Social Scientist, consultant and facilitator, Dr Elissa Farrow is the founder of About Your Transition a business specialising in portfolio, program, project and change management consulting and facilitation. Her doctoral research explored organisational adaptation scenarios and implications as a result of Artificial Intelligence
Interviewed by: Peter Hayward
More about Elissa
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/efarrow
References
1.Farrow, E. (2019) To Augment Human Capacity – Artificial Intelligence Evolution Through Causal Layered Analysis. Futures Journal. (APF 3rd Prize Winner)
2.Farrow, E. (2020) Organisational Artificial Intelligence Future Scenarios – Futurists Insights And Implications For The Organisational Adaptation Approach, Leader And Team. Journal Of Futures Studies (24/3).
3.Futures Conference Immersion – Three Conferences In Three Weeks - Human Futures (2020) And Journal Of Futures Studies Blog (2019)
4.Farrow, E. (2020) Mindset Matters: How Mindset Affects The Ability Of Staff To Anticipate And Adapt To Artificial Intelligence (AI) Future Scenarios In Organisational Settings. AI And Society: Journal Of AI And Society.
5. Farrow, E. (2021) Extending The Participant’s Voice To Guide Artificial Intelligence Installation Using Futures Methodology And Layered User Story Analysis. World Futures Review.
6.Farrow, E,. (2021) Organisational Adaptation For Artificial Intelligence Futures: Key Principles For Leaders From The Futurists Perspective. In Mengel, T (Ed) Leadership Of The Future, Cambridge Scholars Publishing: Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle Upon Tyne, United Kingdom.
Transcript
Peter Hayward
Hello and welcome to Futurepod I'm Peter Hayward. Futurepod gathers voices from the international field of futures and foresight. Through a series of interviews the founders of the field and the emerging leaders share their stories, tools and experiences. Please visit Futurepod.org for further information about this podcast series. Today, our guest is "almost" Dr. Elissa Farrow. Social scientist, consultant and facilitator Elissa Farrow is the founder of About Your Transition, which is a company specializing in strategy creation and delivery using participatory futures and foresight tools. She is a change strategist and regularly partners with organisations to generate positive results for the staff, executives and community in which those organisations serve. Elissa's doctoral research explored organisational adaptation scenarios and implications as a result of artificial intelligence, and she framed it through anticipatory action learning. Elissa has previously held global leadership positions with the Change Management Institute, as well the chair of DV Connect, a service working to prevent domestic and family violence in Queensland, Australia. And she recently commenced being a volunteer surf lifesaver on Minjerribah, North Stradbroke Island. Welcome to Futurepod Elissa.
Elissa Farrow
Thank you. Thank you for having me Peter. I would like to acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the land in which we are both speaking. Today I am talking from the land of the Turrbal and Jagera/Yuggera Peoples and pay my respects to Elders past, present and emerging. I am looking forward to our discussion.
Peter Hayward
So question one, the Elissa Farrow story, how did you become a member of the futures and foresight community?
Elissa Farrow
Well, it's a bit of an interesting story that is connected to the concept of giving back to myself. So that might sound a little bit strange. I first came across futures and foresight work through my work in the Queensland State Government, where I worked for quite a number of years before I left to become a consultant and run my own business. While I was working for the Queensland State Government I was invited to be part of a leadership program that Professor Sohail Inayatullah presented. That was my very first taste of futures, probably about 15 years ago. A seed was planted. At that time, a very dear friend of mine, the now Associate Professor Jeannie Hoffman was doing a doctorate and Sohail was one of her supervisors. Jeanne knew I was thinking of doing a doctorate at some point in time. In 2017, she said, hey how's that thinking about the doctorate going? I said, it's becoming clear in my mind. I had, at that time, been working on a program of change with an organisation and I just been bullied in the workplace. I really was not feeling too good about that and I realized through that incident where this person wasn't dealing with their change process very well and taking it out on others, that I thought - if people were still struggling with change, even if it was a simpler form of change, what about changes that challenge the human in the context of work? If artificial intelligence was becoming more and more prevalent within organisations, what would be the adaptation implications? So Jeanne said Sohail is running a workshop with Dr Colin Russo down on the Gold Coast. Why don't you go to this three day futures and foresight immersion? Then you'll know whether you like futures, and whether or not you might want to think about it as your research methodology. So I went along. It cemented the process for me inspired by a bunch of people all exploring and caring about the future implications of their work or community or the planet itself. For me really that period of time (given the crappy work time), I felt like diving into doctoral research was giving myself time for creativity, exploration and reinvigoration - yay!! The whole last four years of the "almost Dr Farrow" has been an incredible opportunity of meeting futurists and foresight specialists from all parts of the planet with the careful guidance of supervisors including my primary supervisor Dr Marcus Bussey from the University of the Sunshine Coast, who has been a key shape shifter in my experience. So with luck in early 2022 I am going to be graduating. So I am really excited about that.
Peter Hayward
It sounds like in your experience would I would describe as the 'chrysalis moment'. Many people, as I saw them in the classroom, both myself also when I was a student, this notion that to some extent, we reinvent ourselves as a radical departure from the future that might have been expected, maybe even what we expected for ourselves. And yet, that process of liberation is a hugely powerful part of, what I think, draws people into the field?
Elissa Farrow
Yes. That so totally that resonates with me. And the chrysalis and monarch butterfly has been the logo for my company About Your Transition for the last 10 years. So, for me, that's the whole concept around transition and change and growth is about the fact that sometimes we need to bunker in for a little bit like the caterpillar and chrysalis , and then before we can break free into a new reality. Be the butterfly.
Peter Hayward
Change is an interesting one, because we know that at a deep psychological level that people quite rightly, are uncomfortable about change, because change is dangerous. But at some level, one would imagine, as a society as people, we are getting better at managing change. But you're a professional in this space. Are we getting better at this? Or are we actually struggling more as things become harder?
Elissa Farrow
I think that there are examples that I see in my professional world that gives me hope that people are getting better at this. I see in in the people I teach and organisations that I work with, at least there is the consideration of people are central to any change or adaptation process. I know sadly there is still some organisations and governments that are not considering the impacts to both the human and non-human. But I see the raising of awareness and just in the last four years there has been a huge amount of societal shifts and changes that could if handled in a positive way be incredibly important for our continuing life on this planet as a global community. I have also seen small examples of community kindness and individual kindness, that actually has lead to whole groups of people to shift and change. But I still think that we've got a long way to go. But at least the conversations are being had now as opposed to previously, especially from an organisational change perspective. In the past many organisations didnt resource the change efforts and just expected people to sort of suck up the change like cogs in a machine. Now due to a range of drivers, many organisations are starting to consider the human and environmental costs of change or at least design a process that considers wasy to manage the more severe impacts. I found in my research that if leaders considered the longer term impacts of their decisions on the planet, people, process as well as profit, more value will be generated for the people in the communities which those organisations are serving.
Peter Hayward
Given you are a nascent futurist at this particular time, that as a discipline, as a field, we ourselves effectively understand change both as a process and as wider supporters?
Elissa Farrow
From a futurist perspective, I think from what I've experienced through different conferences and futures forums that there's a lot of people in the futures field come up with really cool ideas and plans for the future, but don't necessarily know how to actively make them happen. That was one of the elements for me that I knew I could be a bridge between foresight and action. I am an activist learner and get energised through change for the right reasons. As an extrovert I was drawn to participatory approaches to defining and delivering futures. What drew me to the concept of anticipatory action learning, which I used in my doctoral research was a high sence of curiosity and participation with others. To me in futures there's a point when the inspiration and futures scenarios need to turn to some form of action (unless they are there only to inspire). The balance of futurists that I've met or that I find myself pulled towards are the emerging group of people that really understand that lofty ideas are only ideas until we stop talking and philosophizing and start putting ideas into action. I think we're seeing people are ready as there is a degree of frustration with the current and people are desiring and inspiring action. Consider the work occuring in relation to our climate crisis, or the work occuring in areas of race relations and gender equality. To me the time for talking and not acting is over. It is the time for tangible evidence based collective action from the people on the ground as well as the leaders with the bigger levers?
Peter Hayward
Is it idea, as you know, I tend to provoke, but is it that we, that we, as a field would prefer to come up with the creative ideas, rather than roll up our sleeves and deal and get down in the weeds of the present?
Elissa Farrow
I think our futures family is a fascinating and at times polarizing mix of difference. I think the actual change pieces especially for the transformational agent can be scary. The change for an individual can be full of fear, doubt as well as excitement. This is why some people resist change, because it's often triggering a bit of a fear response, even if that fear is like looking like a bit of a Gumby, as you go through the process. A learning anxiety or survival anxiety that neuroscientists talk about. I think for the person who's actually enacting the change, there's also a degree of interpretation for some in organisational contexts, especially if the system and the culture of that organisational context or the society at large is based on the concept of, of success. Success means that you deliver what you intended. In areas of uncertainty, the future is more evolutionary. So we can't put a clear finger on the future in all circumstances. So that can be quite scary for for people who are actually leading the future, designing futures, as well. And I think leaders need to be given a degree of empathy for for the role that they play, often leaders lead is part to play and say, Oh, you must sponsor this change, but they don't actually, people don't often think that the leader is actually going through their own personal change process, which is they're going through the same fears and, and worries that that the person who were trying to change is going through, but the leader is expected to do it faster and often without as much support.
Peter Hayward
I think Nicholas Talibs phrase there is to talk about only listened to people who have skin in the game
Elissa Farrow
I listened to a podcast recently about exactly that - let's let's get get down from the lofty tower and into the people or the environment or the community, and get your hands dirty throughout the process. To me having done that in a range of organisational settings, doing that, will actually enrich your decision making processes and enrich your thinking.
Peter Hayward
Second question, the methods question the the concept of philosophy question where I asked the guest to explain a framework or approach that is central to their practice. What do you want to talk about?
Elissa Farrow
I would like to talk about the concept of organisational adaption. And the fact that it draws on a broad body of knowledge. I think that would probably be a nice beginning. Linked also to anticipatory action learning as well.
Research has suggested over a number of number of years, that without a good connection between the people, leaders and an appropriate choice of adaptation approach, we're not going see a sustainable change 'sticking'. Organisational adaptation has shifted from a top down approach to thankfully an acknowledgement that change needs to potentially be more incremental in nature. In earlier days, change was much more based on mechanistic models of organisation where people were units, or widgets almost within the broader machine and could be discarded or changed at the will of the 'master mechanic'. I like Peter Senge's work around systems thinking and metaphors of flux and transformation. Approach the organisational adaptation approach, as you would tending a garden (cycles, seasons, demise and growth). Organisations are social environments and are very complex, thus other forms of theories need to be overlaid from even early Darwinian concepts of complexity and adaptation - fear, adaption and survival, and thrival.
Peter Hayward
In my simplistic view, organisational change is when we are currently not doing something, rather doing something we want to stop doing, or we want to start doing or we're not doing enough. And yes, there's a notion you can approach change of starting something or stopping something, it's that it's actually about us making the behavioral change. Rather than recognizing that why we're behaving is actually structurally and culturally informed. Unless you start to change the cultural and the structural aspects, behavior can't change. It's actually the behavior we have in an organization as a product of what the organization is designed to do.
Elissa Farrow
Yes, exactly. You see that as part of performance and reward processes. I've worked in many different organisations that have very siloed performance and reward and incentive processes. Then they wonder why it's a siloed culture, where people almost become competitive or combative against other areas and don't work collaboratively. And, and then there's organisations now, who are starting to acknowledge this and emerging into shared leadership KPIs or goals, because, that means that my success is based on me helping you and you helping me. So it's a collaborative process. And then that culture starts to permeate down within the organization, as opposed to saying, well, we must hit these targets at all costs. So I do totally agree with what you're suggesting. Organisational adaption is for me linking to the fact that change starts with the individual, regardless of the role that they play within the organisation. But then there's some people unwilling to change, or unable to change. But if the structures or cultural elements including the way people are rewarded within organisational environments is oppositie to the intent of the change that you're trying to implement, well, then you're not actually going to get the change that you're hoping for. I consider the trade off between, the amount of benefit that someone will receive or perceive they will receive in consideration of the amount of change that the individual has to take on. If you've got a high expectation on the person changing an aspect of their behavior, or knowledge or skills, or an expectation on their change of attitudes, but without much of a perceived or real payback, it's very likely that you'll start to see forms of resistance start to emerge.
We need to build the right environment so that people can question futures, create futures, actually make mistakes and experiment. Failures in project design are not always failures overall. In some organisations experimentation is expected and it's seen as a beautiful, enriching knowledge process. So it's a knowledge based process, which is based on that whole concept of double or multi loop learning where we understand the process, and then we loop back again, and we relearn or we re-tune or we lift up our thinking,
Peter Hayward
Organisational adaptation, as you're describing it. How does that deal with the fact that power is never fairly shared out? In the sense that people with power and agency often feel empowered by change? And people without power, feel threatened by change? How do you actually have organisational adaptation? If fundamentally the power dynamic in an organisation is against it, so to speak?
Elissa Farrow
Yes, power certainly is a big variable in the process. How I hear you talk about power and agency, to me it is often in the mind of the beholder as well. From a perspective of adaptive capacity, my primary supervisor in my doctoral research Dr. Marcus Bussey writes about adaptive capacities as the measure of the human ability to respond to threatening stimuli, other people call this resilience. I think that regardless of the power position someone has within an organization that they still have the ability to influence their attitudes of what's happening, their mindset, and their approach. They can have a degree of self generated agency, even if they don't have the decision making power. Structurally power can be shared, in very large organizations it may be less so due to hierachy, as opposed to more boutique organisations where power can be shared due to less tight controls compared to larger organisations who are navigating a diverse range of legal and regulatory contexts. Whenever I work with people in transitional processes, I always build or remind people of their own resilience, and their own bag of power that they carry with them. I also remind people that in many circumstances people have the ability to choose and some people forget that concept.
Given our diverse communities, there are people who may be considered more vulnerable. That's where the concept of agency via advocacy can come in, or that additional backup for people who may not be able to either verbalize or fulfill their full agency. They may need a buddy to help them in that regard. I've seen that happen in Australian context, in unionised organisations, people who feel like they don't have a lot of power call on their power of their union to amplify their voice. As we know, in Australia, unions and other advocacy groups have stopped or shifted all sorts of things. So have individual people with our modern and social ways of influencing and communicating. This can be very powerful, the individual influencer who is not in a positional power, but certainly from a influential or societal powerful perspective the can bring results, either good or bad.
I try to remind people that regardless of the situation that they're in, they still have the ability to have a voice and agency and still have the ability with the right level of support, in some circumstances, 'the law of two feet' as they say in open space processes. We can head towards it, if it's good or head in a different direction if we need to move away. Part of my doctoral research, got people playing with the concept of mindsets and growth in fixed mindset using Professor Carol Dweck's work. The research got people thinking about an organisational scenario of the future where AI was going to be taking their jobs and their boss has said they will replace you because AI can do it better. So it was a personal reflection activity on a scenario. 142 people willingly played with me on this process in four different workshops. The mindset that they took had quite a dramatic effect on what their image of the future was as well as their sense of agency and power in the process. It was really incredible. This work on 'mindset matters' is published in an international journal.
Peter Hayward
And that's the power of anticipatory action learning that a person when they imagine a future that on the face of it sounds disempowering, they actually find power in that future.
Elissa Farrow
Yes, I love that sort of sense of flowing back and forth in futures. Let's dip into the future using our anticipatory and creative lenses. Once we are there let's now take that new knowledge back to the current and then use it to help define our strategies. Back to our original conversation that sometimes futurists are very good at saying, 'Oh here's the prediction for the future', but they don't assist people to bring bring to determine what am I going to do right.
Peter Hayward
So what are the futures around you that are emerging that you're paying particular attention to on Wi
Elissa Farrow
The emerging futures that I see at the moment relate firstly to the current state situation that we're we're grappling with, around the Covid-19 pandemic and the flow of implications of that. In the introduction, you mentioned in my bio that I do voluntary Surf Lifesaving on Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island). I have always done some form of volunteer work since I was 15 years old. Surf Life Saving is my latest effort where I had to pass a series of physical challenges to get my Bronze Medallion. Surf Life Saving is a voluntary effort from people who over the warm months in Australia work in teams to keep people attending our patrolled beaches safe. Being a volunteer organisation, a theme I am seeing more generally is that many volunteer organisations are finding it very challenging to find people to support their voluntary efforts. The COVID pandemic hasn't helped many volunteer organisations and nonprofits due to the broader economic situation as well as people's willingness to get out there in the community with the community. From an emerging futures perspective, I think the volunteer organisations will need to start to be augmented more by technologies. For example, in the surf lifesaving field, they're starting to use a lot more drone technology to start to augment or expand the geographic reach of patrol areas and highlight areas for response. Volunteer based organisations partnering with technology provides, can expand delivery and service provision. I think we will definitely see more of that starting to emerge even with driverless delivery vehicles or robots in libraries or gardens, as tour guides as age care visitors.
I think COVID has brought to people's attention greater dimensions of safety of people in the workplace. Some more corporate business models have kept working from home policies, saying for some staff they never have to return to the office full time. I have a good friend who's organisational model is now fully work from home forever. So they moved from the city to the beach as part of their process.
I think there is a ripe opportunity for artificial intelligence as the non human worker of the future, to start to come in more to certain organizational context as well. One scenario in my research I was investigating was a model of a fully machine based organisation. And I know at the moment, the legal setup doesn't enable that to happen, because always need to be a human somewhere who's the legal owner of a business or the Accountable executive, but over time, there'll be pods or parts of organizations that will just be purely AI or Robotic workforces, planning the work, fixing each other and delivering the work. This means we will need different models of human leadership that encompass the fact that at one point, a machine might actually be giving a human instruction.
Peter Hayward
Clearly COVID. And pandemic was a test of our social capital. Yeah, in terms of what keeps us safe? And where communities have large degrees of social capital, then you tend to get more social behaviors. And you tend to get people assisting one another. You say that in whether it's, you know, emergencies, we have bushfires and floods and everything else. And as you say that, that people, if you like, support our own safety, yes. What's been interesting in COVID, is, of course, that to some extent, there's been a kind of projection onto governments to make us safe. And it set up an interesting dynamic between individual behavior. And what socially want to see, now you're talking about augmenting safety through technology and artificial intelligence that that steps on a couple of interesting ones, one that I'd put to you is that generally speaking, we don't have a benevolent idea of artificial intelligence, we generally look at it as a fear driven exercise rather than something that could actually make us safer. And other cultures do it differently, possibly Japan has a has a more open sense that artificial intelligence could actually make them safer in the future, but is a said this, this notion of how much we allow ourselves to be might cipher through artificial intelligence, or in fact, fear that actually, that artificial intelligence actually makes the future more dangerous?
Elissa Farrow
I've seen both manifest as part of my anticipator reaction learning approaches, where, depending again, on the on this scenario that we were looking at, there were a number of implications. And some of them were positive. And some of them were were not positive. But I really saw the people that I worked with, as part of my research actually saved futures where fear wasn't the main driving force. I think I also saw over the last four years, a shift in some of the language that was utilised as well, in common media. Back in 2016, everyone was saying, Oh, my gosh, you know, AI is going to take our jobs. It's gonna be terrible. And let's get all our kids in STEM classes and defund or make more expensive humanities and art subjects at university, which is a really rubbish thing that the federal government in Australia did. And one of the metaphors that I created in the time that I was doing my doctoral research, was "AI as an integral part of paradise". Humans have relationships with more sentient AI more based concepts of mutual trust. There also has to be the right levels of safety built into AI algorithms. There are a number of examples where that safety has not been built into algorithms and there has been human costs of these mistakes.
To me in my reading there is certainly a stronger move now around AI needing to be more reflective of society, to be more designed more ethical and keep humans safe by taking the sort of the jobs that humans may not want to do. That was a metaphor that came out of some work I did with futurists at the Asia Pacific Futures Network( APFN), where the priority scenario emerged as, "AI does the jobs that human humans don't want to do". We have the opportunity to build a really positive future together. It does still need to be assured and risk managed. I know of course there will be examples of AI and robotic forms of technology a bit like the Terminator. But it will be unleashed by people who don't have those ethics and don't have that that sort of human safety lense and one more of greed and evil intent.
Peter Hayward
And I would imagine for another podcast, perhaps but we'll get to a point where are we at risk of turning artificial intelligence into our own slave state? And our own drone state? Do they have any rights in the process?
Elissa Farrow
That was revealed as part of my research, where some people believed AI/Robots needed to have some rights in the future, especially if AI does evolve to a form of sentience, theoretically, it means that we need to look after them too. One notion I explored in my research relate to the notion of empathy. What if my AI colleague is decommissioned? Will I feel sad? Especially if my AI colleague has been instrumental and central to my own success. It's fascinating stuff. I look forward to exploring that further.
Peter Hayward
How do you describe what you do to people who don't necessarily understand what?
Elissa Farrow
I describe what I do differently depending on who they are. So if I was to explain what I do to someone in a corporate setting, I say that I'm support organisations to explore, develop, and co-creating possible futures through strategy design and implementation structures. I use an approach nested in anticipatory futures approach. I work with organistaions and individuals to focus on tangible actions that we can do today that will bring a greater value to the future. Value for either the organisation or the community that those organisations serve. If I was explaining what I do to my mum I would do it differently.
Peter Hayward
Challenge always a challenge
Elissa Farrow
My mum is almost 80 year old and a retired nurse, she doesnt like technology too much and doesn't want or have a smart phone or email address. I explained to her that my work with organisations aims to help them think about what's going to be the best way for them to help people in the future. And part of that process is to change elements of the business, and to involve people as part of what they would like to see in the future. So design futures together. She'll look at me and say, Oh, that's lovely. I used to pre COVID travel around to all sorts of different parts of Asia Pacific teaching people how to do that as well - I do that work no virtually. So I also enjoy leaving the legacy of teaching 'how to' actually implement positive futures.
Peter Hayward
It must be a challenge to explain future jobs to people who, if you like, their understanding of the world is based on their is based on the past. They want to make a connection between their lives and yours. The future, the more that it changes, the more we stretch the bonds back to our parents and our roots. While they're still here that we are still connected.
Elissa Farrow
Hmm, that's one of the things that I am going to do moving forward, have more time connected to community and connected to the earth. And, and I think, partly me doing my voluntary surf life saving at the beautiful Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island, Point Lookout Surf Life Saving Club) is to be connected more to community and the land on which we are so priveledged to live and work upon. I think sometimes, especially doing work, like I've been doing the last number of years with heavy lifting of consultancy, facilitation as well as doing my doctoral research. I have, spent too much time up in my head, as opposed to time in my body and time with my feet and energy connected to the land.
Peter Hayward
Yeah, you talked about the colleague who was told you never need to return into the office again. And that's both wonderful that they don't, but it's also the loss of what is not going to happen, because they don't.
Elissa Farrow
Exactly. And, you know Peter that concept of loss arose in my research, when we were talking about scenarios of the future. And one of those scenarios was, an organisation where, we don't need humans in the future (possible outlier). And some people said, Ah, gosh, what about our bake offs and our coffee catch ups, and actually people tuned into the the loss of those social connections, the less formal things that happen at work that actually for some people, are more meaningful in terms of what motivates them. It's not necessarily the conditions and pay and all of that, that's certainly one side. But it's the sense of connection and the sense of purpose built with other people and, and seeing people through a tiny little stamp size picture of someone in virtual corporate land doesnt bring that same feel.
So virtual work for some is still connection, but it's not connection in the same way where you can feel the heat of the afternoon, have the bodies warming up the room and the interaction over lunch, as we all remember from our face to face work processes. It does of course vary based on the role or function people take in the world of work. We still need our on critical on ground people who do the vital 'front line' work. Who dont have the opportunity to sit in their office or home and do their work, they have to be close to people in this context AI or Robotic workers might protect and provide reassurance to those people's families that the person is not at risk in the front line. When people in my research stated they would miss that chance to just sit around and have cake for someone's birthday, it is a reflection of grief for what Nora Bateson would say as the "warm data" that occurs often in the unseen and the in-between.
Peter Hayward
So Elissa, you talked about artificial intelligence as part of paradise? Do you want to explain that a bit?
Elissa Farrow
Thank you. It was a scenario that emerged through my research that became quite a personal driver. For me, knowing that when I went into my doctoral research in the first place, I wanted to initially think, Oh, I'm looking for adaptation implications seemed a bit more sort of stuck in the system. During the process I freed up myself up (a personal change process not just a doctoral research journey) The scenario came from a Causal Layered Analysis application. Professor Sohail Inayatullah created this great process and futures technique that explores four different layers. The deepeset layer is the myth or metaphor. "AI is integral part of paradise" emerged for me where I felt that what I was hearing and exploring through my studies, was that people also a future where AI is an incredible enabler and become like a good friend, where together humans in AI have a joint goal of empowerment of the humanity.
That means when we're thinking about AI utilisation, what I would personally really like to see is a shift from AI investment, from an individualistic company, profit driven motive, to one that is more collective, ethical and humanitarian. And you see examples of this starting to permeate, AI connected to cleaning water, or food production, or other health enhancing solutions. And that's what I honestly think that those stories that are starting to emerge from very clever technologists combining and working and collaborating with other knowledge domains. So the neuroscientists, the social scientists, the health care professionals, the ecological scientists working with the technologists, all coming together to unveil the possibilities. For me, seeing the futures through the eyes of children is also inspiring and fascinating. There was a picture that I saw from science of tomorrow art competition. There was a eight year old girl, who drew this really cool colourful picture of a robotic octopus with lots of arms, with a person working the controls, together cleaning the ocean. And I love that picture. Because for me, it's hopeful. I think in these times that we have at the moment, with all the all the stuff that's happening at the moment it is easy to focus on the more negative aspects of what AI could do in the wrong hands or with the wrong algorithms within it's coding. There's an incredible amount of possibilities in the right hands. So that's that's what I'm really hopeful for in the future. And for me, that's the message I'd like to, to leave with is that there are really incredible possibilities and, and it will contribute to a beautiful, greater planet. We've also got to start the steps now for that 'paradise' as opposed to spiraling down in a vicious cycle and end in a more of a dystopian one.
Peter Hayward
Thanks for listening, it's been fun to catch up. Thanks for spending some time with Futurepod community.
Elissa Farrow
Thank you very much. I appreciate having the time and our conversation today. Thank you
Peter Hayward
This has been another production from Futurepod Futurepod is a not for profit venture. We exist through the generosity of our supporters. If you would like to support Futurepod Go to the Patreon link on our website. Thank you for listening. Remember to follow us on Instagram and Facebook. This is Peter Hayward saying goodbye for now.