climate change will need

19:59.280 --> 20:01.590
to be equally anthropogenic.

20:01.590 --> 20:04.860
So the program that we put
together originally at Strelka

20:04.860 --> 20:08.247
was quite interdisciplinary,
computer scientists, engineers,

20:08.247 --> 20:10.080
sci-fi writers, artists,
cultural theorists,

20:10.080 --> 20:12.870
drawing on faculty
from many from MIT,

20:12.870 --> 20:14.820
some even in this room.

20:14.820 --> 20:17.910
And we worked for periods
of-- in five-month cycles,

20:17.910 --> 20:20.800
generating a lot of
projects I'll show you very,

20:20.800 --> 20:22.560
very quickly, some
stills from these.

20:22.560 --> 20:24.143
Bear in mind that
what I'm showing you

20:24.143 --> 20:25.210
are stills from videos.

20:25.210 --> 20:27.085
The way in which we
would develop the project

20:27.085 --> 20:30.090
is usually in the form of about
a 20-minute video, all of which

20:30.090 --> 20:33.630
adds up to its own potential
Netflix series, I suppose.

20:33.630 --> 20:36.480
Bury the Sky was a project
around direct air carbon

20:36.480 --> 20:39.900
capture in the basalt
flats of Siberia

20:39.900 --> 20:43.650
and looking at the
existing carbon conveyance

20:43.650 --> 20:46.890
infrastructure of
Russia as a way in which

20:46.890 --> 20:49.800
to try to do this at scale.

20:49.800 --> 20:52.080
Green Military New
Deal was a project

20:52.080 --> 20:54.300
that looked at the
role of the military

20:54.300 --> 20:59.580
as a public institution in the
realization of Green New Deal

20:59.580 --> 21:00.780
goals.

21:00.780 --> 21:05.010
Cosmos Law was a project looking
at the precedence of space law.

21:05.010 --> 21:07.350
One of the issues, of course,
around climate governance

21:07.350 --> 21:11.070
is how-- is what does
planetary jurisdiction mean.

21:11.070 --> 21:14.430
Space law happens to be an
interesting way in which we see

21:14.430 --> 21:16.260
a planetary-scale jurisdiction.

21:16.260 --> 21:18.510
This project laid out a
number of different scenarios

21:18.510 --> 21:21.300
by which this may work
out in interesting ways.

21:21.300 --> 21:24.900
Black Almanac was a project
that took on planetary food

21:24.900 --> 21:28.890
systems, something we just spent
some time discussing earlier

21:28.890 --> 21:32.580
in the day, beginning with the
artificialization of energy

21:32.580 --> 21:35.190
from the beginning of
agriculture to the present.

21:35.190 --> 21:36.870
The project makes
an argument, indeed,

21:36.870 --> 21:40.440
for the embracing of the
artificializaiton going

21:40.440 --> 21:41.280
forward.

21:41.280 --> 21:44.635
And in tribute to E. O. Wilson,
who was a book-- was actually--

21:44.635 --> 21:46.260
the Half-Earth was
on our reading list,

21:46.260 --> 21:48.360
we also did a half-Earth
project called Veha,

21:48.360 --> 21:51.750
which was a project for
rewilding corridors throughout

21:51.750 --> 21:53.280
the Eurasian--

21:53.280 --> 21:55.290
the Eurasian subcontinent.

21:55.290 --> 21:59.940
So over that period of
the 4 and 1/2-- actually

21:59.940 --> 22:02.190
5 and 1/2 years
of the program, we

22:02.190 --> 22:03.630
developed a number of projects.

22:03.630 --> 22:06.060
Two of the key ideas I want
to leave you with around this

22:06.060 --> 22:08.010
is-- one is starting
with the idea

22:08.010 --> 22:10.740
that architecture
as a form of design

22:10.740 --> 22:13.560
has benefited from a kind
of experimental studio

22:13.560 --> 22:16.685
culture in which the inquiry
was not just about building

22:16.685 --> 22:18.060
buildings in the
immediate sense,

22:18.060 --> 22:20.850
but also really getting to
the sort of first principles

22:20.850 --> 22:23.640
of what it is, how design can
be articulated through this.

22:23.640 --> 22:25.570
Part of the idea
was also then-- as

22:25.570 --> 22:28.170
to the extent to
which society now asks

22:28.170 --> 22:30.750
things of software that it
used to ask of architecture,

22:30.750 --> 22:33.810
namely the organization of
people in space and time,

22:33.810 --> 22:36.240
that the design and
conceptualization of software

22:36.240 --> 22:39.630
infrastructure deserves its
own kind of experimental studio

22:39.630 --> 22:40.690
model as well.

22:40.690 --> 22:45.630
So this project, which, again,
went for five years, 33 project

22:45.630 --> 22:49.590
films, 65 faculties, 112
researchers from 35--

22:49.590 --> 22:52.590
34 countries, as
you might imagine,

22:52.590 --> 22:54.420
closed abruptly when
the war started.

22:54.420 --> 22:57.030
Not only this program, but
the whole Strelka Institute

22:57.030 --> 23:00.820
closed in protest
when the war began.

23:00.820 --> 23:03.600
So beginning anew,
we focused again

23:03.600 --> 23:07.800
on this question of computation
and the role of computation

23:07.800 --> 23:11.320
as a planetary technology, both
in terms of what it can do,

23:11.320 --> 23:13.710
but also the ways in which
computational infrastructures

23:13.710 --> 23:16.440
allow us to understand
the world in ways in which

23:16.440 --> 23:18.060
would otherwise be impossible.

23:18.060 --> 23:22.470
That's the program I currently
direct called Antikythera.

23:22.470 --> 23:23.770
This is from our website.

23:23.770 --> 23:25.300
You can go to Antikythera.org.

23:25.300 --> 23:27.720
It is named, as you suspect,
after the Antikythera

23:27.720 --> 23:32.760
mechanism, perhaps the
proverbial first computer

23:32.760 --> 23:33.738
from Ancient Greece.

23:33.738 --> 23:35.280
One of the things
we liked about this

23:35.280 --> 23:37.072
was that the Antikythera
mechanism not just

23:37.072 --> 23:38.250
a calculator device.

23:38.250 --> 23:40.270
It was also an
astronomical device.

23:40.270 --> 23:42.000
And so the use of
the device was a way

23:42.000 --> 23:45.810
in which intelligence
was able to orient itself

23:45.810 --> 23:48.240
in relationship to its
planetary condition.

23:48.240 --> 23:50.190
This is a lovely
beginning point for really

23:50.190 --> 23:51.720
what computation should mean.

23:51.720 --> 23:54.263
Now, to the forward,
we also start

23:54.263 --> 23:56.680
with what does computation
have to do with climate change.

23:56.680 --> 23:59.610
Well, let's not forget that
the very idea of climate

23:59.610 --> 24:02.220
change itself is an
epistemological accomplishment

24:02.220 --> 24:03.450
of planetary computation.

24:03.450 --> 24:04.980
Without the satellites
and sensors,

24:04.980 --> 24:07.680
and most importantly,
supercomputing simulations

24:07.680 --> 24:10.020
of climatic past,
present, and futures,

24:10.020 --> 24:13.410
the notion of climate change
and Anthropocene as we

24:13.410 --> 24:15.970
know it doesn't exist.

24:15.970 --> 24:19.050
So our program is
a design program.

24:19.050 --> 24:21.090
It's also a philosophy
of technology program.

24:21.090 --> 24:22.600
But it's a bit
odd in that sense.

24:22.600 --> 24:24.630
That is, we don't start
with the philosophy

24:24.630 --> 24:26.640
and then try to project
it upon the technology.

24:26.640 --> 24:28.080
Rather, the other way around.

24:28.080 --> 24:30.600
We start with the direct
encounter with the technology

24:30.600 --> 24:33.580
and generate the
philosophy from there.

24:33.580 --> 24:34.897
Our five areas of research--

24:34.897 --> 24:36.730
I won't go through these
in too much detail.

24:36.730 --> 24:39.640
Roughly, AI,
recursive simulations,

24:39.640 --> 24:42.190
hemispherical stacks, which
is computational geopolitics,

24:42.190 --> 24:43.720
synthetic cadillacs
with economics,

24:43.720 --> 24:46.185
and planetary sapiens, which
I will say a little bit about,

24:46.185 --> 24:47.560
which has to do
with the location

24:47.560 --> 24:49.420
of computational
intelligence and the longer

24:49.420 --> 24:53.710
arc of the evolution of
planetary intelligence as such.

24:53.710 --> 24:55.570
A little bit about our method.

24:55.570 --> 24:57.610
Again, it's faculty
from all over the world,

24:57.610 --> 24:59.350
from our finest institutions.

24:59.350 --> 25:01.090
We did a five-month
studio this summer

25:01.090 --> 25:03.940
starting in February where we
took a gazillion applicants.

25:03.940 --> 25:08.020
We picked 12 people,
built the studio primarily

25:08.020 --> 25:09.880
based at the Bradbury
Building, downtown LA,

25:09.880 --> 25:11.005
where Bladerunner was shot.

25:11.005 --> 25:13.720
Very, very dramatic.

25:13.720 --> 25:17.170
And we-- basically, it
was a 24/7 kind of studio,

25:17.170 --> 25:19.480
very interdisciplinary,
very generative,

25:19.480 --> 25:22.030
cycling between seminar
and studio types

25:22.030 --> 25:23.950
of formats extremely quickly.

25:23.950 --> 25:26.740
There's our friend
Nicholas giving his thumbs

25:26.740 --> 25:27.980
up to this work.

25:27.980 --> 25:30.730
We also generated a huge number
of projects, some of which--

25:30.730 --> 25:34.750
I'll show you stills from
the films very quickly here

25:34.750 --> 25:35.360
as well.

25:35.360 --> 25:36.818
One of which we
did, which was very

25:36.818 --> 25:39.460
fun-- we were interested in
the computational geopolitical

25:39.460 --> 25:42.460
futures of computation, US-China
chip wars kinds of things.

25:42.460 --> 25:43.510
We went to Beijing.

25:43.510 --> 25:45.135
We're based at the
Berggruen Institute,

25:45.135 --> 25:47.920
as our primary funder has a
center at Peking

25:47.920 --> 25:48.653
University.

25:48.653 --> 25:51.070
For a week, we worked with
some of the top Chinese science

25:51.070 --> 25:53.530
fiction writers to develop
scenarios for where--

25:53.530 --> 25:57.440
how it is that these futures
may play-- these may play out,

25:57.440 --> 25:58.000
which will--

25:58.000 --> 26:00.583
I think is going to be a book,
actually, from MIT Press coming

26:00.583 --> 26:02.182
out as well.

26:02.182 --> 26:03.640
On climate, we did
a project called

26:03.640 --> 26:05.200
Whole Earth Codec,
which was looking

26:05.200 --> 26:08.950
at the development of
a strongly multimodal

26:08.950 --> 26:12.100
compression/decompression
mechanism, a codec, that would

26:12.100 --> 26:14.590
take in-- takes in ecological
information and data

26:14.590 --> 26:16.030
from a number of
different sources

26:16.030 --> 26:18.113
and can output them in a
number of different ways.

26:18.113 --> 26:20.950
Again, these are stills
from the rather lovely video

26:20.950 --> 26:22.750
about this, all,
of course, based

26:22.750 --> 26:25.790
on the self-attention dynamic
of transformer models.

26:25.790 --> 26:27.790
This is a project we're
continuing with DeepMind

26:27.790 --> 26:28.720
this summer.

26:28.720 --> 26:31.450
A project on simulations,
on planetary simulations.

26:31.450 --> 26:33.778
Of course, climate science
is all about simulations.

26:33.778 --> 26:35.320
Here, we're looking
at the phenomenon

26:35.320 --> 26:37.030
of what we call counter
simulations, how

26:37.030 --> 26:39.700
it is that one geopolitical
entity will not only

26:39.700 --> 26:42.250
simulate the world, but
also simulate its adversary.

26:42.250 --> 26:45.550
Counter simulations is
when you, in essence,

26:45.550 --> 26:47.200
spoil the data in
some sort of way

26:47.200 --> 26:49.660
in which the adversaries
counter simulation.

26:49.660 --> 26:52.400
The simulation of you
doesn't quite work out.

26:52.400 --> 26:54.880
And it is this dynamic of
simulation/counter simulation

26:54.880 --> 26:58.480
that became the whole area
of the research that we did.

26:58.480 --> 27:00.760
It's a fascinating
fascinating film.

27:00.760 --> 27:02.470
On economics, we
did a project called

27:02.470 --> 27:05.440
Autocatallaxy, which was
looking at the impact of AI

27:05.440 --> 27:08.350
will have on price, what kinds
of things need to be priced,

27:08.350 --> 27:09.880
don't need to be
priced, how it is

27:09.880 --> 27:12.820
that price functions as
an information technology,

27:12.820 --> 27:15.490
and the capacities of AI to
sense and model information

27:15.490 --> 27:18.460
in different kinds of ways
will have different-- obviously

27:18.460 --> 27:20.260
tumultuous effects.

27:20.260 --> 27:24.580
On AI, one we call HAIID,
Human AI Interaction Design,

27:24.580 --> 27:28.810
is looking at the shift
from HCI to HAII ID.

27:28.810 --> 27:31.030
And the primary shift
here is one of the HCI

27:31.030 --> 27:32.710
is based on spatial metaphors.

27:32.710 --> 27:36.190
HAID is based on
psychosocial metaphors.

27:36.190 --> 27:37.950
This is a fundamental
shift in dynamics.

27:37.950 --> 27:40.740
I had some lovely conversations
with some new friends

27:40.740 --> 27:43.290
over at Media Lab this
afternoon on very similar work

27:43.290 --> 27:44.730
that they were doing.

27:44.730 --> 27:47.430
On science, we did two projects,
one called End of Science,

27:47.430 --> 27:49.560
which is looking at
the impacts of AI

27:49.560 --> 27:51.750
on scientific epistemology
and some of the ways

27:51.750 --> 27:55.200
in which new kinds of epistemic
overhangs and under hangs

27:55.200 --> 27:56.820
have developed.

27:56.820 --> 27:59.250
On the regionalization,
also, connected

27:59.250 --> 28:01.860
to the Half-Earth,
the impact of the ways

28:01.860 --> 28:04.110
in which a kind of
regional planning school

28:04.110 --> 28:06.420
has developed around
building of the stack.

28:06.420 --> 28:09.180
We looked at the TSMCs
plant in Arizona.

28:09.180 --> 28:12.390
Xenoplex is a cinematic
essay on different theories

28:12.390 --> 28:14.310
of abiogenesis, which
we did with a number

28:14.310 --> 28:17.537
of astrobiologists
and astrophysicists,

28:17.537 --> 28:19.620
looking at different kinds
of experimental methods

28:19.620 --> 28:22.650
by which these could be tested.

28:22.650 --> 28:26.100
And then lastly, Vivarium
is another simulation

28:26.100 --> 28:29.340
in AI project, looking at toy
worlds and the ways in which

28:29.340 --> 28:32.580
AIs are trained in toy
worlds and the ways

28:32.580 --> 28:34.190
in which the
sim-to-real gap might

28:34.190 --> 28:36.225
be blended in different ways.

28:36.225 --> 28:37.940
What we built is
essentially a platform

28:37.940 --> 28:40.550
of lots of different
toy worlds that are

28:40.550 --> 28:41.850
interoperable with one another.

28:41.850 --> 28:44.480
And so as you train
your AI in one,

28:44.480 --> 28:47.060
this becomes learning
in another and allows

28:47.060 --> 28:50.210
for a kind of matrix of one
person, many AIs, many AIs,

28:50.210 --> 28:54.300
one person, many people, many
AIs in different ways as well.

28:54.300 --> 28:57.230
This is, again, one where
we're picking up with DeepMind.

28:57.230 --> 28:59.960
We also, as you surmise,
make lots of films.

28:59.960 --> 29:01.730
These are really scenarios.

29:01.730 --> 29:03.740
They're not pitches.

29:03.740 --> 29:06.620
And in doing so, we use
the cinematic techniques

29:06.620 --> 29:08.840
as a way of building
these worlds.

29:08.840 --> 29:12.650
We also do a lecture series,
which we also built in films.

29:12.650 --> 29:14.780
This is a talk I gave
in London just a couple

29:14.780 --> 29:18.260
of months ago on a
critique of the idea of AI

29:18.260 --> 29:20.570
alignment, which is posted.

29:20.570 --> 29:23.460
I can-- I'm happy to show you.

29:23.460 --> 29:25.400
And if you speak to me
afterwards-- anyway,

29:25.400 --> 29:27.275
this is what we did in
the first five months.

29:27.275 --> 29:29.750
What I've just shown you
is our first five months

29:29.750 --> 29:31.033
of the program.

29:31.033 --> 29:32.450
Doing considerably
more next year.

29:32.450 --> 29:35.640
We've just published a
big, 600-page report.

29:35.640 --> 29:37.800
I'll be happy to give you
the URL to download it

29:37.800 --> 29:40.860
a bit later if you want.

29:40.860 --> 29:42.810
Next year, we are
doing a lot of work

29:42.810 --> 29:45.510
with USC, Tsinghua, DeepMind
Cambridge, as mentioned.

29:45.510 --> 29:48.990
And as you see here, on the
planetary sapience theme,

29:48.990 --> 29:51.780
we'll be back here in
Cambridge in the fall,

29:51.780 --> 29:53.838
working on this with a
number of groups here.

29:53.838 --> 29:55.380
Let me leave you
with-- then with one

29:55.380 --> 29:58.290
thought because I think
I'm at the end of my time.

29:58.290 --> 29:59.940
As I said, we think
of this program

29:59.940 --> 30:01.830
as a philosophy of
technology program

30:01.830 --> 30:03.630
that uses design
studio methodologies

30:03.630 --> 30:05.640
as a way of
developing scenarios,

30:05.640 --> 30:07.140
or it's a speculative
design program

30:07.140 --> 30:08.682
that happens to be
driven by a rather

30:08.682 --> 30:09.960
specific philosophical agenda.

30:09.960 --> 30:11.400
It's really both at once.

30:11.400 --> 30:14.402
But the real idea
is this, is that--

30:14.402 --> 30:15.750
and I strongly believe this.

30:15.750 --> 30:17.583
There are certain points
in times in history

30:17.583 --> 30:20.555
where our ideas about
what might be possible

30:20.555 --> 30:21.930
and what it is
that we like to do

30:21.930 --> 30:25.620
are ahead of our technologies,
and so 19th-century dreams

30:25.620 --> 30:27.603
of spaceflight
might be an example.

30:27.603 --> 30:29.020
There are other
points in history,

30:29.020 --> 30:30.990
however, where our
technologies and what

30:30.990 --> 30:33.790
they're capable of doing
is ahead of our ideas.

30:33.790 --> 30:34.950
It's ahead of our concepts.

30:34.950 --> 30:37.710
It's ahead of our ability to
articulate and to adjudicate

30:37.710 --> 30:39.120
and to make sense of them.

30:39.120 --> 30:41.130
That's where I
think we are at now.

30:41.130 --> 30:42.770
And in that point
in time, the role

30:42.770 --> 30:44.770
of philosophy of technology
is rather different.

30:44.770 --> 30:48.150
It's not about projecting
things onto the technology.

30:48.150 --> 30:50.520
What would Hegel think
of driverless cars?

30:50.520 --> 30:52.780
It's rather the
other way around.

30:52.780 --> 30:54.630
How do we generate
the concepts that we

30:54.630 --> 30:57.195
need so that we can
orient this, orient

30:57.195 --> 31:00.310
the planetary computation, and
not only be oriented by it?

31:00.310 --> 31:00.810
Thank you.

31:00.810 --> 31:03.810
[APPLAUSE]

31:08.810 --> 31:10.000
Thanks so much, Benjamin.

31:10.000 --> 31:10.780
That was intense.

31:10.780 --> 31:14.660
I learned a great deal,
so very inspiring.

31:14.660 --> 31:18.550
So I'd like to introduce
our next speaker, who

31:18.550 --> 31:20.380
is Janelle Knox-Hayes.

31:20.380 --> 31:22.990
Janelle Knox-Hayes is a
professor of economic geography

31:22.990 --> 31:25.540
and planning in the MIT
Department of Urban Studies

31:25.540 --> 31:26.380
and Planning.

31:26.380 --> 31:28.510
Her research focuses
on the ways in which

31:28.510 --> 31:31.480
social and environmental
systems are governed

31:31.480 --> 31:35.290
under changing-- sorry,
changing and temporal--

31:35.290 --> 31:38.110
changing temporal and spatial
scales as a consequence

31:38.110 --> 31:39.880
of globalization.

31:39.880 --> 31:41.870
Please welcome
Janelle to the stage.

31:41.870 --> 31:42.430
Thank you.

31:42.430 --> 31:44.080
[APPLAUSE]

31:44.080 --> 31:47.785
All right, so I'm not
technically a designer.

31:47.785 --> 31:49.690
[LAUGHS] I'll just
give that caveat.

31:49.690 --> 31:53.110
But very pleased to be able to
join this distinguished group.

31:53.110 --> 31:54.550
And I am-- I'm a
social scientist.

31:54.550 --> 31:56.920
And I'm going to talk a little
bit around social science

31:56.920 --> 32:00.080
and social application
for climate change.

32:00.080 --> 32:02.800
And I really just want to
highlight one of the things

32:02.800 --> 32:04.580
that we've recently done at MIT.

32:04.580 --> 32:08.480
And so it's this idea of one
of the ways in which we need

32:08.480 --> 32:11.990
more equitable response
to climate solutions,

32:11.990 --> 32:15.360
is the engagement of a range
of different stakeholders.

32:15.360 --> 32:16.820
And so this is something like--

32:16.820 --> 32:21.300
institutions like MIT do very
well in different sectors,

32:21.300 --> 32:22.400
but it's very segmented.

32:22.400 --> 32:25.010
And so we have a range of
different climate-related

32:25.010 --> 32:28.610
institutions, the Environmental
Solutions Initiative, the MIT

32:28.610 --> 32:30.830
Climate and
Sustainability Consortium.

32:30.830 --> 32:33.530
We have J-WAFS, J-PAL.

32:33.530 --> 32:35.840
Even maybe the
Morningside Academy

32:35.840 --> 32:38.750
could be considered as one of
these new institutions that's

32:38.750 --> 32:41.810
thinking about implications
for climate change.

32:41.810 --> 32:44.600
And they tend to be focused
on very different sectors,

32:44.600 --> 32:46.910
MITIE is working
with corporations.

32:46.910 --> 32:50.060
We have groups like Colab
that are very much focused

32:50.060 --> 32:51.240
on communities.

32:51.240 --> 32:53.420
And so our hypothesis
is what we need

32:53.420 --> 32:56.510
for climate change is some
capacity to bring all of these

32:56.510 --> 32:57.450
together.

32:57.450 --> 32:59.990
The solutions have to
begin from the standpoint

32:59.990 --> 33:02.490
of local intervention
and local action.

33:02.490 --> 33:06.110
And they have to bridge this
divide between communities,

33:06.110 --> 33:08.360
academia, the
government, and industry,

33:08.360 --> 33:10.530
and bring all of the
players together.

33:10.530 --> 33:12.740
So the way we're trying
to do this at MIT

33:12.740 --> 33:16.400
is by building something
akin to a climate community

33:16.400 --> 33:17.450
collaborative.

33:17.450 --> 33:20.480
And so to start or
launch this initiative,

33:20.480 --> 33:24.410
we hosted a symposium
recently in September.

33:24.410 --> 33:27.860
And I want to overview what
happened at the symposium, how

33:27.860 --> 33:29.900
we're carrying forward,
and the kind of impact

33:29.900 --> 33:32.630
that that might generate.

33:32.630 --> 33:34.460
So this brought
together stakeholders

33:34.460 --> 33:37.010
from across the
greater Boston area.

33:37.010 --> 33:38.990
And again, there's this
challenge of scale.

33:38.990 --> 33:42.230
For the sake of the
launch of this symposium,

33:42.230 --> 33:45.920
we decided to focus on the
14 municipalities in Boston.

33:45.920 --> 33:47.900
And it's by no way
saying that that's

33:47.900 --> 33:50.640
the only thing that matters or
we can do this in isolation.

33:50.640 --> 33:52.940
It was just creating
a kind of scope

33:52.940 --> 33:55.550
that makes the partnership
or a collaboration

33:55.550 --> 33:58.040
possible with the idea
that in time, this

33:58.040 --> 34:00.620
can create a model that
other cities can replicate

34:00.620 --> 34:05.030
or that can extend to other
areas and draw other actors in.

34:05.030 --> 34:08.330
And it's trying to bridge an
advanced interdisciplinary

34:08.330 --> 34:12.650
approach to working in a fashion
that's more equitable, just,

34:12.650 --> 34:15.030
and effective for
climate solutions.

34:15.030 --> 34:17.210
So the idea of
this collaborative

34:17.210 --> 34:19.370
is to form a kind
of knowledge sharing

34:19.370 --> 34:23.900
among the various types of
climate experts, academic,

34:23.900 --> 34:27.350
operations experts, industry,
policy, and community based.

34:27.350 --> 34:30.230
And we use this symposium
to bring them together

34:30.230 --> 34:32.070
and to begin to define
the collaborative.

34:32.070 --> 34:34.310
So I'll explain a little
bit about our agenda

34:34.310 --> 34:35.480
and how we did this.

34:35.480 --> 34:37.070
And we also think
it's an opportunity

34:37.070 --> 34:39.650
for initial listening
and dialogue

34:39.650 --> 34:42.440
via exploration of
what's already happening

34:42.440 --> 34:45.980
in the greater Boston area
and how academic institutions

34:45.980 --> 34:49.739
in particular can work
together to catalyze that.

34:49.739 --> 34:53.420
So within this group, we had
a kind of spontaneous breakout

34:53.420 --> 34:57.050
session that led to the call
for a larger convening of tribes

34:57.050 --> 34:57.800
in the Northeast.

34:57.800 --> 35:01.280
And I think this is something
MIT is interested to explore,

35:01.280 --> 35:03.620
how Indigenous and
academic collaboration

35:03.620 --> 35:06.560
can more effectively tackle
equitable climate actions

35:06.560 --> 35:08.120
and benefit all communities.

35:08.120 --> 35:10.430
It's something Harvard
has also been considering.

35:10.430 --> 35:15.230
They held a responsibility and
repair workshop or symposium

35:15.230 --> 35:17.120
and invited the local
tribes in to think

35:17.120 --> 35:19.580
about the shortcomings
and the deficits

35:19.580 --> 35:21.410
in that historical
relationship and how

35:21.410 --> 35:23.580
they can move forward building.

35:23.580 --> 35:25.340
So we're looking at
all pieces of this.

35:25.340 --> 35:27.680
The symposium itself--
we reached out

35:27.680 --> 35:29.990
to more than 300 individuals.

35:29.990 --> 35:34.250
We had 150 or more
attend the symposium.

35:34.250 --> 35:36.860
And it really drew together
a very diverse group

35:36.860 --> 35:41.150
of different types of NGOs,
different municipal government

35:41.150 --> 35:45.080
representatives, different
elements of civil society,

35:45.080 --> 35:47.480
and then also, we had 10
different universities

35:47.480 --> 35:50.510
from the region
participate and engage.

35:50.510 --> 35:52.760
And we had a number of
different activities

35:52.760 --> 35:56.150
that were meant to really center
this workshop on understanding

35:56.150 --> 35:58.100
needs for a
collaborative, how this

35:58.100 --> 36:01.520
would work in a concrete
vision within the Boston area,

36:01.520 --> 36:02.880
and then capacity.

36:02.880 --> 36:05.060
So what you can see in
the center of this diagram

36:05.060 --> 36:07.360
is one of a mapping
exercise we did,

36:07.360 --> 36:10.270
where we gathered data of
registrants about their needs,

36:10.270 --> 36:12.040
what their organizations
need to be more

36:12.040 --> 36:15.440
effective in their climate
interventions within the city,

36:15.440 --> 36:17.200
and then the capacities
they could bring.

36:17.200 --> 36:20.830
And coming in-- so we organized
a series of categories

36:20.830 --> 36:23.620
on a large wall, and then
we used Post-It notes.

36:23.620 --> 36:25.480
First all of the
organizations went up,

36:25.480 --> 36:27.910
and they put up their
needs in one color,

36:27.910 --> 36:29.380
and then we had
them walk the wall

36:29.380 --> 36:31.270
and look at what was
represented and take

36:31.270 --> 36:34.490
a different color of Post-It
and map to it their capacity.

36:34.490 --> 36:36.942
So we directly mapped, and
now we're mining this data

36:36.942 --> 36:38.650
and looking at different
ways in which we

36:38.650 --> 36:42.020
can start to build
relationships within the region.

36:42.020 --> 36:45.760
So the overview-- we started
with understanding a state

36:45.760 --> 36:47.320
of affairs within the region.

36:47.320 --> 36:49.570
We looked at the state
of the state, what

36:49.570 --> 36:51.850
is being-- happening within
Massachusetts at the state

36:51.850 --> 36:52.510
level.

36:52.510 --> 36:56.740
We had Julie Wormser come and
present for the Mystic Valley

36:56.740 --> 36:59.740
Watershed, which encompasses
more than, I think,

36:59.740 --> 37:01.240
10 different municipalities.

37:01.240 --> 37:02.860
And she presented
a lot of the work

37:02.860 --> 37:05.230
they're doing to
bridge collaborations

37:05.230 --> 37:07.040
across the broader
region and thinking

37:07.040 --> 37:09.760
outside of the bounds
of the municipal action.

37:09.760 --> 37:11.510
Because one of the
things that's happening

37:11.510 --> 37:13.760
is all of these
municipalities are

37:13.760 --> 37:16.280
in the process of doing
climate action planning,

37:16.280 --> 37:19.520
but there's a lot of challenges
around capacity and integration

37:19.520 --> 37:22.100
between different
municipalities.

37:22.100 --> 37:23.840
So how do you build
that larger scale?

37:23.840 --> 37:25.820
We think this is one
of the areas where

37:25.820 --> 37:29.240
the academic institutions can
be a big support in bridging.

37:29.240 --> 37:32.660
And then we had a presentation
from Jason Steiding,

37:32.660 --> 37:36.050
the natural resource director
for the Wampanoag tribe,

37:36.050 --> 37:38.090
to also think about
the nonhuman in this.

37:38.090 --> 37:40.287
It's really going to center
an Indigenous approach.

37:40.287 --> 37:41.870
And one of the ways
they're doing this

37:41.870 --> 37:43.250
is to adopt the herring.

37:43.250 --> 37:45.260
So they have a legal
process right now

37:45.260 --> 37:49.100
to adopt herring within their
traditional territorial waters.

37:49.100 --> 37:52.160
And they think that giving
personhood and custody

37:52.160 --> 37:54.740
of the herring to the tribe
is one way in which they

37:54.740 --> 37:58.610
can represent the river system
with a better legal standing

37:58.610 --> 38:02.010
so that it's incorporated and
considered in legal planning.

38:02.010 --> 38:04.310
So we sort of oriented this
view of what's happening.

38:04.310 --> 38:06.770
And we had one presentation
from Eastie Farms thinking

38:06.770 --> 38:09.470
about what some of the
local communities in more

38:09.470 --> 38:12.290
underrepresented areas
are doing within the city

38:12.290 --> 38:14.780
and where they need
elements of support.

38:14.780 --> 38:18.140
And from there, we hosted
a session of case studies

38:18.140 --> 38:19.790
where we had 10 or
so different case

38:19.790 --> 38:22.880
studies of successful
collaborations, forum

38:22.880 --> 38:25.310
roundtables, and we
allowed participants

38:25.310 --> 38:27.650
to join those roundtables
and then understand

38:27.650 --> 38:29.750
some of the most effective
collaborations that

38:29.750 --> 38:31.970
are ongoing in the city
and how these could

38:31.970 --> 38:34.290
be scaled up and built out.

38:34.290 --> 38:36.920
And so as our next phase of
building this collaborative,

38:36.920 --> 38:39.320
we're actually going to
start hosting site visits

38:39.320 --> 38:42.020
for the network that
formed out of the symposium

38:42.020 --> 38:44.810
at these different sites so
that they can get a deeper

38:44.810 --> 38:46.590
dive into what's being
done in the region,

38:46.590 --> 38:49.130
and then we can form
partnerships through that.

38:49.130 --> 38:51.410
As I mentioned, we did
this mapping exercise

38:51.410 --> 38:54.980
of our needs and capacities
to understand generatively

38:54.980 --> 38:57.680
what's required for
collaboration to be

38:57.680 --> 38:59.190
more successful.

38:59.190 --> 39:01.370
And one of the things that
the communities really

39:01.370 --> 39:02.870
brought forward was
this idea that's

39:02.870 --> 39:06.800
prevalent in the scholarship
of Indigenous authors like Kyle

39:06.800 --> 39:10.130
White, the idea that we're
tackling climate change as

39:10.130 --> 39:12.390
though it were a purely
technical solution.

39:12.390 --> 39:15.560
So a lot of this is thinking
about carbon reduction

39:15.560 --> 39:19.040
or net zero targets or
building new infrastructure.

39:19.040 --> 39:22.700
And to be effective, we have to
realize that it's also social.

39:22.700 --> 39:25.820
There's also a relational
approach that's required.

39:25.820 --> 39:27.980
So as we're facing
an ecological tipping

39:27.980 --> 39:29.810
point for many of
these communities

39:29.810 --> 39:32.600
that are essential to a just
and efficacious response

39:32.600 --> 39:35.840
to climate change, there's
also a relational tipping point

39:35.840 --> 39:37.370
that's already been crossed.

39:37.370 --> 39:39.170
Before we can even
get to climate,

39:39.170 --> 39:41.270
we have to rebuild
relationships.

39:41.270 --> 39:43.340
And for a lot of the
Indigenous communities,

39:43.340 --> 39:46.460
that's an underlying
thread that follows

39:46.460 --> 39:49.100
their engagement or their
work with these possibilities.

39:49.100 --> 39:52.430
And beyond the ethics
of why this matters,

39:52.430 --> 39:54.500
there's still major landholders.

39:54.500 --> 39:56.300
We're not going to be
able to do land use

39:56.300 --> 39:59.730
planning without engaging
the Indigenous communities.

39:59.730 --> 40:01.700
We also looked at the
ways in which we can

40:01.700 --> 40:03.295
scale funding opportunities.

40:03.295 --> 40:04.670
And some of those
at the workshop

40:04.670 --> 40:07.800
presented very successful models
of how they're doing this.

40:07.800 --> 40:09.410
This was a part
of a presentation

40:09.410 --> 40:11.550
by Phil Thompson
and Liz Reynolds,

40:11.550 --> 40:14.120
who are working with
the MIT Nucleus.

40:14.120 --> 40:16.070
And they're basically
creating programs

40:16.070 --> 40:18.500
for grant writers
in the classroom

40:18.500 --> 40:20.780
and sending them out to
underserved communities

40:20.780 --> 40:23.150
across the country
to help deploy

40:23.150 --> 40:26.480
some of the funding that's
coming from the IRA and BIL.

40:26.480 --> 40:28.280
We looked at the role
of higher education,

40:28.280 --> 40:31.280
and this is kind of our idea of
the heart of the collaborative.

40:31.280 --> 40:32.840
And this was thinking
about both what

40:32.840 --> 40:35.480
a number of different
institutions like Tufts

40:35.480 --> 40:39.620
and Roxbury Community College,
Northeastern, et cetera, are

40:39.620 --> 40:41.570
doing in response
to climate change,

40:41.570 --> 40:44.630
but then also thinking about how
we start to build partnerships

40:44.630 --> 40:47.120
together, how we synergize
these activities,

40:47.120 --> 40:50.570
form something of an academic
core, and then bring in

40:50.570 --> 40:53.360
and bridge the other
dimensions across sectors

40:53.360 --> 40:55.200
from that standpoint.

40:55.200 --> 40:57.920
So our next steps-- we sent
out a follow-up survey.

40:57.920 --> 40:59.900
We've also built
a LinkedIn group

40:59.900 --> 41:01.640
as one way in which
we're starting

41:01.640 --> 41:05.210
to connect and build
out the forming network

41:05.210 --> 41:06.635
from this symposium.

41:06.635 --> 41:08.010
We have a number
of students that

41:08.010 --> 41:11.100
are working on analyzing
the extensive data

41:11.100 --> 41:12.810
that we got from our
various sessions,

41:12.810 --> 41:15.810
and we're going to generate
a report that will come out

41:15.810 --> 41:20.040
hopefully early next
year that synthesizes all

41:20.040 --> 41:21.860
of the information we gathered.

41:21.860 --> 41:24.360
We've been holding meetings
with both our advisory committee

41:24.360 --> 41:27.510
meeting that helped set
up the symposium with us,

41:27.510 --> 41:30.330
and then we had an
external academic group

41:30.330 --> 41:32.970
that we are now forming
into this academic core.

41:32.970 --> 41:34.830
And so we have two
sets of site visits

41:34.830 --> 41:37.727
that we're organizing to
begin to build the community

41:37.727 --> 41:38.310
collaborative.

41:38.310 --> 41:41.490
One is site visits with
the academic team partners

41:41.490 --> 41:44.730
to better understand the
distribution, operations,

41:44.730 --> 41:47.340
needs, resources of
each institution.

41:47.340 --> 41:50.820
Because as you can imagine, what
MIT is doing or what MIT needs

41:50.820 --> 41:53.790
is quite different from
Roxbury Community College.

41:53.790 --> 41:57.180
The type of stakeholders MIT
is going to be able to engage

41:57.180 --> 41:59.400
is quite different
from the stakeholders

41:59.400 --> 42:01.990
that Roxbury Community College
is going to be able to engage,

42:01.990 --> 42:04.290
so kind of understanding
and mapping

42:04.290 --> 42:07.570
those different relationships
is critical to forming a core.

42:07.570 --> 42:09.250
And then we're also
starting to host,

42:09.250 --> 42:13.120
to engage, the broader
symposium participants, site

42:13.120 --> 42:15.035
visits to the various
case study partners

42:15.035 --> 42:17.410
so that we can get a deeper
learning and deeper knowledge

42:17.410 --> 42:20.510
dive into what's actually
happening in the region.

42:20.510 --> 42:22.630
And then finally--
so again, thinking

42:22.630 --> 42:26.650
about this as beginning, as this
local, academic, government,

42:26.650 --> 42:30.250
tribal, community, industry
partnership and forming

42:30.250 --> 42:32.830
at different-- catalyzing
different activities

42:32.830 --> 42:35.440
at different points
across the region,

42:35.440 --> 42:38.742
we're also highly aware of
other types of activities

42:38.742 --> 42:39.950
that are forming around this.

42:39.950 --> 42:42.940
So there's-- two weeks after
we hosted our symposium,

42:42.940 --> 42:46.870
the Boston Green Ribbon
Commission hosted or was part

42:46.870 --> 42:48.820
of a climate beacon project.

42:48.820 --> 42:51.640
And rather than seeing these
as competitive opportunities

42:51.640 --> 42:54.520
or competitive
projects, we really

42:54.520 --> 42:57.250
think there's a strong
opportunity for integration.

42:57.250 --> 42:59.830
The beacon event-- I don't know
if anyone here was at that.

42:59.830 --> 43:02.180
It's operating in
a more macro scale,

43:02.180 --> 43:04.360
so bringing in kind of a
higher-level government

43:04.360 --> 43:05.320
operation.

43:05.320 --> 43:07.840
It's also much more
industry focused,

43:07.840 --> 43:10.240
and so it could be a
really nice partner--

43:10.240 --> 43:13.630
or there could be a nice,
synergistic relationship

43:13.630 --> 43:16.160
with a community
climate collaborative.

43:16.160 --> 43:16.660
All right.

43:16.660 --> 43:18.730
So follow-up steps,
follow-up recommendations.

43:18.730 --> 43:20.410
We're trying to grow
the collaborative.

43:20.410 --> 43:23.020
We're thinking about how we
can operate the collaborative.

43:23.020 --> 43:26.500
And then also, for now, this
is being hosted in-house

43:26.500 --> 43:30.130
and somewhat in an
anti-hierarchical partnership

43:30.130 --> 43:32.860
fashion with the other
academic institutions,

43:32.860 --> 43:34.963
but we're thinking about
major grant funding, how

43:34.963 --> 43:36.880
we would go out and do
this to build something

43:36.880 --> 43:40.000
like a secretariat that sits
between the institutions

43:40.000 --> 43:42.230
and hosts this activity
for the region.

43:42.230 --> 43:44.350
So I'd love to talk
more about that

43:44.350 --> 43:47.450
and hear your ideas and
thoughts in the dialogue.

43:47.450 --> 43:48.320
Thank you very much.

43:48.320 --> 43:52.190
So we'll turn it over to her.

43:52.190 --> 43:52.690
Thank you.

43:52.690 --> 43:56.190
[APPLAUSE]

43:57.460 --> 43:58.460
Thanks so much, Janelle.

43:58.460 --> 44:01.790
That was such important work
that you're doing and exciting,

44:01.790 --> 44:03.590
and you've queued
us up perfectly.

44:03.590 --> 44:06.500
So I'm going to
introduce Ayr Muir.

44:06.500 --> 44:09.590
Ayr Muir is the founder
of Clover Food Lab,

44:09.590 --> 44:12.590
a vegetarian restaurant chain
that works with local providers

44:12.590 --> 44:15.980
to reduce the CO2 footprint
of the food industry.

44:15.980 --> 44:16.940
Welcome, Ayr.

44:16.940 --> 44:17.510
Thank you.

44:17.510 --> 44:19.010
[APPLAUSE]

44:19.010 --> 44:19.510
Thank you.

44:23.170 --> 44:25.240
Hi, everybody.

44:25.240 --> 44:27.982
I think-- I feel--

44:27.982 --> 44:30.190
well, hopefully, I have
something to contribute here.

44:30.190 --> 44:32.200
I guess, MIT's "mens et manus," right?

44:32.200 --> 44:35.170
Some very cerebral topics
we're just going through,

44:35.170 --> 44:37.540
and I'm going to
bring us down to food

44:37.540 --> 44:39.850
that we touch with our hands.

44:39.850 --> 44:42.400
I'm the founder of
Clover Food Lab.

44:42.400 --> 44:48.250
And Clover is-- as mentioned,
we're a restaurant chain.

44:48.250 --> 44:50.200
We're just here in
the Boston area,

44:50.200 --> 44:53.410
hoping to be many
places someday.

44:53.410 --> 44:57.700
But right now, we operate 15
restaurants in this region.

44:57.700 --> 45:00.160
And you know, I'll share
something with you.

45:00.160 --> 45:03.490
Not everybody knows the
name Clover Food Lab,

45:03.490 --> 45:06.430
where that comes from.

45:06.430 --> 45:08.230
First, I wanted to call
the company Clover.

45:08.230 --> 45:09.438
It's the idea I came up with.

45:09.438 --> 45:13.240
And we were at
the very beginning

45:13.240 --> 45:15.940
facing this problem, which is,
I didn't think this would work.

45:15.940 --> 45:17.565
I was trying to figure
out how could we

45:17.565 --> 45:21.260
make some food that people
who love eating meat

45:21.260 --> 45:24.050
would dream about and
come back for and walk

45:24.050 --> 45:28.460
past their favorite, you
know, Chipotle or Chick-fil-A

45:28.460 --> 45:30.120
or whatever to come eat with us.

45:30.120 --> 45:31.310
And I didn't know--

45:31.310 --> 45:33.140
I didn't-- I thought
it was worth trying.

45:33.140 --> 45:34.348
I didn't think it would work.

45:34.348 --> 45:36.600
So Clover really started
with a design problem.

45:36.600 --> 45:40.430
And I think as any
good design approach,

45:40.430 --> 45:42.735
I tried to make our test
as cheap as possible,

45:42.735 --> 45:44.360
which is why we
started with food truck

45:44.360 --> 45:45.860
here on the MIT campus.

45:45.860 --> 45:49.640
And the-- we were afraid--

45:49.640 --> 45:51.098
at that point, food trucks--

45:51.098 --> 45:53.390
this is a little history,
but it's sort of interesting,

45:53.390 --> 45:56.270
since we're at MIT-- and Carlton
Street isn't really a street

45:56.270 --> 45:57.570
anymore, but that's
where our truck started.

45:57.570 --> 45:58.520
And it's like right--

45:58.520 --> 46:00.562
I don't know if I'm pointing
the right direction,

46:00.562 --> 46:03.810
but it's very close to here.

46:03.810 --> 46:08.130
And I-- trucks had a bad
reputation at that time.

46:08.130 --> 46:10.230
And I wanted to open the
restaurant called Clover.

46:10.230 --> 46:11.520
I was like, what do
we call this truck?

46:11.520 --> 46:12.900
We don't want to call
it the same thing.

46:12.900 --> 46:15.030
People might not want to
come to the restaurant.

46:15.030 --> 46:16.602
That was the mindset.

46:16.602 --> 46:18.060
And I was like,
well, we're at MIT.

46:18.060 --> 46:21.360
Maybe we call it like the lab
that we run for a few months

46:21.360 --> 46:22.890
and then open the
real restaurant,

46:22.890 --> 46:25.600
and we have some name
that carries over.

46:25.600 --> 46:28.660
And we actually-- we tried
to make that transition.

46:28.660 --> 46:30.870
We tried to stop using
the name Food Lab,

46:30.870 --> 46:34.260
and we changed our website, and
I had business cards back then.

46:34.260 --> 46:37.320
And we changed everything
to just Clover Fast Food.

46:37.320 --> 46:40.410
And three years later, I
was looking at Google Search

46:40.410 --> 46:44.220
results, and 60% of
the organic search

46:44.220 --> 46:47.100
was for Clover Food Lab, not
Clover Restaurants or Clover

46:47.100 --> 46:47.620
Fast Food.

46:47.620 --> 46:50.500
So we're like, somehow,
that name stuck with people.

46:50.500 --> 46:52.095
But I think that
people do ask today

46:52.095 --> 46:53.720
who are not familiar
with Clover, like,

46:53.720 --> 46:55.590
what's the "food lab" part?

46:55.590 --> 46:59.190
And I think it was a
name we chose early on,

46:59.190 --> 47:04.210
but symbolically, it's
meant to be inclusive.

47:04.210 --> 47:05.830
Like, you are all the lab.

47:05.830 --> 47:07.870
Because I think for
us, we're trying

47:07.870 --> 47:11.680
to design a food system that's
going to get us better results.

47:11.680 --> 47:15.620
And we need collaboration
and cooperation to get there.

47:15.620 --> 47:18.070
So really, everything
we're doing well at Clover

47:18.070 --> 47:20.470
right now is--

47:20.470 --> 47:23.620
can be traced back to
some customer giving us

47:23.620 --> 47:27.250
indirect or direct feedback
and engagement that we've

47:27.250 --> 47:29.750
had from a broader community.

47:29.750 --> 47:32.995
So get through some
of these slides.

47:32.995 --> 47:34.495
I think I already
talked about that.

47:37.650 --> 47:42.400
This slide is just to
make a very simple point,

47:42.400 --> 47:45.600
which I think at this point
most people here may understand,

47:45.600 --> 47:48.912
but I can't say this often
enough because even if we

47:48.912 --> 47:50.370
understand our
minds, I still don't

47:50.370 --> 47:54.630
think this has lodged itself in
people's hearts and worldview.

47:54.630 --> 48:01.400
But using animals for
food is equivalent,

48:01.400 --> 48:04.700
in terms of its impact
on CO2 emissions

48:04.700 --> 48:06.680
and global warming--
it's equivalent to

48:06.680 --> 48:08.300
the internal combustion engine.

48:08.300 --> 48:10.620
These things are
at the same level,

48:10.620 --> 48:12.860
which is a pretty wild idea.

48:12.860 --> 48:16.340
And there are actually
lots of other impacts

48:16.340 --> 48:20.240
that are the result of
using animals for food.

48:20.240 --> 48:22.430
There's a lot of
loss of species,

48:22.430 --> 48:24.200
biodiversity because there's--

48:24.200 --> 48:27.290
a lot of our deforestation--
most of our deforestation

48:27.290 --> 48:29.900
is happening right now,
is to produce food,

48:29.900 --> 48:33.170
and most of that's for cattle,
grazing, and things like that.

48:33.170 --> 48:34.840
But it also-- erosion.

48:34.840 --> 48:36.090
There's lots of other effects.

48:36.090 --> 48:39.560
But if you want to just
think about climate change,

48:39.560 --> 48:41.570
there's this very,
very direct impact

48:41.570 --> 48:43.400
to the way we choose
to eat and the way

48:43.400 --> 48:45.200
we choose to fill
out our calories

48:45.200 --> 48:48.450
and the impact that we're
having on the planet.

48:48.450 --> 48:52.460
And this is the thing
I learned about in 2008

48:52.460 --> 48:55.680
and I found shocking,
and I was suspicious of.

48:55.680 --> 48:58.830
And I did more research
and convinced myself

48:58.830 --> 49:01.050
it's not only probably
true, but it's something

49:01.050 --> 49:02.820
that is underinvested.

49:02.820 --> 49:04.320
And I think that's
true to this day.

49:04.320 --> 49:05.403
There's a lot of progress.

49:05.403 --> 49:09.150
But I still think if we look
at the various things that

49:09.150 --> 49:10.980
matter to climate
change, there's

49:10.980 --> 49:14.430
not enough people working
on food solutions.

49:14.430 --> 49:17.430
So the challenge
that I wanted to try,

49:17.430 --> 49:20.670
and this isn't the only way to
take on that previous slide.

49:20.670 --> 49:23.640
I'm hoping that
people have success

49:23.640 --> 49:26.190
in lots of different
efforts that can help

49:26.190 --> 49:27.780
us decarbonize our food system.

49:27.780 --> 49:29.550
But the thing I
was interested in

49:29.550 --> 49:33.360
is, can you make meat-free
meals that meat lovers will

49:33.360 --> 49:33.930
dream about?

49:33.930 --> 49:36.210
And partly, this was
interesting to me

49:36.210 --> 49:37.620
because I really
like food a lot.

49:37.620 --> 49:40.200
So as I imagine what
that future looks like,

49:40.200 --> 49:42.030
whatever the design
parameters are,

49:42.030 --> 49:44.550
I would love it to taste great.

49:44.550 --> 49:47.130
I'd like future to be
delicious and enjoyable.

49:47.130 --> 49:50.280
I don't want it to be,
like, punishment eating.

49:50.280 --> 49:54.900
So this is what set our path.

49:54.900 --> 50:00.033
And I found this old
picture, which I thought

50:00.033 --> 50:01.450
would be interesting
to this group

50:01.450 --> 50:04.510
because we're talking about
design and designing solutions.

50:04.510 --> 50:06.970
And as I mentioned,
my belief is you just

50:06.970 --> 50:09.910
do the cheapest possible thing
you can to get an answer.

50:09.910 --> 50:13.270
It's going to let you collect
more and better information.

50:13.270 --> 50:17.690
And the cheapest thing I could
do to explore this idea--

50:17.690 --> 50:20.470
I was working at McKinsey
Company at the time,

50:20.470 --> 50:23.170
and I had a lot of vacation
time because I work too much.

50:23.170 --> 50:26.830
And I took it all at once, so I
had six weeks of vacation time

50:26.830 --> 50:27.590
all at once.

50:27.590 --> 50:31.870
And I went and got a job
at Burger King and Panera,

50:31.870 --> 50:34.540
but I don't have a
picture of the Panera one.

50:34.540 --> 50:39.120
And the Burger King uniform
is much better, too.

50:39.120 --> 50:41.892
And I just worked there
for six weeks to see what--

50:41.892 --> 50:43.600
I had never worked in
restaurants before,

50:43.600 --> 50:45.400
and I just wanted
to see what's it

50:45.400 --> 50:48.082
like, what's the pace,
what's the flow, what

50:48.082 --> 50:48.790
are people doing.

50:48.790 --> 50:52.180
It was actually
really uplifting.

50:52.180 --> 50:54.250
I don't want to take too
much time, but little

50:54.250 --> 50:55.510
story-- it's really cool.

50:55.510 --> 50:58.400
When I was working
there, I saw--

50:58.400 --> 51:01.190
there was this little thing that
happened which gave me insight

51:01.190 --> 51:05.150
and hope more broadly for food
and that delicious future I

51:05.150 --> 51:06.020
really want.

51:06.020 --> 51:09.313
Just a week and a half in,
one of the assistant managers

51:09.313 --> 51:09.980
was showing me--

51:09.980 --> 51:12.170
I'll show you how to
make the cookies now.

51:12.170 --> 51:12.800
I said, OK.

51:12.800 --> 51:15.140
And so she took me, and
there's this special oven,

51:15.140 --> 51:17.450
the frozen cookies--
because everything comes out

51:17.450 --> 51:19.070
of the freezer at Burger King.

51:19.070 --> 51:20.720
I don't know if people know
this about our food system

51:20.720 --> 51:21.140
in general.

51:21.140 --> 51:22.820
Like, everything comes
out of the freezer.

51:22.820 --> 51:24.320
So it comes out of
the freezer, cookies.

51:24.320 --> 51:24.987
You put them in.

51:24.987 --> 51:26.450
You hit a button
that says cookies.

51:26.450 --> 51:29.540
But she had a little
kitchen timer.

51:29.540 --> 51:30.440
I'm not even kidding.

51:30.440 --> 51:31.648
Like, a little kitchen timer.

51:31.648 --> 51:35.000
And she set it at
a different time.

51:35.000 --> 51:36.590
And she's like,
well, she's like,

51:36.590 --> 51:38.340
if you let it do the
whole cookie setting,

51:38.340 --> 51:40.507
the cookies are sort of
hard, and they're not really

51:40.507 --> 51:41.070
that good.

51:41.070 --> 51:42.080
But we take them out.

51:42.080 --> 51:43.580
We use this timer
instead, and we take them

51:43.580 --> 51:45.620
out a little earlier, and
they're more gooey and chewy,

51:45.620 --> 51:46.940
and customers like them
better, and they're

51:46.940 --> 51:48.050
a lot more delicious.

51:48.050 --> 51:50.000
And I thought, that's amazing.

51:50.000 --> 51:52.580
Like, we have somebody
at this, like, Burger

51:52.580 --> 51:55.280
King in Winchester,
Massachusetts, who's getting

51:55.280 --> 52:02.560
paid at the time $6.15 an hour,
and is trying to go around

52:02.560 --> 52:04.840
like the heavily
engineered cookie

52:04.840 --> 52:08.230
that Burger King corporate wants
to make because they think it's

52:08.230 --> 52:10.060
a little more tasty, right?

52:10.060 --> 52:13.410
It was really cool, and probably
her job's a little bit at risk

52:13.410 --> 52:13.910
there.

52:13.910 --> 52:15.868
But she was trying to
make something delicious.

52:15.868 --> 52:18.700
So I actually had a really
good experience there.

52:18.700 --> 52:20.620
And it led to
buying a food truck.

52:20.620 --> 52:22.300
And that's Clementine.

52:22.300 --> 52:25.270
And we just put in our
first college application

52:25.270 --> 52:27.340
last night, so this is--

52:27.340 --> 52:29.080
Clover just hit
its 15th birthday,

52:29.080 --> 52:31.540
so this is a while ago now.

52:31.540 --> 52:34.030
And that's me on the
first food truck.

52:34.030 --> 52:37.307
And really, we just started out
trying to ask people questions.

52:37.307 --> 52:38.390
What do you think of this?

52:38.390 --> 52:39.473
What do you think of that?

52:39.473 --> 52:40.660
Without any preconceptions.

52:40.660 --> 52:43.810
Like, we really wanted to know
if something-- if somebody

52:43.810 --> 52:45.520
didn't love something,
we don't want them

52:45.520 --> 52:46.510
just nodding and smiling.

52:46.510 --> 52:48.520
And it's really hard to get
people not-- because everyone

52:48.520 --> 52:50.728
thinks when you ask them do
you like what I made you,

52:50.728 --> 52:52.960
that you just want them
to say yes, thank you.

52:52.960 --> 52:55.300
But we really wanted to hear
what people really thought,

52:55.300 --> 52:58.910
so we learned lots of different
ways to go about that.

52:58.910 --> 53:01.668
And we started out first
day with just one sandwich

53:01.668 --> 53:03.710
on the menu, and then we
came back the second day

53:03.710 --> 53:05.240
with a different version
of that sandwich.

53:05.240 --> 53:06.230
And then we came
back the next day

53:06.230 --> 53:07.970
with the second sandwich,
and then a third day

53:07.970 --> 53:09.887
without that sandwich
because no one liked it.

53:09.887 --> 53:12.800
And we went on that
until we had a core menu.

53:12.800 --> 53:17.325
And this looks sort of
impossible in the post-COVID

53:17.325 --> 53:17.825
era--

53:17.825 --> 53:20.870
[LAUGHS] to imagine this
many people in one place.

53:20.870 --> 53:22.520
But this is what
started happening.

53:22.520 --> 53:26.492
And it was a lot of fun and
took on a life of its own.

53:26.492 --> 53:27.950
And then we moved
into restaurants.

53:27.950 --> 53:30.212
And this-- some people might
recognize the restaurant.

53:30.212 --> 53:31.670
When we opened that
restaurant, you

53:31.670 --> 53:34.040
could actually look over
and see the food truck

53:34.040 --> 53:36.898
because they were both
operating at the same time.

53:36.898 --> 53:38.690
And this is another
one of our restaurants.

53:38.690 --> 53:41.570
This is over at
Harvard Science Center.

53:41.570 --> 53:49.190
And we continue developing
solutions for this problem.

53:49.190 --> 53:51.260
This sandwich, our
chickpea fritter sandwich,

53:51.260 --> 53:54.260
the falafel sandwich, has become
Boston's favorite sandwich.

53:54.260 --> 53:56.480
And more of this sandwich--
we sell more units

53:56.480 --> 54:00.390
of this sandwich in Boston every
day than any other sandwich.

54:00.390 --> 54:00.890
So--

54:00.890 --> 54:01.760
[APPLAUSE]

54:01.760 --> 54:02.690
--it's really fun.

54:05.510 --> 54:08.810
And it's delicious,
but it's also--

54:08.810 --> 54:12.470
it happens to be vegan,
which is really awesome.

54:12.470 --> 54:14.252
A quick plug.

54:14.252 --> 54:16.460
I know we're probably getting
a little tight on time,

54:16.460 --> 54:18.827
but a quick plug
for the Brussels

54:18.827 --> 54:20.160
sprout sandwich, which just hit.

54:20.160 --> 54:22.285
I don't know if anybody's
had this sandwich before,

54:22.285 --> 54:23.960
but this is one of my favorites.

54:23.960 --> 54:27.710
And it's a fun
example of what we're

54:27.710 --> 54:31.017
able to do, because I think
that the future I envision is,

54:31.017 --> 54:33.350
like, people get more and
more excited about vegetables.

54:33.350 --> 54:35.840
And growing up, like, I
loved Brussels sprouts.

54:35.840 --> 54:36.620
I was a weird kid.

54:36.620 --> 54:38.738
But I was, like, in a
cultural environment

54:38.738 --> 54:41.030
where people made fun of
Brussels sprouts all the time.

54:41.030 --> 54:42.230
And it always made
me a little bit

54:42.230 --> 54:44.030
sad to hear people say
bad things about them.

54:44.030 --> 54:45.905
And I would sort of be
quiet about how much I

54:45.905 --> 54:47.690
liked Brussels sprouts.

54:47.690 --> 54:50.900
And then a few years ago,
I developed the sandwich

54:50.900 --> 54:52.520
as like an ode to
the Brussels sprout,

54:52.520 --> 54:55.028
with the hope I could get lots
and lots of other Brussels

54:55.028 --> 54:56.070
sprouts lovers out there.

54:56.070 --> 54:57.600
And the neat thing
about this-- this

54:57.600 --> 54:59.267
has just launched
last week on our menu.

54:59.267 --> 55:01.110
Just timing-wise, it
happens to be-- this

55:01.110 --> 55:02.100
is Brussels sprouts season.

55:02.100 --> 55:04.517
You have to wait until it's
cold at night and a little bit

55:04.517 --> 55:05.657
warmer in the day.

55:05.657 --> 55:07.740
When this sandwich is on
our menu, which is, like,

55:07.740 --> 55:11.070
five, six weeks a year, this
is the best-selling sandwich

55:11.070 --> 55:12.250
we sell, period.

55:12.250 --> 55:15.180
So this outsells the
chickpea fritter sandwich.

55:15.180 --> 55:17.345
It is our best-selling
sandwich we ever have,

55:17.345 --> 55:18.220
which is really neat.

55:18.220 --> 55:20.490
Now, it doesn't-- we don't
sell it all year long,

55:20.490 --> 55:22.050
but it's really--

55:22.050 --> 55:24.330
it's an exciting
thing, that if you

55:24.330 --> 55:26.433
find the right
quality of ingredient

55:26.433 --> 55:27.850
and you treat it
in the right way,

55:27.850 --> 55:31.420
you can change
people's perceptions.

55:31.420 --> 55:34.170
So that's all I have to say.

55:34.170 --> 55:37.450
And really thankful to be
invited and part of this.

55:37.450 --> 55:42.120
And I'm so happy so many people
are thinking about designing

55:42.120 --> 55:43.620
solutions for the climate.

55:43.620 --> 55:46.150
I mean, this is really
an amazing thing.

55:46.150 --> 55:48.850
I think we could go back
in time only a decade,

55:48.850 --> 55:54.270
and we wouldn't find so
much energy and so much

55:54.270 --> 55:56.110
effort against such
an important problem.

55:56.110 --> 55:58.268
So it's really awesome to
see and really thankful

55:58.268 --> 55:59.310
for everybody being here.

55:59.310 --> 56:02.642
[APPLAUSE]

56:06.120 --> 56:06.620
Thank you.

56:06.620 --> 56:07.250
Thank you, Ayr.

56:07.250 --> 56:08.930
I'm also a Brussels
sprouts person,

56:08.930 --> 56:10.355
so it makes me very
happy, and I'm excited.

56:10.355 --> 56:10.880
[APPLAUSE]

56:10.880 --> 56:11.452
Yes.

56:11.452 --> 56:12.660
Let's hear it for the sprout.

56:12.660 --> 56:15.320
So I'm going to-- so
I'm going to invite

56:15.320 --> 56:17.653
our panelists to come up to
the front and take a seat.

56:17.653 --> 56:19.070
And you can sit
wherever you like.

56:19.070 --> 56:21.270
And then I will
moderate from there.

56:21.270 --> 56:22.820
And I think the--

56:22.820 --> 56:23.600
yes.

56:23.600 --> 56:26.070
Thank you.

56:26.070 --> 56:26.570
Oh, great.

56:29.570 --> 56:32.160
So it's-- can you hear?

56:32.160 --> 56:32.660
OK.

56:32.660 --> 56:33.320
Yes, sir.

56:33.320 --> 56:35.120
Sorry, untethered.

56:35.120 --> 56:36.860
So I'm going to--

56:36.860 --> 56:37.838
so we'll take a breath.

56:37.838 --> 56:39.380
And what I'm going
to do is I'm going

56:39.380 --> 56:42.890
to ask two questions in
our moderated portion--

56:42.890 --> 56:44.090
and yes, we have time.

56:44.090 --> 56:46.940
And you can feel free
to answer or not.

56:46.940 --> 56:47.755
You don't have to.

56:47.755 --> 56:49.880
And you can also build on
other people's questions.

56:49.880 --> 56:52.460
But I just-- I'll start
with this one, which

56:52.460 --> 56:55.910
is in your presentations, we
saw very different approaches

56:55.910 --> 56:57.290
to technology.

56:57.290 --> 56:59.900
Some were very tech heavy,
and some were less reliant

56:59.900 --> 57:01.040
on technology.

57:01.040 --> 57:03.680
And in a place like
MIT, there's just

57:03.680 --> 57:06.830
a lot of optimistic confidence
about the possibility

57:06.830 --> 57:10.220
of technological solutions
to climate change.

57:10.220 --> 57:12.200
What thoughts do
you have on the ways

57:12.200 --> 57:14.720
that design and technology
might work together

57:14.720 --> 57:17.600
in addressing climate and
environmental challenges?

57:17.600 --> 57:19.580
And you can raise your
hand, or I can call--

57:22.630 --> 57:23.452
I'll go first.

57:23.452 --> 57:24.160
Paula, thank you.

57:24.160 --> 57:25.225
I just have a short answer.

57:25.225 --> 57:25.725
Yeah.

57:25.725 --> 57:28.840
And that is that the
kinds of information

57:28.840 --> 57:33.160
that we're talking
about-- the data

57:33.160 --> 57:37.270
is so complex, that
the design actually

57:37.270 --> 57:40.210
becomes really critical
in helping people

57:40.210 --> 57:43.120
be able to engage
with that information,

57:43.120 --> 57:46.960
understand it, know how it's
important to their lives,

57:46.960 --> 57:48.370
and that kind of thing.

57:48.370 --> 57:51.490
I think if we really
want all of the things

57:51.490 --> 57:53.440
that we're beginning
to understand and know

57:53.440 --> 57:59.290
about our world to come to life
and help to solve the climate

57:59.290 --> 58:04.430
and conservation
crises, we need design.

58:04.430 --> 58:07.760
That's the thing that-- it's
like the leveler across all

58:07.760 --> 58:10.820
these deep areas of
expertise across which

58:10.820 --> 58:12.560
we can communicate
and understand

58:12.560 --> 58:14.450
the problem together.

58:14.450 --> 58:15.060
I love that.

58:15.060 --> 58:18.320
So it's a way to connect to
people, all this information?

58:18.320 --> 58:18.980
Yes, OK.

58:18.980 --> 58:19.790
That's wonderful.

58:19.790 --> 58:20.550
Thank you.

58:20.550 --> 58:24.440
And make complex information
come to life for them,

58:24.440 --> 58:29.060
and even across our areas
of expertise, engineering,

58:29.060 --> 58:34.160
scientists, that we
together, by using design,

58:34.160 --> 58:38.420
can help to understand
what information is there

58:38.420 --> 58:41.330
and then help others to
engage in what to do.

58:41.330 --> 58:42.090
I love that.

58:42.090 --> 58:42.590
Yeah.

58:42.590 --> 58:45.868
Building on what Paula
says, I wonder if--

58:45.868 --> 58:47.660
I mean, everything's
being designed, right?

58:47.660 --> 58:49.190
It's a question
of who's designing

58:49.190 --> 58:52.090
and how intentionally
and to what parameters.

58:52.090 --> 58:53.090
You're speaking to food.

58:53.090 --> 58:56.990
Like, the food system we have
right now, which we're all

58:56.990 --> 59:00.530
becoming more aware of a lot
of the negative outcomes,

59:00.530 --> 59:03.340
it was designed for
very specific purposes,

59:03.340 --> 59:05.010
which is achieved
really, really well.

59:05.010 --> 59:09.660
Like, we-- food's
never been cheaper.

59:09.660 --> 59:11.400
It's very efficient.

59:11.400 --> 59:13.950
And we get incredible variety.

59:13.950 --> 59:17.850
So there are design
parameters that were at place,

59:17.850 --> 59:20.430
but maybe there are some
other things we're missing,

59:20.430 --> 59:22.000
and maybe not
everybody was involved.

59:22.000 --> 59:25.530
And I think linking that
with technology, there's

59:25.530 --> 59:26.730
not a food--

59:26.730 --> 59:28.530
there's not a
realistic food future

59:28.530 --> 59:32.400
in which we go back to how
people ate in the 1800s, right?

59:32.400 --> 59:36.620
I mean, it's-- you could
want that or not want it.

59:36.620 --> 59:37.870
It's just not going to happen.

59:37.870 --> 59:38.770
It's not realistic.

59:38.770 --> 59:40.625
So I think that we have to--

59:40.625 --> 59:42.750
I mean, I think where
technology incoming is, like,

59:42.750 --> 59:45.270
as we imagine what kind
of future we want and try

59:45.270 --> 59:47.790
and start designing
solutions to it-- like,

59:47.790 --> 59:50.550
we actually have the ability
to build something that's

59:50.550 --> 59:54.510
much better and takes advantage
of where we are in time

59:54.510 --> 59:59.190
and we know, and instead of
being nostalgic and thinking

59:59.190 --> 01:00:02.810
back to a time that doesn't
really exist anymore.

01:00:02.810 --> 01:00:05.000
Do you mean in terms of
production methods, or--

01:00:05.000 --> 01:00:08.120
I think broadly.

01:00:08.120 --> 01:00:09.710
I mean, I'm sort of--

01:00:09.710 --> 01:00:11.960
I've spent the most time
thinking about this for food.

01:00:11.960 --> 01:00:14.750
I would suspect it applies
to other climate solutions

01:00:14.750 --> 01:00:15.260
as well.

01:00:15.260 --> 01:00:17.877
I mean, if-- you
could say, like,

01:00:17.877 --> 01:00:19.460
before the internal
combustion engine,

01:00:19.460 --> 01:00:21.500
we weren't belching out
all the CO2, but like,

01:00:21.500 --> 01:00:24.800
is that a realistic way to think
about a solution to climate,

01:00:24.800 --> 01:00:27.560
is no internal combustion
engine immediately?

01:00:27.560 --> 01:00:28.670
Probably not.

01:00:28.670 --> 01:00:32.565
So maybe we work within what we
have and work for substitutes

01:00:32.565 --> 01:00:33.690
and other things like that.

01:00:33.690 --> 01:00:35.160
I think for food--

01:00:35.160 --> 01:00:36.350
this is just very much true.

01:00:36.350 --> 01:00:38.610
I mean, people used to eat
in a very different way.

01:00:38.610 --> 01:00:40.160
It didn't have a lot of
the negative outcomes

01:00:40.160 --> 01:00:41.450
that food system does today.

01:00:41.450 --> 01:00:43.340
But as we think
forward, I don't think

01:00:43.340 --> 01:00:46.280
the solutions are going
to be trying to replicate

01:00:46.280 --> 01:00:48.383
some past food ways.

01:00:48.383 --> 01:00:51.050
I think instead, it's how do you
use everything we've developed,

01:00:51.050 --> 01:00:53.810
all this cool technology
and new technologies that

01:00:53.810 --> 01:00:55.730
are around the
corner and use them

01:00:55.730 --> 01:00:58.670
to build to new design
parameters that make a better

01:00:58.670 --> 01:01:00.260
food future, right?

01:01:00.260 --> 01:01:01.550
Move forward.

01:01:01.550 --> 01:01:04.260
I mean, just-- I strongly
agree with this as well.

01:01:04.260 --> 01:01:06.490
I think particularly for
food, but really, obviously,

01:01:06.490 --> 01:01:08.550
many kind of
climate initiatives,

01:01:08.550 --> 01:01:13.470
the pastoral imaginary
may do more harm

01:01:13.470 --> 01:01:14.820
than good in a certain way.

01:01:14.820 --> 01:01:17.940
I guess for me, it's not
so much about optimism

01:01:17.940 --> 01:01:21.670
than it is about
realism, in both senses,

01:01:21.670 --> 01:01:23.310
both in terms of
pragmatism, but also

01:01:23.310 --> 01:01:26.220
in terms of understanding
the world as it is

01:01:26.220 --> 01:01:29.460
and reorienting ourselves--

01:01:29.460 --> 01:01:33.130
reorientation
accordingly to that.

01:01:33.130 --> 01:01:36.460
And just to piggyback on
what you said as well,

01:01:36.460 --> 01:01:40.540
I don't really see it as sort
of sociocultural dynamics

01:01:40.540 --> 01:01:43.960
versus sociotechnical--
versus technical dynamics.

01:01:43.960 --> 01:01:47.260
The technical is always
sociotechnical already,

01:01:47.260 --> 01:01:50.162
and the social is also
always sociotechnical

01:01:50.162 --> 01:01:50.870
at the same time.

01:01:50.870 --> 01:01:54.970
You can't really separate them
in different kinds of ways.

01:01:54.970 --> 01:01:59.810
But to-- just to be the
technology guy, to make the--

01:01:59.810 --> 01:02:04.300
to be the lawyer on behalf
of technology, I suppose--

01:02:04.300 --> 01:02:05.620
[LAUGHS]

01:02:05.620 --> 01:02:07.630
--one of the things
we've been thinking about

01:02:07.630 --> 01:02:10.810
lately is simulations and
the role of simulations,

01:02:10.810 --> 01:02:12.790
particularly
computational simulations,

01:02:12.790 --> 01:02:15.320
but not only that as well.

01:02:15.320 --> 01:02:18.100
And I think it's easy to
forget, in a certain sense,

01:02:18.100 --> 01:02:21.070
that as I mentioned-- that
what we think-- when we--

01:02:21.070 --> 01:02:23.380
the phenomenon that
we refer to as climate

01:02:23.380 --> 01:02:26.800
change and the way in which
we're all trying to mobilize

01:02:26.800 --> 01:02:29.170
at different scales, at a
different tempos, a kind

01:02:29.170 --> 01:02:32.840
of planetary political
response to this,

01:02:32.840 --> 01:02:36.300
is in response to what
is at the end of the day

01:02:36.300 --> 01:02:40.970
a computational simulations
of what the year 2050 is going

01:02:40.970 --> 01:02:41.840
to be like.

01:02:41.840 --> 01:02:45.260
We have predictive models
of this future that

01:02:45.260 --> 01:02:47.240
are calculative, and
obviously, the variables

01:02:47.240 --> 01:02:50.210
are mostly social, more
than anything else.

01:02:50.210 --> 01:02:52.140
But we wouldn't normally
think of it this way,

01:02:52.140 --> 01:02:55.310
but what the planetary
climate politics is

01:02:55.310 --> 01:02:57.650
to try to mobilize a
response in relationship

01:02:57.650 --> 01:03:00.380
to this computational.

01:03:00.380 --> 01:03:02.480
This places simulations
in a position

01:03:02.480 --> 01:03:06.260
of tremendous political agency,
and the significance of this,

01:03:06.260 --> 01:03:09.200
I think, is also-- is important.

01:03:09.200 --> 01:03:12.470
I guess one thing I wanted
to add to this conversation

01:03:12.470 --> 01:03:15.950
also around design is
it's important to remember

01:03:15.950 --> 01:03:19.010
that many-- climate change
is not an event, right?

01:03:19.010 --> 01:03:21.470
It's not something that is
going to happen in the future,

01:03:21.470 --> 01:03:22.940
that it's, like,
a Roland Emmerich

01:03:22.940 --> 01:03:24.680
movie, that Godzilla
will show up

01:03:24.680 --> 01:03:27.150
and this will be
the climate change.

01:03:27.150 --> 01:03:28.730
And it's also not
something that will

01:03:28.730 --> 01:03:32.840
be solved in the sense to
which, OK, now we're done.

01:03:32.840 --> 01:03:34.280
It's forever.

01:03:34.280 --> 01:03:35.060
It's forever.

01:03:35.060 --> 01:03:38.980
Like, we will-- as
long as there is--

01:03:38.980 --> 01:03:40.840
as long as there is
sapient intelligence,

01:03:40.840 --> 01:03:43.120
from this point going
forward, the question

01:03:43.120 --> 01:03:46.660
of how we will compose the
planet, how the planet will

01:03:46.660 --> 01:03:49.870
be made, terraformed if you
like, one way or another,

01:03:49.870 --> 01:03:52.180
is a permanent condition.

01:03:52.180 --> 01:03:54.100
And so the question
of what viability

01:03:54.100 --> 01:03:56.440
means, how it is
that we can have--

01:03:56.440 --> 01:03:58.942
that the long-term viability
around this as well--

01:03:58.942 --> 01:04:01.400
this is the design question,
this is-- around this as well.

01:04:01.400 --> 01:04:04.900
And again, it's really about
the social and technological

01:04:04.900 --> 01:04:05.630
at the same time.

01:04:05.630 --> 01:04:07.910
It can't be separated.

01:04:07.910 --> 01:04:11.300
I think that makes a lot of
sense, to think about them--

01:04:11.300 --> 01:04:14.990
at MIT, it's very-- we're very
much tech-- we separate them

01:04:14.990 --> 01:04:16.145
maybe too much sometimes.

01:04:16.145 --> 01:04:18.350
Well, in the humanities, where
I live, they get separated, too.

01:04:18.350 --> 01:04:18.980
Yes.

01:04:18.980 --> 01:04:21.110
The idea of, oh, we're not going
to deal with the technology.

01:04:21.110 --> 01:04:22.610
We're going to deal
with signs and symbols,

01:04:22.610 --> 01:04:23.700
and that will solve it.

01:04:23.700 --> 01:04:24.620
And that's not--

01:04:24.620 --> 01:04:25.160
Thank you.

01:04:25.160 --> 01:04:26.070
That's a ceremony.

01:04:26.070 --> 01:04:26.570
Right.

01:04:26.570 --> 01:04:30.772
That's not a response, yeah.

01:04:30.772 --> 01:04:31.730
Janelle, did you have--

01:04:31.730 --> 01:04:32.230
Yeah.

01:04:32.230 --> 01:04:35.630
I mean, I fully agree with that,
that you really can't separate

01:04:35.630 --> 01:04:37.520
the social from
the technological,

01:04:37.520 --> 01:04:40.580
but I think too often, the
technological, especially,

01:04:40.580 --> 01:04:41.750
we try.

01:04:41.750 --> 01:04:44.660
And one of the ways my
lab is working on this

01:04:44.660 --> 01:04:47.300
is around the idea of
offshore wind codesign.

01:04:47.300 --> 01:04:49.337
So this is a recent
project we've

01:04:49.337 --> 01:04:51.170
been developing, where
we're trying to push,

01:04:51.170 --> 01:04:54.530
with a team of engineers, the
parameters of engineering.

01:04:54.530 --> 01:04:56.690
And this could go at
the base level, where

01:04:56.690 --> 01:04:59.150
you think about the massive
offshore wind systems that

01:04:59.150 --> 01:05:01.530
are being designed
across the country,

01:05:01.530 --> 01:05:04.880
but many being developed
now in the Northeast.

01:05:04.880 --> 01:05:06.800
And you push the
design so that it's

01:05:06.800 --> 01:05:11.330
integrated with community needs
and desires and objectives,

01:05:11.330 --> 01:05:13.400
and you get very
different configurations.

01:05:13.400 --> 01:05:15.740
You get different ideas of
what community benefits are,

01:05:15.740 --> 01:05:18.440
how systems have to
operate once you start

01:05:18.440 --> 01:05:21.368
building a bridge between
the technological designers

01:05:21.368 --> 01:05:23.660
and the system developers
and then the communities that

01:05:23.660 --> 01:05:26.220
are going to be the
recipients of that energy.

01:05:26.220 --> 01:05:27.950
And this can go from
something as simple

01:05:27.950 --> 01:05:32.010
as the codesign of the system
all the way to the technology

01:05:32.010 --> 01:05:35.880
itself, where right now, the
engineering of the technology

01:05:35.880 --> 01:05:40.060
is done in silos built around
the technical criteria,

01:05:40.060 --> 01:05:43.320
so different ways to understand
the wind speeds, the wave

01:05:43.320 --> 01:05:45.810
conditions, the
different vibrations

01:05:45.810 --> 01:05:48.180
and how those impact design.

01:05:48.180 --> 01:05:51.240
They could equally, instead of
just thinking about efficiency

01:05:51.240 --> 01:05:54.817
and in technical criteria, be
designed to community concern.

01:05:54.817 --> 01:05:56.400
So you could think
about even bringing

01:05:56.400 --> 01:05:58.620
some of the principles
of architecture in,

01:05:58.620 --> 01:06:00.750
where you might have
charettes, and you

01:06:00.750 --> 01:06:02.970
get the designers
or the engineers

01:06:02.970 --> 01:06:05.310
to understand what is it
the community needs, what

01:06:05.310 --> 01:06:07.770
do they want, and then
the technology isn't just

01:06:07.770 --> 01:06:10.320
about optimizing energy
produced over the wind speed.

01:06:10.320 --> 01:06:13.080
It's about minimizing
impact on the whales

01:06:13.080 --> 01:06:15.000
or minimizing the
impact on the fisheries

01:06:15.000 --> 01:06:17.700
or maybe even enhancing
the fisheries.

01:06:17.700 --> 01:06:20.790
And you get a very different
kind of system or product

01:06:20.790 --> 01:06:23.265
that is developed out
of that interaction.

01:06:23.265 --> 01:06:25.890
I love that the message there is
similar to what Ayr was saying

01:06:25.890 --> 01:06:28.950
before about thinking about what
your stakeholders really desire

01:06:28.950 --> 01:06:32.370
and how they respond to
things and integrating that.

01:06:32.370 --> 01:06:36.310
I have another
question for the panel.

01:06:36.310 --> 01:06:40.170
So there's a tremendous drive
on the part of many students

01:06:40.170 --> 01:06:43.798
at MIT and other places to
engage in climate action,

01:06:43.798 --> 01:06:45.840
but there's also sometimes
a sense of frustration

01:06:45.840 --> 01:06:48.450
that things are not
moving fast enough

01:06:48.450 --> 01:06:50.610
and that there are many
obstacles that remain,

01:06:50.610 --> 01:06:53.640
and there's still a
lot to do, obviously.

01:06:53.640 --> 01:06:57.900
So with all of the things
that you each individually do,

01:06:57.900 --> 01:07:01.410
they're ambitious, and they
aim to be truly transformative.

01:07:01.410 --> 01:07:04.530
But what are your thoughts
on the speed of change?

01:07:04.530 --> 01:07:08.550
What would speed or--
facilitate implementing the work

01:07:08.550 --> 01:07:10.125
that you each of you do does?

01:07:14.610 --> 01:07:16.660
I can take a crack at that one.

01:07:16.660 --> 01:07:20.010
So I think this is actually
one of the biggest challenges

01:07:20.010 --> 01:07:23.820
in climate change, is this
sense of the need for urgency

01:07:23.820 --> 01:07:26.880
and rapid and
large-scale deployment.

01:07:26.880 --> 01:07:30.270
It often, though, leads
to poorly considered,

01:07:30.270 --> 01:07:32.160
poorly developed
solutions, where

01:07:32.160 --> 01:07:34.770
you really-- for
a long-term impact

01:07:34.770 --> 01:07:38.190
and for more equitable, just
impact, you want deliberation.

01:07:38.190 --> 01:07:39.600
You want careful consideration.

01:07:39.600 --> 01:07:42.840
You want solutions to
span greater time frames.

01:07:42.840 --> 01:07:44.490
And so I think that
also maybe starts

01:07:44.490 --> 01:07:47.580
to get at this idea of the
ecological and relational

01:07:47.580 --> 01:07:50.430
tipping point,
where we don't want

01:07:50.430 --> 01:07:54.992
to see a slowness of process
as the same thing as inaction.

01:07:54.992 --> 01:07:56.700
And I think too often,
there's this sense

01:07:56.700 --> 01:07:59.490
that if you're being
slow and careful,

01:07:59.490 --> 01:08:01.480
you're not responding
to the immediate crisis,

01:08:01.480 --> 01:08:03.780
but really understanding,
as others have said,

01:08:03.780 --> 01:08:06.810
climate change is going to
be a long-term phenomenon,

01:08:06.810 --> 01:08:08.470
a long-term problem.

01:08:08.470 --> 01:08:10.560
And so we need to change
and adapt our planning

01:08:10.560 --> 01:08:12.780
processes so we're
really accommodating

01:08:12.780 --> 01:08:15.220
the scale of what's
happening and thinking

01:08:15.220 --> 01:08:17.890
about how our solutions
are also going

01:08:17.890 --> 01:08:20.800
to expand to meet that scale.

01:08:20.800 --> 01:08:25.990
I really appreciate that sort of
sentiment of being thoughtfully

01:08:25.990 --> 01:08:27.609
considered now and--

01:08:27.609 --> 01:08:28.930
rather than pay later, right?

01:08:28.930 --> 01:08:30.819
And then-- but that
maybe it isn't as fast

01:08:30.819 --> 01:08:32.893
as maybe people would like.

01:08:32.893 --> 01:08:34.060
That is such a good comment.

01:08:34.060 --> 01:08:35.319
Other comments from--

01:08:35.319 --> 01:08:37.090
I mean, I would
say stay impatient.

01:08:37.090 --> 01:08:41.920
Like, we need-- there are a lot
of different layers of this.

01:08:41.920 --> 01:08:46.210
I think that broadly, we don't
have the political consensus

01:08:46.210 --> 01:08:49.660
to drive at this problem
as hard as we should.

01:08:49.660 --> 01:08:53.130
I mean, I think, unquestionably
100 years from now,

01:08:53.130 --> 01:08:54.880
people are going to
look back at this time

01:08:54.880 --> 01:08:56.338
and scratch their
head and be like,

01:08:56.338 --> 01:08:57.729
what was wrong with everybody?

01:09:00.274 --> 01:09:02.149
And I think some people
are looking at this--

01:09:02.149 --> 01:09:07.779
so I think that the impatience
is great and put it into action

01:09:07.779 --> 01:09:11.680
and try to use it to that
energy to build more awareness

01:09:11.680 --> 01:09:17.500
and get more people focused
on what we need to do.

01:09:17.500 --> 01:09:19.210
I think at the
same time, there's

01:09:19.210 --> 01:09:21.069
a lot of optimism I'll share.

01:09:21.069 --> 01:09:23.920
Because Clover just turned
15, so that's a lot of years

01:09:23.920 --> 01:09:25.850
I've been working on this.

01:09:25.850 --> 01:09:30.819
And it's-- so much has
happened over that time.

01:09:36.170 --> 01:09:38.620
I think that there are--

01:09:38.620 --> 01:09:40.990
just-- I'm looking
around right now.

01:09:40.990 --> 01:09:43.060
We're right in the--

01:09:43.060 --> 01:09:47.120
MIT as an institution is
focused on climate change.

01:09:47.120 --> 01:09:51.486
I mean, we were so far from
that back 15 years ago.

01:09:51.486 --> 01:09:53.319
It wouldn't be something
I would even really

01:09:53.319 --> 01:09:57.160
conceive of as realistic
or an expectation,

01:09:57.160 --> 01:10:02.470
where we have lots of capital
being directed toward companies

01:10:02.470 --> 01:10:05.440
that are trying to come up with
very serious climate solutions.

01:10:05.440 --> 01:10:09.020
That was not the case even five
years ago or seven years ago.

01:10:09.020 --> 01:10:11.830
So there are a lot of
bright points, too.

01:10:11.830 --> 01:10:14.773
I think that it's great
for people stay impatient.

01:10:14.773 --> 01:10:16.690
I think the comments
that some of these things

01:10:16.690 --> 01:10:19.750
are going to take a while
is probably important, too.

01:10:19.750 --> 01:10:21.910
But there's also a reason
for a lot of optimism.

01:10:21.910 --> 01:10:23.650
I mean, there's maybe
not-- we haven't

01:10:23.650 --> 01:10:26.830
made the progress we need to,
but there is a lot of movement.

01:10:26.830 --> 01:10:28.390
We're not standing still.

01:10:28.390 --> 01:10:33.350
I think we're progressing
toward solutions.

01:10:33.350 --> 01:10:33.850
Yeah.

01:10:33.850 --> 01:10:37.030
I mean, I strongly
agree with this point.

01:10:37.030 --> 01:10:38.530
In a certain sense, there's--

01:10:38.530 --> 01:10:40.780
I mean, I guess there's two
ways of thinking about it.

01:10:40.780 --> 01:10:43.405
On the one hand, I think there's
a clear sense that there needs

01:10:43.405 --> 01:10:46.840
to be enough rapid change that
the possibility of long-term

01:10:46.840 --> 01:10:47.770
change is even--

01:10:47.770 --> 01:10:50.460
is possible, and so
that we can change this

01:10:50.460 --> 01:10:52.960
fast enough so that those plans
can make themselves through.

01:10:52.960 --> 01:10:56.950
But the deeper
significance, I think,

01:10:56.950 --> 01:11:00.490
of the conceptual
realization of Anthropocene,

01:11:00.490 --> 01:11:02.980
if you want to call
it this, has to do

01:11:02.980 --> 01:11:06.160
with an elongation of
the time, timescales,

01:11:06.160 --> 01:11:08.660
in which we understand that
we're really operating in.

01:11:08.660 --> 01:11:12.100
And so to your question
about the students,

01:11:12.100 --> 01:11:15.910
I suppose what I often will tell
them is it's like, whatever you

01:11:15.910 --> 01:11:18.550
do, whatever you work on, you're
working on a climate change

01:11:18.550 --> 01:11:19.480
project.

01:11:19.480 --> 01:11:22.030
It's going to have some kind
of ecological and climate

01:11:22.030 --> 01:11:24.490
significance and impact
and reverberation.

01:11:24.490 --> 01:11:26.950
It's not a category
of a type of project.

01:11:26.950 --> 01:11:28.840
It's a fundamental
foundation by which

01:11:28.840 --> 01:11:32.240
any of the kinds of initiatives
will work themselves out.

01:11:32.240 --> 01:11:35.825
But really, more
direct, fair answer

01:11:35.825 --> 01:11:37.200
to question is
some of the things

01:11:37.200 --> 01:11:42.340
that I always will tell
the students is adaptation

01:11:42.340 --> 01:11:45.360
is just as important as
mitigation in the long run.

01:11:45.360 --> 01:11:47.860
And it's particularly in terms
of the sociotechnical systems

01:11:47.860 --> 01:11:53.380
and dealing with this
as well in this sense.

01:11:53.380 --> 01:11:57.580
And backwards compatibility,
that the most likely--

01:11:57.580 --> 01:11:59.560
the solutions or
interventions that

01:11:59.560 --> 01:12:01.552
are most likely to
have the biggest impact

01:12:01.552 --> 01:12:03.760
are ones that are able to
work with systems that they

01:12:03.760 --> 01:12:06.190
exist now and are
able to reduce the--

01:12:06.190 --> 01:12:08.680
let's say the opportunity
costs of transition

01:12:08.680 --> 01:12:11.020
in one way or another.

01:12:11.020 --> 01:12:15.430
Third, it's like-- if
what you're working on

01:12:15.430 --> 01:12:17.980
isn't cheap enough to
work in India and China,

01:12:17.980 --> 01:12:20.260
it's not cheap enough.

01:12:20.260 --> 01:12:22.420
It has to work from
a kind of-- really,

01:12:22.420 --> 01:12:24.040
a bottom-up kind of way.

01:12:24.040 --> 01:12:25.540
Anyway, these are
some of the things

01:12:25.540 --> 01:12:29.710
that you definitely
will have to work.

01:12:29.710 --> 01:12:31.480
Well, I agree.

01:12:31.480 --> 01:12:34.840
Motivating students to feel like
what they're doing in the world

01:12:34.840 --> 01:12:38.950
is going to make a difference,
that their unique passion

01:12:38.950 --> 01:12:43.600
or peculiar way of looking
at things or understanding

01:12:43.600 --> 01:12:47.340
things, the world, is
critical to being able to move

01:12:47.340 --> 01:12:48.610
these things forward.

01:12:48.610 --> 01:12:56.160
And when you talk about the
impatience, the need for speed,

01:12:56.160 --> 01:12:56.790
it's--

01:12:56.790 --> 01:12:59.370
for me, from the
world of conservation,

01:12:59.370 --> 01:13:03.960
we've been caring for a while
and earnestly putting out fires

01:13:03.960 --> 01:13:10.770
here and there, that the key to
motivating speed or moving more

01:13:10.770 --> 01:13:16.530
quickly to a problem or to a
way of solving this problem

01:13:16.530 --> 01:13:22.560
is, maybe no surprise, for
us to have a goal, for us

01:13:22.560 --> 01:13:25.260
to be able to have something
we're looking at together, we

01:13:25.260 --> 01:13:27.480
want to achieve and we
can work together on.

01:13:27.480 --> 01:13:32.020
And I think that that in
some sense is the key,

01:13:32.020 --> 01:13:39.780
so that as we convene to solve
a problem like this, that we

01:13:39.780 --> 01:13:43.050
each feel like in whatever
ways we're working,

01:13:43.050 --> 01:13:45.945
we're able to work together
to achieve that goal.

01:13:48.740 --> 01:13:51.650
[COUGH]

01:13:51.650 --> 01:13:53.277
Sorry.

01:13:53.277 --> 01:13:53.985
I'm really sorry.

01:13:58.330 --> 01:13:58.830
Sorry.

01:13:58.830 --> 01:13:59.310
Bad timing.

01:13:59.310 --> 01:13:59.730
OK.

01:13:59.730 --> 01:14:00.230
Yeah.

01:14:00.230 --> 01:14:02.778
[LAUGHS]

01:14:03.123 --> 01:14:05.040
Did you want to moment
to finish your thought?

01:14:05.040 --> 01:14:05.700
I'm sorry.

01:14:05.700 --> 01:14:07.150
No, I think I was there.

01:14:07.150 --> 01:14:07.650
[COUGHS]

01:14:07.650 --> 01:14:09.060
[LAUGHTER]

01:14:09.060 --> 01:14:10.230
Sorry.

01:14:10.230 --> 01:14:11.860
And it was a dramatic response.

01:14:11.860 --> 01:14:12.360
No, no.

01:14:12.360 --> 01:14:13.100
[LAUGHS]

01:14:13.100 --> 01:14:13.680
It happens.

01:14:13.680 --> 01:14:14.180
Yeah.

01:14:14.180 --> 01:14:16.970
I could feel it, so.

01:14:16.970 --> 01:14:18.760
So we don't have a
whole lot of time left,

01:14:18.760 --> 01:14:21.060
but I do want to have an
opportunity for people

01:14:21.060 --> 01:14:23.040
to ask questions.

01:14:23.040 --> 01:14:23.700
I'm OK.

01:14:23.700 --> 01:14:27.840
So if people would like
to raise your hands--

01:14:27.840 --> 01:14:31.800
we actually have runners with
microphones who can come to you

01:14:31.800 --> 01:14:32.970
and take your questions.

01:14:32.970 --> 01:14:36.288
[COUGHING]

01:14:37.740 --> 01:14:40.140
Oh, and in case some online
attendees, thank you,

01:14:40.140 --> 01:14:42.390
are unable to access
the live question field,

01:14:42.390 --> 01:14:44.260
please refresh your browser.

01:14:44.260 --> 01:14:45.420
Thank you, Adelaide.

01:14:45.420 --> 01:14:46.020
Sorry.

01:14:46.020 --> 01:14:49.070
I did not know that.

01:14:49.070 --> 01:14:50.030
Hi.

01:14:50.030 --> 01:14:52.640
Thank you for the great talks.

01:14:52.640 --> 01:14:54.478
I was wondering on the--

01:14:54.478 --> 01:14:56.270
there's been some
presentations, especially

01:14:56.270 --> 01:14:59.060
from Dr. Ehrlich
and Dr. Bratton,

01:14:59.060 --> 01:15:02.600
about these sort of planetary
data, planetary simulations.

01:15:02.600 --> 01:15:05.210
And my question is, I'm
a climate scientist.

01:15:05.210 --> 01:15:06.560
I do simulations.

01:15:06.560 --> 01:15:08.550
It doesn't seem
like they do much.

01:15:08.550 --> 01:15:11.390
We make simulations of the
world's going to do this,

01:15:11.390 --> 01:15:13.970
and connecting that to
impact is very hard.

01:15:13.970 --> 01:15:16.640
How do we go from these big
models, big simulations,

01:15:16.640 --> 01:15:21.143
big data, towards the sort
of action that is necessary?

01:15:21.143 --> 01:15:23.060
How do you make that
connection from planetary

01:15:23.060 --> 01:15:27.250
thinking to doing things?

01:15:27.250 --> 01:15:28.000
Should I go first?

01:15:28.000 --> 01:15:28.500
Sure.

01:15:28.500 --> 01:15:29.930
OK.

01:15:29.930 --> 01:15:34.410
That's a tough
question, isn't it?

01:15:34.410 --> 01:15:38.360
I think it-- the way which we
theorize or think about it is

01:15:38.360 --> 01:15:39.560
we can--

01:15:39.560 --> 01:15:42.110
that relationship between
the predictive simulation

01:15:42.110 --> 01:15:45.125
and the way it might
influence the present,

01:15:45.125 --> 01:15:47.000
like a prediction of
the future in a way that

01:15:47.000 --> 01:15:47.900
might influence the present.

01:15:47.900 --> 01:15:49.317
There's certain
ways in which this

01:15:49.317 --> 01:15:53.540
might be directly recursive
or merely reflexive.

01:15:53.540 --> 01:15:56.240
So a reflexive simulation, we
would say, is one in which,

01:15:56.240 --> 01:15:58.640
well, I see the
implications of that.

01:15:58.640 --> 01:15:59.700
I'm not going to.

01:15:59.700 --> 01:16:00.950
I'm not going to do this.

01:16:00.950 --> 01:16:03.920
And it's a kind of
negotiated kind of thing.

01:16:03.920 --> 01:16:06.920
A recursive simulation
is one in which--

01:16:06.920 --> 01:16:09.650
maybe a bit more like an
actuarial table in insurance,

01:16:09.650 --> 01:16:12.350
where there's a predictive model
of the way in which the future

01:16:12.350 --> 01:16:17.380
is going to work, and
because of the transformation

01:16:17.380 --> 01:16:21.080
in that predictive model, this
directly reprices, let's say,

01:16:21.080 --> 01:16:23.510
or directly acts back
upon the present.

01:16:23.510 --> 01:16:28.130
Financial simulations do this
all the time, the McKinsey book

01:16:28.130 --> 01:16:32.060
about-- the market is
an engine not a camera,

01:16:32.060 --> 01:16:33.560
where the prediction
of the future

01:16:33.560 --> 01:16:35.510
is actually producing
the present in a kind

01:16:35.510 --> 01:16:36.900
of-- in a certain kind of way.

01:16:36.900 --> 01:16:39.802
So in an abstract level,
we need to think of both.

01:16:39.802 --> 01:16:41.510
We need to think of
ways in which there's

01:16:41.510 --> 01:16:46.430
a reflexivity about,
well, here's 2050,

01:16:46.430 --> 01:16:48.290
and here's the interesting
thing with this.

01:16:48.290 --> 01:16:51.228
If we were having this
discussion 25 years ago,

01:16:51.228 --> 01:16:53.270
we might be talking about
the future as something

01:16:53.270 --> 01:16:55.370
to be achieved.

01:16:55.370 --> 01:16:58.160
If we do we do all this,
we'll achieve the future.

01:16:58.160 --> 01:17:01.170
Now we talk about the future
as something to be prevented.

01:17:01.170 --> 01:17:03.740
The future must be prevented.

01:17:03.740 --> 01:17:06.073
That's a different kind--
that involves a different kind

01:17:06.073 --> 01:17:06.907
of reaction to this.

01:17:06.907 --> 01:17:08.390
So as I said, on
a reflexive level,

01:17:08.390 --> 01:17:10.940
it has to do with the building
of a planetary politics.

01:17:10.940 --> 01:17:13.670
Ecosystems are planetary
by their nature.

01:17:13.670 --> 01:17:16.010
And arguably, the
future of politics

01:17:16.010 --> 01:17:17.743
is the future of
climate governance.

01:17:17.743 --> 01:17:19.410
It's climate governance,
the same thing.

01:17:19.410 --> 01:17:21.440
And the other is--

01:17:21.440 --> 01:17:25.490
well, the other is a bit
dicier, but interesting.

01:17:25.490 --> 01:17:28.440
Like, how is it that climate
simulations and simulations

01:17:28.440 --> 01:17:31.200
and models of planetary
systems might directly and even

01:17:31.200 --> 01:17:34.290
automatically
cybernetically affect

01:17:34.290 --> 01:17:37.800
the things that they're modeling
in a kind of direct incursion?

01:17:37.800 --> 01:17:39.780
What are the
infrastructures for that?

01:17:39.780 --> 01:17:42.640
Carbon pricing is a certain kind
of way of thinking about that.

01:17:42.640 --> 01:17:44.460
In other words,
some aspects of it

01:17:44.460 --> 01:17:46.020
have to do with implications.

01:17:46.020 --> 01:17:48.300
Some of it has to do with
direct instrumentality.

01:17:51.210 --> 01:17:54.960
Well, I think you're
asking the question, right?

01:17:54.960 --> 01:17:57.060
But for all of this
work we're doing

01:17:57.060 --> 01:18:01.500
to try to understand our world
better and provide information

01:18:01.500 --> 01:18:06.600
and data to guide, what we need
to do to care for our planet--

01:18:06.600 --> 01:18:09.120
driving that
information to action

01:18:09.120 --> 01:18:12.820
is the key thing
we need to do next.

01:18:12.820 --> 01:18:19.290
And I do think that as we
begin to understand and not

01:18:19.290 --> 01:18:23.490
just model what's happening,
but truly know what's happening,

01:18:23.490 --> 01:18:28.980
truly understand life as it's
organized, genes and species

01:18:28.980 --> 01:18:32.610
and ecosystems, and really
understand how those things fit

01:18:32.610 --> 01:18:35.610
together to create
this web of life

01:18:35.610 --> 01:18:38.760
that we're part of, that we
will have the opportunity

01:18:38.760 --> 01:18:43.380
to make better decisions
to support the future

01:18:43.380 --> 01:18:45.130
we want to see.

01:18:45.130 --> 01:18:49.200
And so ways that we're
currently driving

01:18:49.200 --> 01:18:51.220
that kind of
information to action

01:18:51.220 --> 01:18:53.770
is, well, starting early, right?

01:18:53.770 --> 01:18:59.452
Engaging students at an early
age, when they have the--

01:18:59.452 --> 01:19:03.460
when they're open to having
those transformative moments,

01:19:03.460 --> 01:19:06.010
where they realize that this
is important to themselves

01:19:06.010 --> 01:19:10.960
and their lives, working with
communities in the places where

01:19:10.960 --> 01:19:14.680
they live, who have their own
unique socioeconomic needs

01:19:14.680 --> 01:19:18.520
or priorities and helping
them to support their lives

01:19:18.520 --> 01:19:21.670
in those places and using
those as models for others

01:19:21.670 --> 01:19:25.220
to give us courage, right, about
how we can manage these things.

01:19:25.220 --> 01:19:27.670
And I get that it's
hard, but the--

01:19:27.670 --> 01:19:33.040
but as we continue to
model that, as we continue

01:19:33.040 --> 01:19:37.840
to research and understand
more about this species

01:19:37.840 --> 01:19:40.545
of our planet and how they
work together to support us,

01:19:40.545 --> 01:19:41.920
we have to remember,
they evolved

01:19:41.920 --> 01:19:49.000
over 3.5 billion years in
this exquisite resilience that

01:19:49.000 --> 01:19:52.570
supports our lives now, and to
the extent we don't understand

01:19:52.570 --> 01:19:55.630
every aspect of it, we have
to, with great humility,

01:19:55.630 --> 01:19:59.860
continue to try to learn more,
and with that information,

01:19:59.860 --> 01:20:02.860
hopefully, first of
all, make sure that we

01:20:02.860 --> 01:20:05.140
do no harm, and second
of all, that we can

01:20:05.140 --> 01:20:09.000
continue to learn and thrive.

01:20:09.000 --> 01:20:10.410
That's wonderful.

01:20:10.410 --> 01:20:11.720
I appreciate that.

01:20:11.720 --> 01:20:13.220
Unless you have
something, I'm going

01:20:13.220 --> 01:20:15.590
to see if there's
other questions?

01:20:15.590 --> 01:20:16.100
Yes.

01:20:16.100 --> 01:20:16.600
Yeah.

01:20:16.600 --> 01:20:20.060
I want to entertain the
idea that at its simplest

01:20:20.060 --> 01:20:23.180
form, carbon, at least the
threshold of carbon that we are

01:20:23.180 --> 01:20:28.250
talking about, is equal to
the levels of which capital is

01:20:28.250 --> 01:20:30.270
accumulated around the country.

01:20:30.270 --> 01:20:34.220
So therefore, if I'm a frequent
flyer of American Airlines

01:20:34.220 --> 01:20:35.960
and I'm achieving
gold status, I'm

01:20:35.960 --> 01:20:41.690
actually contributing to that
threshold, and that same echoes

01:20:41.690 --> 01:20:45.717
to the salaries of these
people in the rooms as well.

01:20:45.717 --> 01:20:47.300
I want to think
through this framework

01:20:47.300 --> 01:20:51.320
to think about how income
bias in this context

01:20:51.320 --> 01:20:55.280
actually prevents us to
attain some of the more

01:20:55.280 --> 01:21:00.080
challenging ideas that I think
are unthinkable at the moment

01:21:00.080 --> 01:21:02.930
but are very needed
to be also addressed.

01:21:02.930 --> 01:21:04.415
What do you think
about this idea?

01:21:08.240 --> 01:21:10.440
So I can take a
stab at this one.

01:21:10.440 --> 01:21:13.880
So a lot of my work-- my first
book is called The Cultures

01:21:13.880 --> 01:21:17.000
of Markets, and
it's all about the--

01:21:17.000 --> 01:21:21.410
around 2006 to 2013, I was
studying the development

01:21:21.410 --> 01:21:24.680
of the missions markets in
the United States and Europe,

01:21:24.680 --> 01:21:27.660
and then as they shifted to
other parts of the world.

01:21:27.660 --> 01:21:30.138
And one of the pieces of
this book what I thought

01:21:30.138 --> 01:21:30.680
was kind of--

01:21:30.680 --> 01:21:34.670
I traced the economic theory
of pricing and pricing

01:21:34.670 --> 01:21:37.250
externalities and where that
came, from Coase's theory

01:21:37.250 --> 01:21:39.230
through the different
inspirations.

01:21:39.230 --> 01:21:43.070
And as I did that, I started to
trace economic theory back more

01:21:43.070 --> 01:21:45.500
generally, both
through the heterodox

01:21:45.500 --> 01:21:47.270
and orthodox theories.

01:21:47.270 --> 01:21:49.940
And this led to a realization
that the primary way

01:21:49.940 --> 01:21:53.990
in which we divide value into
conceptions of use and exchange

01:21:53.990 --> 01:21:55.490
are fundamentally spatial.

01:21:55.490 --> 01:21:58.680
It goes all the way back to
Aristotle in The Politics,

01:21:58.680 --> 01:22:00.950
and there was a neglect
of time altogether

01:22:00.950 --> 01:22:03.060
to the temporality of value.

01:22:03.060 --> 01:22:04.910
And so if you really
want to understand

01:22:04.910 --> 01:22:07.650
what we're trying to do
with externalities pricing,

01:22:07.650 --> 01:22:11.580
is we're trying to reintegrate
temporality into economics.

01:22:11.580 --> 01:22:14.470
And so to this question
of what is climate change,

01:22:14.470 --> 01:22:16.500
is it a challenge of pricing?

01:22:16.500 --> 01:22:18.400
No, it's much deeper than that.

01:22:18.400 --> 01:22:21.270
It's a much deeper, spatial,
temporal phenomenon,

01:22:21.270 --> 01:22:25.050
where the rate at which
we're releasing bound carbon

01:22:25.050 --> 01:22:28.860
from the terrestrial
or oceanic reservoirs

01:22:28.860 --> 01:22:32.298
is much greater than the
rate of natural cycling.

01:22:32.298 --> 01:22:33.840
And so if we want
to solve this, it's

01:22:33.840 --> 01:22:36.000
not just about pricing carbon.

01:22:36.000 --> 01:22:38.760
It's fundamentally about
planetary boundaries

01:22:38.760 --> 01:22:40.920
and how we bring
the activities of

01:22:40.920 --> 01:22:43.950
human economic,
sociopolitical systems

01:22:43.950 --> 01:22:47.070
back into entrainment,
temporal entrainment,

01:22:47.070 --> 01:22:48.450
with natural systems.

01:22:48.450 --> 01:22:51.750
And to do that, we have to
fundamentally reconfigure

01:22:51.750 --> 01:22:54.540
our economics so
that we have some way

01:22:54.540 --> 01:22:58.260
to generate both a knowledge of
the use value, what that means

01:22:58.260 --> 01:23:00.150
and externalities,
aren't actually

01:23:00.150 --> 01:23:01.680
an extension of exchange value.

01:23:01.680 --> 01:23:03.850
They're extension of use value.

01:23:03.850 --> 01:23:05.760
So to stabilize
externalities, we

01:23:05.760 --> 01:23:08.340
need different theories
of use, but we also

01:23:08.340 --> 01:23:12.870
need to entrain temporality into
exchange so that we understand

01:23:12.870 --> 01:23:16.500
the physical, spatial, temporal
connotation of what it means

01:23:16.500 --> 01:23:19.200
to generate and sink
a resource, and that's

01:23:19.200 --> 01:23:22.320
priced within markets,
not just this idea

01:23:22.320 --> 01:23:24.780
that resources
across all spatial

01:23:24.780 --> 01:23:27.390
and temporal connotations
can be made commensurate

01:23:27.390 --> 01:23:28.410
through the price.

01:23:28.410 --> 01:23:29.340
Because they can't.

01:23:29.340 --> 01:23:31.470
I mean, with red,
for example, you

01:23:31.470 --> 01:23:34.590
take a forest, an
old growth forest,

01:23:34.590 --> 01:23:37.980
that's taken literally thousands
of years to regenerate itself

01:23:37.980 --> 01:23:40.320
or to generate itself,
and you price it

01:23:40.320 --> 01:23:42.220
as though it exists
only in this moment.

01:23:42.220 --> 01:23:44.970
It's equivalent
to something else.

01:23:44.970 --> 01:23:45.720
It's not--

01:23:45.720 --> 01:23:48.270
So I think-- I think there's
a very important point.

01:23:48.270 --> 01:23:52.680
I think the temporality of
price, the temporally priced,

01:23:52.680 --> 01:23:54.753
the temporality of
the indexing of value

01:23:54.753 --> 01:23:55.920
what price is meant to mean.

01:23:55.920 --> 01:23:57.960
So negative externalities
as we think about them

01:23:57.960 --> 01:24:00.530
are oftentimes things that will
happen after the transaction

01:24:00.530 --> 01:24:01.030
moment.

01:24:01.030 --> 01:24:03.730
They're in the future for
the transaction moment.

01:24:03.730 --> 01:24:06.870
So going back to the predictive
simulation kind of dynamic,

01:24:06.870 --> 01:24:07.370
how is it--

01:24:07.370 --> 01:24:08.787
I mean, to the
point of how do you

01:24:08.787 --> 01:24:11.640
fold the externality or the cost
of the externality back in has

01:24:11.640 --> 01:24:14.790
to do to a certain extent of
some kind of model of what's

01:24:14.790 --> 01:24:17.500
likely to happen after
this transaction is done,

01:24:17.500 --> 01:24:20.190
which is actually-- was a
project that we worked on,

01:24:20.190 --> 01:24:22.830
probably not successfully.

01:24:22.830 --> 01:24:25.830
But to Matt's point more
specifically, I think--

01:24:25.830 --> 01:24:30.030
I mean, this correlation between
capital and carbon is clear.

01:24:30.030 --> 01:24:32.898
I mean, because
both of them have

01:24:32.898 --> 01:24:34.440
a kind of energy
equivalence to them,

01:24:34.440 --> 01:24:36.520
of capital to energy
and energy to carbon.

01:24:36.520 --> 01:24:38.220
And so part of the
answer is like, well,

01:24:38.220 --> 01:24:41.430
how-- one, how do you decouple
the value from the energy

01:24:41.430 --> 01:24:44.790
in such a way that you actually
are able to produce or protect

01:24:44.790 --> 01:24:48.010
and preserve value without the
energy expenditure on the one

01:24:48.010 --> 01:24:48.510
hand?

01:24:48.510 --> 01:24:51.240
But in terms of the bias
issue here as well--

01:24:51.240 --> 01:24:52.710
I think it's well stated that--

01:24:52.710 --> 01:24:56.190
I mean, in high energy
societies, like ours,

01:24:56.190 --> 01:24:59.790
it's easy to say, well,
if we just use less energy

01:24:59.790 --> 01:25:03.060
and we-- there's a kind
of voluntary asceticism

01:25:03.060 --> 01:25:04.740
that this will get us there.

01:25:04.740 --> 01:25:07.350
In low energy societies,
which is most of the world,

01:25:07.350 --> 01:25:09.300
that's not viable.

01:25:09.300 --> 01:25:11.490
A part of the sociotechnical
transformation

01:25:11.490 --> 01:25:15.420
here has to be a
continuance of development

01:25:15.420 --> 01:25:19.715
as decoupled as possible
in most of the world,

01:25:19.715 --> 01:25:21.090
particularly in
the Global South,

01:25:21.090 --> 01:25:22.800
but not exclusively
in the Global South.

01:25:22.800 --> 01:25:27.570
And so how to do so in the
sort of way is a tremendous

01:25:27.570 --> 01:25:30.090
challenge because obviously,
the infrastructures we've built

01:25:30.090 --> 01:25:32.270
in the past can't-- it
can't simply be exported

01:25:32.270 --> 01:25:34.020
and continued for all
these exact reasons.

01:25:37.010 --> 01:25:39.380
I think we have a
question from Zoom world.

01:25:39.380 --> 01:25:42.860
A question from the webcast,
and this is for Dr. Ehrlich.

01:25:42.860 --> 01:25:45.470
Is conservation
a hopeless effort

01:25:45.470 --> 01:25:47.900
if demand for products
from destructive industries

01:25:47.900 --> 01:25:51.020
like animal agriculture
isn't reduced drastically?

01:25:51.020 --> 01:25:55.795
Does conserving one area simply
shift destruction to another?

01:25:55.795 --> 01:25:56.295
No.

01:25:56.295 --> 01:25:59.490
[LAUGHS] There are, like,
three questions in there,

01:25:59.490 --> 01:26:01.200
and I was like, no, no, no.

01:26:01.200 --> 01:26:04.872
[LAUGHTER]

01:26:05.790 --> 01:26:08.970
I'm an optimist,
obviously, and I

01:26:08.970 --> 01:26:12.780
do think where we
are earnestly working

01:26:12.780 --> 01:26:15.930
to try to conserve
more areas, it's

01:26:15.930 --> 01:26:18.750
not just to the exclusion
of everything else

01:26:18.750 --> 01:26:20.700
we need to do to support life.

01:26:20.700 --> 01:26:26.250
We need to look at all of
those layers of information,

01:26:26.250 --> 01:26:32.410
population, agriculture,
alternative energy.

01:26:32.410 --> 01:26:36.150
That's another way that
we'll be in the future using

01:26:36.150 --> 01:26:39.450
more and more land for the
minerals and other things

01:26:39.450 --> 01:26:44.250
associated with
those technologies.

01:26:44.250 --> 01:26:49.770
So it's not that one's more
important than the other,

01:26:49.770 --> 01:26:50.730
I don't think.

01:26:50.730 --> 01:26:55.110
It's that we need to actually
do the hard work of pulling

01:26:55.110 --> 01:26:58.180
together all of that
information and understanding

01:26:58.180 --> 01:27:00.640
what's where and what
our priorities are

01:27:00.640 --> 01:27:05.990
and how we can best support
all of life in these places.

01:27:05.990 --> 01:27:09.340
But I appreciate the
question because there

01:27:09.340 --> 01:27:13.810
is no real black-and-white
answer except to the extent

01:27:13.810 --> 01:27:17.500
that we acknowledge that it's
hard, but by understanding what

01:27:17.500 --> 01:27:22.810
all of the-- understanding more
deeply what's needed to support

01:27:22.810 --> 01:27:25.930
and sustain our
livelihoods in these

01:27:25.930 --> 01:27:30.390
places that we can come up
with ways of supporting them.

01:27:33.660 --> 01:27:37.753
So I know we have more
questions, but I actually--

01:27:37.753 --> 01:27:39.920
for the sake of time, we're
going to wrap things up.

01:27:39.920 --> 01:27:42.620
And before I bring John
back up to close things off,

01:27:42.620 --> 01:27:45.305
I do want to give our
panelists a round of applause.

01:27:45.305 --> 01:27:48.680
[APPLAUSE]

01:27:52.640 --> 01:27:54.170
John, if you want to--

01:27:54.170 --> 01:27:57.345
well, I'm excited to say we
have Clover Food Lab outside.

01:27:57.345 --> 01:27:57.845
Yeah.

01:27:57.845 --> 01:27:59.110
[LAUGHTER]

01:27:59.110 --> 01:28:01.070
[APPLAUSE]

01:28:01.070 --> 01:28:02.780
Please join me, and--

01:28:02.780 --> 01:28:06.530
at the reception outside,
where we have Clover Food.

01:28:06.530 --> 01:28:09.410
And for those of you
in the online audience,

01:28:09.410 --> 01:28:13.280
please get back to Cambridge
soon and enjoy Clover.

01:28:13.280 --> 01:28:16.880
And I just want to say overall,
it was an inspiring session.

01:28:16.880 --> 01:28:20.780
And we know one
thing is certain,

01:28:20.780 --> 01:28:23.900
is that we need thoughtful
design to envision

01:28:23.900 --> 01:28:26.480
the world that we all want
to see that works for people

01:28:26.480 --> 01:28:30.260
and works for all of the other
inhabitants of this planet

01:28:30.260 --> 01:28:31.110
as well.

01:28:31.110 --> 01:28:34.170
So with that, please
join me in thanking

01:28:34.170 --> 01:28:36.170
all of our participants,
also for the workshops.

01:28:36.170 --> 01:28:36.950
[APPLAUSE]

01:28:36.950 --> 01:28:38.240
And join us outside.

01:28:38.240 --> 01:28:40.120
Thank you all.
