First Anniversary Gala Celebration Roundtable Discussion: THE FUTURE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY December 2, 2020 gentlemen, or good morning if you are joining us from Japan. I am David Janes, Managing Director of the Foundation. It is hard to believe that one year has passed since we launched the Foundation at the residence of Ambassador [Shinsuke J.] Sugiyama in Washington DC. We deeply appreciate everyone who has supported us and helped us accomplish our mission this year. We now move to our “Future of Science and Technology" roundtable, and it is my pleasure to introduce Ambassador Kanji Yamanouchi to give opening remarks. Ambassador Yamanouchi is Consul General of Japan in New York. He brings with him years of experience, ranging from his most recent position as Assistant Minister, Director General for the Economic Affairs Bureau at the headquarters of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to his initial post at the Embassy of Japan in Washington DC. Ambassador Yamanouchi, thank you so much for being with us this evening. I now turn the floor to you. be part of this great OIST gala opportunity. Congratulations. Great things. I'm so happy. One year ago, I hosted a seminar at my residence to talk about the future of science and technology. That was amazing. Everybody was so enthusiastic. But right after that event, COVID took place, and now the world is so different. The world has changed. But I really believe in the importance of science and technology, and the importance of OIST has never changed. It will grow much, much farther. And I really think OIST has made a big, big difference in the past year. I would mention three things: First, OIST has hosted many inspiring webinars online. That's amazing. A lot of people saw it, and it's inspired a lot. Also, OIST did a great thing for the Okinawan people: providing assistance in fighting COVID-19. And, OIST has reached out to young professionals to encourage STEM education in Okinawa. So, all in all, OIST is the great bridge between Okinawa and the United States, a bridge between Japan and the United States. As a result of those inspiring activities, I've heard you raised $100,000 for the initial year. You fulfilled your initial targets. That's an amazing thing in just one year. And I know that you have much bigger targets for next year. I would like to share a little of my experience. I know OIST is very much engaged in climate change through science and technology. When I was young, I was addicted to scuba diving. So, I know the beauty of the coral reef under the water. And now it's in danger. But through science and technology, OIST is saving the beauty of our world. So, this is a true connection between nature and science and technology. [Unintelligible.] What OIST is doing is inspiring our own diplomats here in New York City. Young professionals have come together to establish what we call the Science and Technology Diplomatic Circle in New York. Ten countries participate. [Unintelligible.] Science and technology are now a very, very important part of foreign policy. So, I like to express my gratitude for that. And finally, and I couldn't agree more with Ambassador Sugiyama saying [earlier in the gala program] in the era of uncertainty, science and technology play a very, very important role. And so needless to say, science and technology will have a significant impact on our future. Today's panel discussion also will lead to enhanced cooperation between the U.S. and Japan. And I truly believe that cooperation will save the world. So, once again, congratulations for the anniversary for today. And also, I would say the Consulate of Japan here in New York will always stand by OIST. I'm looking forward to working together with you further. And I hope everybody watching this webinar will have a good time, a productive time. And I wish good luck and great holiday season ahead to all of you. Thank you very much. Janes: Thank you so much Ambassador Yamanouchi for your remarks. We really appreciate you being here to celebrate with us. It is now my pleasure and honor to introduce Dr. Peter Gruss, President and CEO of the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology. Dr. Gruss ranks among the most productive scientists in his field, with more than 500 publications. He has received numerous awards for his scientific achievements. In 2002, he became president of the Max Planck Society, and in 2017, he became president of OIST. A pioneer in the internationalization of research and education, Peter Gruss expanded the presence of the Max Planck Society abroad. He is a leader in technology transfer and innovation, and he co- founded a biopharmaceutical company and serves as chair of the Siemens Technology and Innovation Council. Dr. Gruss, thank you so much for joining us at the gala. The floor is now yours. Dr. Peter Gruss: Thank you so much, David, for these very kind words, and congratulations to the OIST Foundation on its one-year anniversary. Above all my gratitude goes to the founding members of the OIST Foundation, without whom none of us would have reasons to celebrate today. I still remember the thoughts that we had that we need to be more active in the United States to find supporting individuals for the goals that OIST has. So, it gives me great pleasure to thank David Janes, managing director of the Foundation; Nasser Kazeminy, who provided the initial donation to prepare the legal status of the OIST Foundation. And Takeshi Ueshima, the chair of the trustees, who is working very hard to get the Foundation to function in an excellent way. Of course, also to all others, too many to thank individually, I want to express gratitude, on behalf of the Okinawa Institute, to every single member. Now, just one year after its inception, the Foundation has made remarkable steps in pursuing its mission to promote always innovative work, support the sustainable development of Okinawa, and deepen the U.S.- Japan relationship. The Foundation has funded several impactful activities. Some of them were just mentioned by Ambassador Yamanouchi, such as new scientific research projects advancing environmental sustainability, initiatives to support women in science, and outreach programs to inspire the next generation of scientists in Okinawa. Over the past few months, the Foundation has hosted several dynamic discussions on topics related to science and beyond, engaging more than 1,000 individual participants from around the world. So, I now look forward to continuing to grow this community, and to sharing your enthusiasm for the future of science and its potential benefits for Okinawa, Japan, and the world. Janes: Thank you so much, Dr. Gruss, for those remarks. We really appreciate it. I would like to turn the floor over to our roundtable moderator, Dr. Nancy Snow, joining us from Tokyo. Dr. Snow is the Pax Mundi Professor of Public Diplomacy at Kyoto University of Foreign Studies. Dr. Snow, the floor is yours. Dr. Nancy Snow: Thank you so much, David, and welcome everyone. I want to quickly introduce this stellar lineup of speakers. Dr. Gruss will be joining us on the panel, he is president and CEO of OIST. We're also joined by James Higa, Executive Director of the Philanthropic Ventures Foundation; Dr. Sachiko Kuno, the founder of the Halcyon Incubator; Dr. Carla Shatz of Stanford University — and, word has it, the first female PhD in neurobiology from Harvard. I had to get that in! — Dr. Kenji Doya, a professor in the Neural Computation Unit from OIST; Professor Amy Webb, a quantitative futurist and also professor at the NYU Stern School of Business; and last but surely not least, Dr. Andrew Blake, chair of the Samsung AI Center at Cambridge. I wanted to begin by saying it was almost exactly five years ago that I wrote a little piece called “Japan's Future Is an OISTer.” It was based on my experience of finding out about this incredible university that I had never heard of at that time. It was the most diverse international university I had experienced in Japan, and, I believe, as of September 2020, OIST has about 82% international students, and 41% female students. They're all doctoral students. What really struck me was that they were very user- friendly, these students. They were personable. They were able to make a lot of science palatable to the public, and I thought what an incredible place. The OIST way is making science and technology more accessible. Can there be anything more important for these times than that? What I'd like to ask Dr. Gruss to begin is: Can you tell us about the science and technology mega trends? Can you tell us more about those today and what OIST is doing in these areas, specifically why is OIST so important for Japan's future? Gruss: Thank you very much, Nancy. We all know science philosophers for centuries have said that science is supposed to make the world a better place to live in. We know our world is not perfect, and some of the imperfections have been laid down by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals – 17 goals or challenges that we have to meet if you want to sustain our Earth. I cannot address all these 17 SDGs, so let me pick a few; for example, climate change and the depletion of natural resources and biodiversity. I think this is one of the most pressing problems that we have currently. We need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. We all are reading day after day about the melting ice caps, about the loss of glaciers around the globe, about the warming of the oceans. So, this is of course true due to the fact that we use mostly fossil fuels and increase the CO2 in our atmosphere. We are working hard at OIST to provide some alternatives in order to have sustainable energy resources; for example, cheap carbon-based photovoltaic solar cells that can be printed in a very easy process. We have something very unique that has been produced at OIST, which is solar wave energy. Solar wave energy production is, if you wish, a small generator that is put into the waves, the breaking waves close to the beach. And this is already working pretty well [unintelligible]. A hotel can be supplied with power through this wave energy. So, it's a very good source for islands in particular. But as we also know, unless we reduce the CO2 level, we will have to face great challenges regarding biodiversity. So OIST has quite a large component of research, studying terrestrial ecology, and, in particular, marine ecology. We have a very high number of excellent professors looking at the coral reefs, looking at what happens to the coral reefs if the temperature rises. We have experiments going on where we grow corals in higher temperatures. We have experiments going on where we have fish, coral fish in particular, and we see how they are doing in higher temperatures. So, I think this is not only of benefit to Okinawa, it's also of benefit to Japan and the world. But I also feel that there is another major issue coming up in the future, and this is urbanization. Mass migration resulting in the increase of the number of mega-cities. That, in conjunction with the higher number of old versus young — remember, Okinawa is one of the five “blue zones” in the world, where the oldest individuals live. So, we need to put a lot of attention in studying healthy aging. We need to look at the transformation of the clinical system to a personalized, data-driven system that is based on genomics and that is based on the entirety of data that has been collected from individuals, shifting them literally from late-phase therapy to early prediction and, in particular, prevention. So, these types of analyses are possible by doing genomics, for example. [Unintelligible.] And on top of this we are currently having plans to increase our study in organogenesis. We all know that we have a great deficiency in organs, if you want to transplant organs. But there's a new way to grow these organs in tissue culture, and we hope very much by building up this particular area of research we can contribute also to the health of individuals. Thank you very much. Snow: Excellent. That's incredible to hear about all that's going on at OIST. James, you're from Okinawa and you're highly engaged there. We're already hearing how unique the place is. Can you tell us more about that with your background? Philanthropic Ventures Foundation: I sure can. And first of all, hello. I'm dialing in from the heart of Silicon Valley in San Jose. But I'm a local native boy, so I want to say hello to all my friends and uchinanchu on the island. Hello to everybody out there who has joined us, who has visited Okinawa, has been touched by Okinawa, and a welcome in advance to anybody planning to come in the future. I think what really makes Okinawa unique is that it has been an island based upon a knowledge economy, and powered by knowledge. What I mean by that is if you really think back to the days of the Ryukyu kingdom, Okinawa based its might on the knowledge of the Chinese court, on the Chinese language, on the Chinese customs — and knowledge of who were the most important relationships to have, and how to navigate that. And that is how the Ryukyu kingdom was able to seize the most important trade routes in the Far East. It's quite an amazing thing if you think about it, that such a small, tiny island with such a small population played such a vital and important role for trade, economy, the passing of knowledge, etc., in the Far East. That's why I believe, Okinawa, at its heart, if you look at the long arc of history, has been the island of knowledge. A knowledge-based economy. And my view is that Okinawa can again regain that heritage by projecting this knowledge. What the world needs today is not more of the same. What the world craves, and what the world needs, is a unique point of view, and it needs cognitive diversity. And the more unique you are, the better. I believe that's what Okinawa is, and it can again be an island of immense influence in the world if it can project its knowledge, not just in art, not just in culture, not just in craft, but now with OIST, in science and in technology. And that is my hope for the future of Okinawa and the world. Snow: Thank you so much. And now I'm going to open it up to everyone. What do you think are going to be the most innovative discoveries in science and technology over the next 30 years? I'd like to call on Amy Webb first to delve into that. Ms. Amy Webb, Quantitative Futurist, NYU Stern School of Business: Thank you again for including me in this panel of luminaries. It truly is an honor. I think I'll pick up where Peter and James left off. The most interesting area of science and technology is actually the intersection of an interesting Venn diagram. We can start to think of the 21st century, and the most important technology platform in this century is biology. The field of synthetic biology is still somewhat nascent, but it is growing, and that was true before COVID. The best way to think about synthetic biology is that it's been possible since the early 2000s to edit DNA. You're probably familiar with CRISPR. This is the next iteration from that. It's kind of akin to using a Word document and editing genetic code for the purpose of enhancing or creating new forms of life. There are universities, it sounds like also in Okinawa, where organoids, sort of like a body on a chip, are being printed for the purpose of testing pharmaceuticals and to speed up the process of clinical trials. But beyond that, synthetic biology is really the key to us mitigating climate change through the development of new enzymes that can help eat plastics, for example. It's a solution to different types of fuels. It means precision medicine. There's some tremendous research underway right now that uses skin cells to create insulin for diabetics, so that rather than having to take insulin every day, which is expensive and challenging, a diabetic 10 or 15 years from now, possibly sooner, might get a single dose. And their body is the pharmacy and does the regulating that's necessary. So oftentimes when we talk about this type of technology, people start thinking about designer babies, and clearly there are some ethical concerns, but it really, I think, will fundamentally shape our lives much in the same way that artificial intelligence has shaped our lives very recently. AI would be the other big field. AI is not a singular technology. It's kind of an umbrella term for many different technologies, and it's on a very long trajectory. So likewise, that'll have a huge impact. And then I would just end on devices, because those seem to be so prominent in our everyday lives. We're going to start to see the end of devices as we know them today and the beginning of something different, more ubiquitous, human-machine connectivity. Snow: Thank you. I think I'll follow up from there with Dr. Andrew Blake. And thank you for joining us. I'll ask you about the next 30 years. Director, Microsoft Research Cambridge, Former Director of the Alan Turning Institute, Chair of the Samsung AI Centre: It's quite late here in Scotland but a great pleasure to be in Okinawa virtually. As I was born in the same year as artificial intelligence, the year of the Dartmouth Conference that launched the topic, I have to choose artificial intelligence. Indeed, I've been working on it for the last 40 years. And as Amy said we've seen a surge in artificial intelligence in the last decade. It's enabled so many things and will enable so many more things. For example, in health care I think it's going to become a huge component and change the way healthcare is done. But I'm also excited about seeing artificial intelligence develop so that learning happens much more in the way that humans learn. At the moment, AI and machine learning need big data. Big data is a blessing but it's also a curse, because you need too much of it. Little humans, when they learn, it's clear they don't need anything like the quantities of data that our computers need at the moment. So, if a little human knows already what a car is and it has to learn what a truck is, after one or two trucks, it's got it. Whereas our artificial intelligence at the moment needs another thousand trucks before it's really got the idea. I think this is something that's really going to change in the field, and as it changes there'll be great technological benefit. But also, I believe we are learning as directly as possible about the nature of what intelligence really is. We're unraveling this great mystery. So that's what excites me for the next 30 years. Snow: I'd like to call on Dr. Sachiko Kuno for your perspective. What do you see coming along in science and technology in the future? Dr. Sachiko Kuno, Founder, Halcyon Incubator: Thank you so much for having me, and congratulations to the OIST Foundation and OIST. My thought for the next 30 years would be to have communication be beyond damage, beyond fraud, be possible. And perhaps human- to-human communication without the use of words or language, and without phone or internet. For people in different cultures to truly empathize with each other, I think physical sensation are needed to understand each other. So, sensations like touch, taste, smell or even a sixth sense will be very much important in addition to the visual and auditory sensations we currently use. The brain may connect directly to a computer interface. [Unintelligible.] It may eventually be possible to interact with your pet. So, I think that by using science and technology for the next 30 years, expanding that in Pacific world would be our goal, and I think I'm very much encouraged by seeing art and music and in this gala, and that can give us some idea how to communicate with. Thank you. Snow: Kenji, I will go to you next, and your thoughts on the future of science and technology. Computation Unit, OIST: Good morning from Okinawa. It's a rainy morning today. As Peter emphasized, sustainability is a very important issue for science today. When studying nature and how to deal with [unintelligible], those technologies are important. But I think equally important is human decision making and the preferences behind them. I started my research career as a kind of engineer working on the concept of what is now called reinforcement learning. But while letting robots learn behavior and make decisions, I got more and more interested in how humans make decisions and learn behaviors. So now I do half AI research and half neuroscience research. When I was working on my robots, I found one parameter which is very interesting. That is a parameter which weighs the goodness of an immediate state with the goodness of the long- term future. So, a decision between an immediate state and long-term prosperity is a very important decision in human life, and also for our society. So, we got interested in how that kind of decision is controlled in the animal and human brain. One of the major research [topics] in my lab in neuroscience is the role of a so-called serotonergic system. This is one with a neurotransmitter. And if you go to OIST website, you can see a news article about our most recent work. In addition to studying the environment itself, understanding the mechanism of human preference and decision making will help us to make better decisions for the long term or sustainability of the world. That is a very important aspect and role of neuroscience. That's one of the main reasons why I work on neuroscience here at OIST. Snow: Thank you so much. Dr. Shatz. Professor, The Catherine Holman Johnson Director of Stanford Bio-X, and Professor of Biology and Neurobiology, Stanford University: Well, thank you. I want to congratulate the Foundation and of course, OIST, on this very special moment. I think what I'd like to do is turn this question around and maybe say that I think the most exciting and innovative thing in science, as opposed to technology, will be something we can't even imagine today. And I really want to emphasize the word “science.” There are so many great visions for 30 years from now, all of them extremely exciting, but I really want to emphasize this idea of curiosity-driven research and its importance. Just think, who could have possibly imagined that a chemical reaction in bacteria would lead to the current day CRISPR revolution. We just heard from Dr. Webb about this synthetic biology and being able to engineer genomes and all those amazing implications. But without the actual curiosity-driven research in a little bug, we wouldn't be here right now and thinking about the technological and ethical implications. Or let's think of another thing: Dr. Gruss mentioned growing organs in a dish. Again, we wouldn't be here today if there weren't fundamental studies of, for example, brain development or organ development where we could discover the genes that tell different kinds of cells that they ought to be a liver cell, or they ought to be a brain cell, or they ought to be a kidney cell or, for that matter, a pancreatic islet cell for insulin production. That knowledge came from people just wondering, “How does the body work?" Now, it's amazing, you can grow little human organoids, little brain cells that will perhaps allow us to study in detail aspects of human neuronal, cell, molecular, and even systems biology. If you even just think about COVID-19 and the current response to COVID, and the enormous fundamental biological reservoir of knowledge that was built — almost waiting for this kind of terrible thing to happen — and perhaps will even save us all in the next year, maybe, with vaccines. That all came from curiosity-driven research. And OIST: the S is about science, as well as the T for technology, so I think that's what's wonderful about the Institute. And I just beg everyone to remember that curiosity-driven research is a kind of endangered species these days as we get carried away with the excitement of the technology and the applications, remember where it all came from. Snow: Thank you so much. I want to move us to what advice you might have for younger people. I'm hearing so many inspiring ideas, but I'm not one of the young people. So, for those who are embarking on their studies or work, what piece of advice might you give them? I'm going to make this sort of a rapid fire round here beginning with Dr. Gruss. Gruss: For me, the most important issue is you have to light a fire. You need to burn for something. So, your gut feeling very often tells you what is right and what is wrong in science as well, not just the brain. And I like to quote Sydney Brenner — Sydney Brenner who has been the founding father of OIST. He said do the right experiment and be honest about it. That's all. In the sciences there are very few experiments that we could call the right experiment, but they will move and change the world. Do the right experiment, and be honest about it. Don't fake data. Webb: I think in both Japan and in the United States, unfortunately, there's too much of a narrow focus on education. If we all agree that we're training machines to assist us with cognitive abilities then it should logically follow that we need to pursue creativity, critical thinking skills, comparative literature, some of the softer sides of scientific thinking and technological thinking. The other thing that I would say is, I think, unfortunately... I don't think this is true of OIST, but in many other places, the curriculum reflects the professors' and the departments' existing fears about today. They don't really think about the future. So, if you're a student or you know somebody who is a student, it's important to go pretty far into the future and try to reverse engineer, back to the present, what's necessary, which means hybrid skills. It's great if you know machine learning as long as you can do machine learning plus. Where, if you're pursuing biology, you know, biology plus AI, we're going to need computational pharmacists. We're going to need MDs who are trained in robotics. We're standing on the precipice of many new types of jobs that we've never needed before. So, the best way to prepare for that future is not to predict it — the math doesn't work out — but to try to reduce uncertainty so that you can be more prepared. Blake: Well, I do give advice to people in the middle of their scientific careers, and I'm not sure that my colleagues here will be pleased with me. But what I often say to people is, particularly when they're coming to the end of their doctorate, don't rush off and become a professor. Because, when you finish your doctorate, this is a wonderful moment when, first of all, you can kind of negate and contradict all the things that you had to sign up to do during your doctorate. It's a wonderful moment of freedom, and really, to echo what Carla was saying, it's a point in your career when you can really exercise your curiosity and follow your instinct. I would say to young people, when you have the chance to do that, don't rush headlong for greater responsibility, but really enjoy that, that special moment of exploration and inquiry. Snow: I wish I had heard that back in the day. Sachiko, your thoughts. Kuno: I think that science and technology will be more important than ever as tools to guide us all into the future, and unfortunately no one knows what kind of future we will have. So, their goal is likely to be inseparable from the larger vision of a better society, better planet, and a better universe. The outcomes we should aim for will be the combination of the economic impact, social impact, and global environmental impact. But at the same time, for the younger people I'd like to say, consider what AI cannot do. So, it will be something that takes advantage of the inherent strengths of human beings' intuition, instinct, and a curiosity not based on past data. As many people said already, I think curiosity is why we are human. That is quite an important thing for younger people, as a message. Please think about what you are curious about. And also, in the 21st century, realize that a scientist is a visionary and doer. So, this means a deep interest, not only in the natural sciences, but also in the social sciences, such as philosophy or psychology and social sciences. [Unintelligible.] I think being a scientist in the 21st century, I'd like to say that they should be visionary and a doer, as well as curiosity driven. Higa: I'm the non-academic of the group, although I would argue that I got my degree from the “Steve Jobs Institute of Science and Technology." But I will apply those lessons to, hopefully, academics as well. The advice I would give comes from two of my favorite people: my colleague Steve Jobs who mentioned this at a famous commencement speech that he gave at Stanford. He quoted one of my other favorite thinkers, Stewart Brand, who created The Whole Earth Catalog. He said, “Stay hungry, stay foolish." I think the ability to stay hungry for knowledge is important, and Carla touched on it. I would say instead of curiosity, I would say foolish. And it's a really important trade in business. Some of the best ideas are completely crazy, foolish ideas. Airbnb started off with an idea to put an inflated air bed in your room that somebody could sleep on and could be rented. Sounds like the dumbest, craziest, most foolish idea in the world, and here we are at the precipice of their IPO, imminently. So, stay hungry, and most importantly, stay very, very foolish. Doya: I don't have a particular tip, but when I started as a PI in Okinawa, I set my mission to enjoy research life in Okinawa. And it appears to be quite successful so we could attract many researchers and students here in Okinawa. But when I was an undergraduate student, I didn't like the course curriculum pretty much. If you see my transcript it's very terrible! But when I started my hands-on research in robotics and also simulation, I became much more interested in the mathematics behind that. So rather than just learning from a textbook, try hands-on and then explore for yourself. Then that will motivate you to learn many new things. I think hands-on experience is very important for cultivating a basis for science. Shatz: I just wanted to say one thing to add to all these great comments and that is just to remind everybody that there is so much more to learn. Sometimes when you watch a NOVA program or something you get the feeling that scientists have discovered everything already, and you might as well look at another profession. The fact is that we know so little, and my advice is to always think about looking outside of the light under the lamppost, to look beyond where you are at the moment. You'll find tons of really exciting, fun things to study. Snow: Thank you so much. We are going to have two themes now to get us toward wrapping up. And that is the question of the most pressing ethical and human rights issues that are emerging from recent technological and scientific developments. How are scientists and innovators approaching these issues, and, I would add, in my own work in public diplomacy and public communication, we're addressing so often disinformation and misinformation. We all want to rely on clear, accurate, timely information. But we're living in a world where that is less meaningful. A lot of it’s online where people have their own competing narratives, so I'm wondering who might want to address that. The second question is how can the U.S. and Japan work closer and work deeper in the realms of science and technology — adding to that early on was the need to improve English fluency. I know that OIST has been committed to having more Japanese young scholars come to OIST, so there was that question about English and global innovation and being attracted to OIST in the future. Gruss: The first question is very relevant but a very difficult one. In many cases it is driven by cultural characteristics. You can see this regarding embryonic protection laws that are different across the globe. Some of the actual tools we have, like CRISPR, that we as a scientific community did not recommend using, have been used in China. But the things that are being discovered will be used. So, the only body that can regulate it are the local people, the governments. We have to regulate it despite the fact that I feel that the scientists have done a very good job, so far, self-regulating themselves. Not many will remember but in the 70s, there was the Asilomar Conference in which these scientists self-regulated the use of gene technology. So, the bottom line is the scientists. They see the farthest. They know what the impacts are. They should make recommendations, but these recommendations have, as I said, a cultural impact and have to be executed by the local governments. Webb: I just wanted to respond to that because it's true, the Asilomar Conference brought everybody together to talk through the future of genetic editing. It's my observation that there's still too much of a separation between the people who make laws and the people who make science, who study science and who create some of these advancements. I think that's true also in Japan. It's definitely true in the United States. I'll give you two examples. In 2010, there was a group of people, another group of scientists brought together to have a conversation about the frontiers of synthetic biology. And at that point, the United States government said this sounds like science fiction. It's so far into the future, call us back when more things have been done. Likewise, I was in a separate meeting having to do with misinformation and AI and chatbots. And I really struggled in 2013 to convince folks in different departments that we were looking at some potential challenges in upcoming elections. Part of the problem is that we can't have occasional meetings where we bring both groups together. This is another call to action for students. There aren't enough people who go into public policy who have a background in science. And so the challenge that we face is, we all know that innovations move faster than our ability to think through policy or certainly to govern. And in many governments in better democracies, governing is about reaction versus really long- term planning. We're beyond the point where we can continue to react. We have to come together to do very, very long-term planning. Stewart Brand, who James mentioned, is wonderful and continues to do this. There are not enough people doing it. It's what I do for a living. And if you don't make a huge effort, government won't a part of that. So, it's really important if we want to inhabit a great future that we're all happy to be in, we have to plan for it. It's not just going to show up for us. Snow: At OIST there is this founding principle of an equal emphasis on applied and basic research. I'm wondering if maybe the U.S. and Japan could come together, to Amy's point, to really train people in policy and advocacy for science. Because these are two communities that don't talk often enough to each other — and add to that science diplomacy. Higa: I wanted to talk a little bit about how I think about architecture innovation. Jim Clark, who was Netscape's founder and original backer, famously said there's only one business model: bundle and unbundle. The record labels used to bundle everything into an album. iTunes came along and we unbundled everything so you could buy things by song. Spotify comes along and bundles everything into a streaming service. And I think similarly about collaboration. There's been fundamentally two architectures. One is centralized collaboration where you build and control the entire stack. In this case, information processing... you build the chips, build the applications, build the messaging app, build the payment system on top, and you kind of have to go with the whole stack. And then there's the decentralized version of the world, which is more about collaborating in loosely formed, dynamic APIs, etc., open source, more democratic ways of collaborating and research. I think between the U.S. and Japan we should bet on that open, radically collaborative, democratic process for both research and innovation, because I think that's the way we become stronger by working together. And it is, I believe in my heart of hearts, the engine for true, true innovation in the world. Snow: Well, I'd like to hear from the innovators on that. Carla what's your thought? You're in Stanford, very well known for public policy and science and business. Shatz: Well, I like what has been said so far. The one thing I would add is that having this kind of open-source design really can lead, as James has said, to tremendous innovation. Because it's unpredictable, and you're allowing for things that are random to happen. But, you know, you also have to support that process, and that requires some form of structure. Actually, at Stanford we have that kind of structure in a number of really wonderful programs including Stanford's Bio-X program, and it's supported by training people to think in ways that are interconnected. But also, it's supported by resources, by money, to allow people to do very creative things. So, I would say that, at least in this space of fundamental innovation, it takes more than just great minds. It also takes money. Blake: Yes, some very interesting things have been said. It's certainly very striking... maybe the U.K. is particularly extreme on this. A member of Parliament for Cambridge, where I live, recently was a scientist. And he was said to be the only scientist in the whole of Parliament out of 650 representatives. So yes, one would love to see greater strength in science, not only for the specifics of knowing about how various sciences work, but also for the approach. The way that scientists reason about things is a methodology which has a much broader application in government as a whole. So, I would like to see a lot more of that kind of thinking in government. Snow: I wanted to share with you all the first question that came in [from the online audience]. I think this is again getting at the ethics, and it is about AI. The question is: As AI continues to develop will it eventually control and vanquish humans? Webb: We've got to stop asking this question. There are so many other really challenging issues that we will have to address. The corpora that are being used for training data are problematic, and there's no financial incentive to fix them. We're building automated systems that do some things and not others. The equity is all messed up. You know, it's fun but the problem is that science fiction movies and books have left an indelible image. We cannot continue to equate AI with Skynet, like robots that will come and murder us in our sleep, and before they murder us, they'll take all of our jobs. I know that's what we think about when we think of AI. But that is not AI. Blake: You know there are many good answers to this question, but the one I love the best is the one that Geoff Hinton, one of the pioneers of modern AI, gave when he was asked if he was worried about AI taking over the world. And he said, no, he's not because he's much more worried about global warming, which is a far greater and more serious threat. Doya: We shouldn't stop asking the ethical issues of AI. But AI agents are now becoming more and more autonomous, so part of my research is how to define curiosity for machines. AI agents can be dangerous, but it is important to notice that humans are also a very dangerous species. Human intelligence brought many species to extinction already, and human intelligence drove us to near extinction caused by nuclear war. But we somehow avoided such catastrophes. And I think that democracy is very important. We have the wisdom of human history to avoid the catastrophe from intelligence. We have elections and division of power. Also, in the economy we have antitrust laws and the right to strike. I think that should also apply for AI programs. If we give control of the whole world to one program that's very dangerous, but in the future, I think a more likely situation is that there are many AI programs with different overlapping expertise. The important thing is to introduce some kind of democracy, or peer reviewing, so that if one program makes a mistake or tries to do bad things, others can watch and stop them. So, in creating such a society of AI agents, we should have something to learn from the history of human society and also the human brain, which supports associated activities. That's a very exciting new direction of research in artificial intelligence. some of the ethics, but you really emphasized human communication too, and I wanted to revisit that with you Kuno: I think that AI has wonderful potential for the future that might be helping us to create a better world. But at the same time, as many people said, how do we use that new technology or science? So that's the key issue, and democracy [unintelligible] could be the key. [Unintelligible.] I think democracy is important, and also the check and balance system. That is another important thing, I believe. We need to be discussing open-mindedly and with transparency. I think that scientists need to be transparent and to say something honestly when they have discovered or invented some great technology or great things so that other people can be [unintelligible] to that technology and new science. I think better transparency and trust- based discussion will be the key issue for us to keep. Snow: Well, Dr. Gruss, these are values that are really emphasized at OIST. This is what I saw, and I have no doubt that it continues there. Going forward, what can OIST do to bridge more of this collaborative work? Gruss: Well, OIST is very dedicated to crossing boundaries. We are a university that has no departments. We mix all sciences. These scientists meet at lunch, they meet at the same building, because every building is stochastically constituted by various groups. So that's one issue, I have very little doubt. And we have 65% of our publications with an external author. We know we have to reach out for people that could contribute to our questions. What we are not good at, at this point in time, is humanities and the impact that science may have on society. I'm currently working with Snow: Sachiko, I wanted to ask you to address our graduate school to bring in people who could help to educate the young students and faculty in what are the impacts. What would it mean if we have AI broadly distributed in society? If, like Amy said, we are losing some jobs, what's happening to society? We will have to understand what it will be like if we have informational content that would allow you to predict your lifespan, more or less. What would it mean for insurances? What would it mean for hospitals? So, there's a whole set of questions that need to be addressed and can only be addressed if you join the leading thinkers in the sciences with the leading thinkers in humanities. Snow: I'm ready to sign up for that! I want to go around with our few remaining moments to ask about any final comments you have. The topic of biodiversity came up in this era where we hear so much about diversity and inclusion and cultural diversity. We have this need for balance. At OIST I found all the students were such visionaries, at least the ones I met. They were able to bridge between the hard sciences and the so-called soft sciences like nothing I'd ever experienced. Doya: Most of the students are interested in and focused on a certain topic in science or technology. But I think it's also important to realize how such research impacts society. As Peter pointed out, it is important to give opportunities to researchers and students to sometimes look wider at the meaning of his or her research. And then, what other directions he or she would do with the future research. Indeed, the events hosted by the OIST Foundation were quite helpful for me to think wider about different issues in the world. So, I think to supplement what OIST does as a main curriculum, this kind of social event would be pretty helpful for nurturing the wider vision of young scientists. Shatz: I like to think that there's an art of science and the science of art, and that the two really cross-fertilize and nurture each other. I think that Peter’s point about wanting and hoping there would be more humanities represented at OIST is a really important point. Because knowing something about the humanities gives you a kind of important perspective, even on your work as a scientist. And the best time to learn about these things and create this new brain, this new person who's going to go out into the world and have these sort of multimodal capabilities, and have maybe a social conscience and so on, really is in undergraduate and graduate education. This is like the early critical periods for building these new brains. We have a great opportunity to build these new brains. I feel like we haven't done a good enough job. Snow: Amy, would you add to that? I'm sure that NYU is doing similar work like that proposed. Webb: I actually spend the majority of my time not at NYU. I run a company called the Future Today Institute, and we advise the world's largest corporations in transportation and IT and biosciences. Here's what I would say: There is a demand right now for certainty. And I think that's because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It's good to remember that we are emotionally addicted to certainty, and in some places around the world we are culturally addicted to certainty. If we can accept that the future cannot be certain, even if I have all the data and the best predictive modeling in the world…then that gives us some leeway to get into the business of doing next- order impacts. Companies who make use of all of these amazing science innovations and technology innovations that come out of a place like OIST. The challenge is they don't know what to do with risk, they get excited about what’s shiny and new, and we have the tough conversations way after the fact. So, the best thing we can all do is to accept uncertainty and to do the best job we can at incrementally modeling out what are the next-order impacts of this work. It doesn't need to stop the work, it just means to take a very broad lens and see if we can try to gauge where this work could go, to what benefit or what potential harm, and then to mitigate or leverage. Higa: I recall Steve [Jobs] saying to a lot of us, when he spoke about the future, something Alan Kay originally said. He would always say the best way to predict the future is to create it. And I think it's incumbent on all of us here on the call, and the scientists, and the researchers, and the technologists to ask as they do their creation, to be ethical, be moral, be thoughtful about what it is that you are doing and what it is that we are doing. And that is the best way for us to together create and thus predict the future. Snow: Excellent. Andrew, would you agree with that? Blake: Well, I was going to say I'm struck by the theme of going beyond the sciences and you know the C.P. Snow idea of the two cultures and the separation between arts and sciences is still very much alive. But I would say, especially as a technologist, to the arts community, do you really want a society entirely designed by engineers? Because they're going to do it unless you get in there and get involved. Earlier we were talking about getting scientists into government, but equally I'd say to the arts and humanities and disciplines like design, come in and get involved before the future gets crystallized, because your contribution is really needed. Kuno: My concern regarding Japan is that it's still a little of an old-fashioned society. I do not see many female scientists or scientists to be. I'm serving as a board member for Kyoto University and the female student rate is less than 20%. When I went to Kyoto University 40 years ago it was less than 1% female students. For the next 30 years we cannot be living on [unintelligible] a winner takes all business model. I think we need to change the business model or social system to be more empathetic so that we can solve global issues. Climate change, poverty... everything is too huge for one country to solve. We need to think about inclusion and diversity as another way to create empathetic worlds. I would like to encourage Japanese women to be involved more and more and in science. [Unintelligible.] I think OIST could be some sort of heart in Japan to create that inclusion and diversity-based innovation. And I think that OIST would be one of the best ecosystems in Japan to encourage a young female to be thinking about becoming a scientist. Snow: Well, I’ve got a couple of points of good news to conclude with. One is that OIST has a very good gender balance as I mentioned at the top, about 41% [women] amongst the students. The other thing that's good news is that OIST is part of the international learning community. We know from research on international exchange and international education that one of the best ways to reduce anxiety about uncertainty, with that demand that we have for certainty, is to get outside your so-called comfort zone, to leave your place, to go elsewhere. And they're living that every day at OIST. I can't thank you all enough. This has been so stimulating, and I know we could go on for some time, but I want to just give a chance for Dr. Gruss to give us some final remarks. Gruss: Like you have said, Nancy, and others, this was an amazing discussion. It has had an extreme high level of competency. And what we should do is keep it alive, so maybe we can have other opportunities, not necessarily wait for the next Foundation anniversary. We should have the opportunity to bring you here to get in touch with you, and to learn from what other thinkers around the globe think and feel OIST can do in order to profit on its way going forward. Snow: David Janes, thank you so much, too, for the OIST Foundation, and congratulations for the one-year anniversary. Excellent job. Janes: Thank you so much, Nancy. I really want to thank everyone on the panel for this amazing and stimulating discussion. Thank you so very much. To watch the recording of this conversation and the rest of the OIST Foundation’s first anniversary celebration, visit: youtu.be/iteRtIZE_ZI To learn more about how the OIST Foundation is supporting the future of science and technology, visit: oistfoundation.org