Setting the Scene
Equity markets are implicitly bets on the future. Investing in equity markets is implicitly not just taking a stake on the future, but saying, “I have a different view than the sum of everybody else.”
JANE
ROSS Dawson is a futurist and entrepreneur. He helps people think about the future and learn by doing. We talk about ethics, science fiction, and what people can do practically to help shape the future. Very nice to see you, Ross.
ROSS
Wonderful to be here.
JANE
Before we actually get into the future-oriented questions, I wanted to ask you if I were to say to somebody, “I talked to this really interesting guy yesterday,” how would you want me to finish the sentence?
ROSS
Well, the short description is always futurist and entrepreneur, so helping people think about the future and playing with various ventures along the way.
JANE
Well, that sounds good. Futurist and entrepreneur, that’s a lot harder to do than to say, I think. I know you’ve been working in this area for a long time.
ROSS
I have.
Financial systems are bets on the future
I noticed that you were a stockbroker before and I wondered if that influenced you in your approach to future thinking and planning, being a stockbroker. That’s pretty concrete.
ROSS
So it’s a very long time ago, so pretty early in my career. But the reason why, so my degree was in physics, I then had a job in computer sales, so ended up in the computer industry saying all this technology is going to change the world. And then I’ve always wanted to think about the world, society, everything, the future and just what I thought is that in order to understand how the world goes around, I have to understand the world of money. So that is why I basically went gone into financial markets, and then capital markets was to understand the ways in which our financial system underpins the way things work. So it’s really one of the fundamental pieces.
I’ve worked in a variety of different industries and a variety of different countries. And it is one of those fundamental pieces to having the context, understanding the system, and of course the system in which we live in is very much based on money and finance and financial structures and financial markets. So that has been a foundation for being able to understand those ways of thinking. So the nature of equity markets is they are implicitly bets on the future. So whenever you buy or you sell, you are basically making, essentially your judgment is that it’s going to, because that price will go up or it will go down. That’s the usual reason why you’re doing that.
So this is all a way of analyzing, but I mean one I think particularly interesting point though is the efficient market hypothesis, which is not entirely true, but what it suggests is that basically markets always incorporate all available information. So essentially the current price reflects what everybody else thinks. So if you think differently, as in, “I think it’s worth more,” or, “I think it’s worth less.” That’s when you do something about it as in you buy and you sell. So essentially, investing in equity markets is implicitly not just taking a stake on the future but saying, “I have a different view than the sum of everybody else, which is the current price.”
Technology and healthcare sectors are areas for potential future investment
That’s really interesting. That gives me a lot to think about. As a futurist, what sector or technology would you recommend that people invest in today, given the situation we’re in today?
ROSS
Well, I think there’s always disclosures when you give investment advice and one is that I’m not an investment advisor, so I wouldn’t recommend any particular stock picks or anything like that. To the point, as I’m saying, that essentially if you look at anything which is looking like is promising, the price is going to be extraordinarily high. NVIDIA, for example, the valuation on a price earnings multiple ratio is extraordinarily high, which reflects or just current save the people that believe that it will continue to be able to grow over time. So essentially, even though you might believe in the potential there, there’s a judgment to be made.
But what I’ll broadly say is that we say where is the world going? Where is more and more of our money going to be spent? So broadly technology, we are shifting from traditional industries to technology industries and you have to be very careful around particularly the valuations, that’s one point. Other is healthcare, where people will spend more and more of their money to be able to be well, to extend their lives, to live healthily. And so there’s, I think, broadly we can point to not just healthcare but also those that are improving, not just curing diseases, but also well-being is another one. And also anything which is associated with aged care because we are living longer and the trends have very likely that it will continue to be long. So any array of forces from aged care centers to technologies that support people to live longer in their homes and so on. So that’s just a few broad sectors I would say are certainly pointing to where the world is going.
Ethical dilemmas influenced by the digital divide
Interesting. What ethical dilemmas do you think we will be facing in the near future?
ROSS
The biggest dilemmas are all around division and inclusion essentially. And the biggest one which is going to come up and which is already emerging, is around whether or how we will augment ourselves with technologies. So this plays out on a whole array of different levels. One of them is the one which still exists, which is an old one which still exists, is the digital divide. Not everybody has access to technologies, to devices, to the internet and so on, and they are massively disadvantaged. That is one of the fundamental dilemmas. Another is now not just the access to AI but the AI skills. Two of the very important ones which emerge, one is essentially cognitive augmentation. And so some of those may be various types of devices that we use to augment our capabilities and our thinking. And so people will either choose to augment themselves with technologies and their thinking their capabilities or have the money to be able to do so. And others will either not have access or not choose to do. So ultimately lead into a fork in society.
Also, the technologies of longevity, essentially these are not likely to be so inexpensive that everybody in the world can access to them. So if we have technologies of longevity, does that means those only access to those who have the most wealth. And I think another one which is a little more immediate is that of essentially how focused is our attention. Essentially, if our attention is being hacked by companies that are spending billions of dollars to capture our attention, and most people are basically succumbing to that. Whereas there are some who are choosing to use these technologies to augment themselves. That all of these divides are merging and is both the choice and the access. Means that we will have more divides in society, we need to guard against that with everything which we have. But these are the fundamental divisions and fundamental ethical issues that we must understand and address.
JANE
That’s interesting, Ross, because I have a number of people based in Africa that I’ve interviewed in my podcast and very, very interesting to talk with them. Often we did not have a good internet connection, in the long run, it worked out fine. But it’s clearly a different world and I’m trying to get even more people from Africa and from certain parts of South America and certain parts of Asia because I do not want imaginized world to be focused on what we call the global north. In fact, you’re not in the global north.
Africa has extraordinary potential
Well, I live in a developed country and I’m very fortunate for that. But no, I absolutely agree with you. We have to guard against these. And yeah, Africa is a place of extraordinary potential for many reasons, including the talent of the people because of their desire to grow from where they are and seeing the potential. And now having tools of amplification. So the attitudes to AI in Africa are very different than for example in Western Europe because they say, “Well, let’s not worry about the details. These are things that can make us healthier, that can make us better. It can support our societies and economies.” So it’s a very different frame.
JANE
Have you worked in Africa or worked with people in Africa?
ROSS
I’ve had clients in South Africa, so I’ve been there a number of times. I’ve visited other parts of the continent, but it is one of the big gaps as I’ve traveled extensively around the world and I’ve only really touched a few pieces of Africa briefly, and I am keen to spend more time there and understand more and to be part of that journey.
The future doesn’t just happen, it is created
When people think about the future or talk about the future, what do many of them get wrong?
ROSS
It is pretty distant, I think. Or is this distinction between saying, “What’s going to happen,” as opposed to saying, “What can I do to create the future I want?” And most people are saying they’re going to the futurists or the analysts and so on and say, “What’s going to happen?” And the reality is the future doesn’t just happen, it is created. And it’s not just created by an individual. It’s created collectively by some of us and it’s own complex systems, but we all play a part in that.
If we think about the futures of planets, of society or even down to our family or community, these are all things which we participate on. So I think there is this very simple framing as we must be thinking about how it is we create the future, understanding that it is always in process of being created. All of us are participating in doing that, and we shouldn’t be asking so much what is going to happen because that is deeply unforeseeable, but more what are the things that I can do or what are the things that I’m doing which might shift that future one way or another.
JANE
That’s really interesting, Ross. That is the whole heart of my podcast. The motto is how to shape the future before it shapes us. You just described it extremely well. What can an ordinary person do to help shape the future? Just an ordinary person.
The role of ordinary people in shaping the future
Well, I do believe this, like the very fundamentals of smiling to people when you pass them, this is already shaping the future. I mean, just get this ripple effect of just the more you push out the positive energy, that amplifies itself. Imagine you’re passing somebody in the street and you smile at them and they feel a bit better and they’re nicer to other people in turn and so on. I just think that’s one very simple thing we can do is that in all of our interactions we encourage and support a positive attitude. This idea of how is it that I can inspire people, think of possibilities. So I think that’s just anything, just by the nature of being alive, interacting with people is already creating things which can ripple out more broadly.
And the other, perhaps on a bigger scale, it’s thinking, “Well, there’s so many issues, there’s so many things that matter and we have to make a choice.” There’s a wonderful book called Zen and the Art of Making a Living, and I’m not even sure if it’s still in print, but most other things, what it does is it has these little things that you fill out and answer, just to be able to think through your own journey and career and what does you want to do.
And it has this whole series of questions says, “Where do I want to have an impact? Is it in my geography? Is it locally? Is it my city? Is it the nation? Is it the world? Is it… What people are they? Disadvantaged people or disadvantaged in particular ways? Are they people who are prospering to be able to be able to have greater impact?” What difference do you want to make. So you can start to just think through what kind of people and what type of place and what impact you want to have and whether it’s in terms of health or an attitude or in terms of animals or whatever it might be.
And just choose from the wealth, from the hundreds of the millions of possibilities we have and where we could make an impact to say, “Here’s one thing that matters. I think it’s important, I care about.” And that means you can reduce down and say, “Well, all right, and here’s a few things that I can do,” which might not change the entire planet right away, but which make an impact. Just that every little impact we have adds up. So I don’t think we need to aspire to change the world. I mean, we can certainly, it’s not wrong if you do and you want to try to do that, but I think it’s also absolutely equally valid to have just a very specific and even very small positive impact, that can be your purpose.
Science fiction authors to read
Nice. That’s very encouraging. I think people who listen to our conversation will find that interesting. Ross, do you read science fiction?
ROSS
Yes. Well, I grew up, my teens were basically immersed in science fiction. I read everything I could possibly find.
JANE
Any particular authors you recommend that people read?
ROSS
Well, two, which have certainly stayed with me, which are very well known and I think are William Gibson and Neal Stephenson. And so they’re now very widely read. So I read their critical books Neuromancer and Snow Crash decades ago just soon after they came out, they were formative to my thinking. But I think one of the other interesting books I would point to from Neal Stephenson, which is probably overlooked, is called The Diamond Age, which is extraordinarily relevant. So the Snow Crash is the one that gets all of the attention, but The Diamond age, which points amongst other things to a world in which we have personalized education and the implications of that and the formation of collective intelligence from that is extraordinarily powerful story. And one which I still think points to many of the things that are unfolding today.
Influence of AI on the balance and interaction between generalists and specialists
I’ve done a fair amount of reading about generalists and specialists and I actually contributed a chapter to a book about that that was published a few years ago. What’s your take on being a generalist or being a specialist? Do you think one is better than the other?
ROSS
Well, they’re of course complements and I suppose it is harder and harder to be a generalist. Well, there are actually some interesting shifts at the moment. But certainly historically, basically as knowledge accumulates, we need to be more and more specialists. We need to have deeper and deeper knowledge in order to be distinctive. Otherwise, we are completely commodity because there’s lots of people which have similar knowledge to us. So specialization has been an enormously valuable part of being able to contribute to the economy and be rewarded for it. So essentially all people that are being highly paid are specialists.
There is the idea of the pi-shaped skills, so T-shaped skills that came up in the 1980s. It’s the idea of you have both T, which is this, you have the breadth and they also have the depth. And that’s a critical point because if you have just specialized in a particular area, then you don’t have the context. Part of the value comes with the collaboration. The corollary of deeper and deeper specialization means the need for greater and greater collaboration. So you need to work with other people, and if you only understand your area of specialization, you are not able to collaborate effectively. So you’d need the breadth as well as the depth.
So the next step from the T-shaped was the pi-shaped where you’d have more than one area of specialization. So you have your breadths, and then you have two areas of specialization. And so dual degrees of various kinds of being very important. So classic way in which this has been implemented is understanding of technology and a particular industry being able to bring those together. So back quite a long time ago, and I think I was the first one to come up with a phrase, and it has been used reasonably widely since then, is the comb-shaped where you have many areas of specialization as well as the area of breadth. And of course the more areas of specialization the less specialized you are.
But part of the reason I came to that idea of this comb-shaped thinking is looking at myself because I am a generalist, I have very broad perspectives acROSS many domains. There’s not many situations you can bring me in and I don’t have a reasonable amount of context. I have got there through repeatedly going into deep areas of specialization in amongst other things, in various aspects of computing and distributed computing, in finance and equities, capital markets and publishing and then in professional services through my books and yeah, I could go on. In each of these I dove quite deep. And so that meant that this ability to build this generalization has to be based on specialization. So now when people talk about being a generalist or a specialist, you can’t be a generalist. Unless you have depth somewhere along the way, you don’t have that context. You don’t have the grounding to be able to pull together ideas acROSS multiple domains.
So now it’s a very interesting time and many people are pointing to now how generative AI is shifting that domain because you can access specialist knowledge immediately. You can say, “Well, now these are competing with PhDs and the large language models and what the types of quality of response you get.” So you don’t need to necessarily find a human expert. You can say, “I want find out of this particular thing,” find some context. And as long it doesn’t hallucinate too much, you get some decent answers.
So this changes the nature of that dynamic between the generalist and the specialist. I think we’re still observing and understanding how that’s unfolding today. But certainly I think this idea of the generalists having this broader context, I think that’s the one thing which humans bring to complement AI in this humans plus AI world is the context, the framing, really understanding the broader domain. This is the capability does the generalists, but I still believe that in order to have that, you do need to be able to develop those areas of specialization and now AI can facilitate that. These ways of being able to pull together to correlate areas of understanding and help us understand faster and better.
JANE
So these two previously quite different perspectives are beginning to blend, thanks to AI. Is that the idea? Or maybe not blend, but work together.
ROSS
Well, yes, AI is, I hesitate to call it a knowledge machine because it is information, but it does interact in order to be able to assist us to develop knowledge. But the nature of it does change, significantly change this balance or trade-off or interaction between being the generalist and the specialist. And it does change what is most valued in those interactions where the generalist skills are basically being made more important. But again, we can’t have those generalist skills without being through journeys of depth in particular domains along the way in our own journey of developing that context.
JANE
Right. How do you see your own work evolving over the next say 10 years or so?
Future work: exploring the potential of humans plus AI
So I’ve worked with, looked at AI and its impact on people and work and organization society for a very long time. I’ve written about it for over two decades. But just over two and a half years ago, I think we were, just about everybody on the planet, including all this AI specialists, were surprised by a leap of what seemed like emergent possibilities. So since then I have basically completely focused on this framing of humans plus AI.
Taking this human focus center and be able to look at humans as the most extraordinary thing in the universe. I’m a deep believer in humans and humanity and human potential, but now we have created something which is a complement to that. Which can expand us where there are many risks and deep challenges, but also extraordinary opportunities. So that, I see it’s a very long time to come. I will still be diving deep as much as I can into this framing of humans plus AI or whatever language we use around the technologies we have to be able to complement us, to help us achieve our potential, to grow, to develop, to improve society. Great value. Part of that does go to this, what I alluded to earlier around these technologies of augmentation and making them accessible to many, not just in terms of giving people access, but giving people the skills or the attitudes which will enable them to do that.
So I see that there is, and I suppose that part of my journey. So I said at the very beginning, I’m a futurist and entrepreneur, and the essence of that is that I learn by doing. So, part of what gives me my ability to be an effective futurist and working with boards and executive teams and organizations to think about the future is that I’m not just reading things and looking around. I’m actually actively doing projects, learning about the technologies, understanding the ways they interact, seeing the way markets unfold. And so that journey of the next 10 to 15 years is not just the thinking about, but also the doing of trying these tools, working with them, helping others to work with them, to be able to build communities. So I have the Humans + AI Explorers Community, which is a big focus for me, where people can learn alongside others.
JANE
I joined it, Ross, because I heard about it.
ROSS
Oh, fantastic.
JANE
And I just wanted to check it out. And so far it’s really interesting. There’s so much to dive into.
ROSS
Yes. Yes, absolutely. And the thing is, we all have very busy lives, and so it’s always taken the attention, but I think this idea of learning together, peer learning has always been the strongest form of learning. We learn with others. And now, in this world where it’s unfolding every day and there’s so many potentials and we don’t have any textbooks because this is in the process of being written and created, where communities for learning are, I think, the center of what we’re doing. So I very much look forward to the community and its growth and the learning with others that that entails.
JANE
Well, that is very interesting. Ross, do you have any final thought or anything that you’d like to share?
ROSS
Just that in order to create a positive future, we need to believe it is possible. So there’s a lot of very negative thinking at the moment. And to be fair, there’s a lot of things which aren’t wonderful happening in the world today, and we have to acknowledge that, we can never turn away from the realities of these things. But I think we need to acknowledge the downsides, we need to believe that it is possible that things we can do could help make a career a positive future.
And that’s then to be able to say, “Well, if it is possible, whatever degree of possibility that we can create a better future, then I will be part of being able to move us towards that.” I think that’s a fundamental thing we need to think about. And I would also just invite anybody who is interested to look at the Humans + AI Community. So just search for Humans +AI or humansplus.ai, will find it. And as part of that journey of creating a positive future, we’re in a world where AI is augmenting human capabilities.
JANE
And I’ll put a link to it to make it easy for people to find it. Ross, I want to thank you very much for your time today and hope to see you again soon.
ROSS
Indeed. It’s been a real pleasure.
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