The Promise and Pitfalls of AI in Improving Our Moral Judgment

Can AI Help Us Be Better People?

We've all heard the hype about AI revolutionizing the world, but what about revolutionizing ourselves? Can AI truly help us become better people? Jon Rueda, a Ph.D. candidate, and La Caixa INPhINIT Fellow at the University of Granada thinks so. In a recent article, he co-wrote with Bianca Rodriguez, they argue that AI can play a role in improving our moral judgment.

In their paper, Rueda and Rodriguez discuss the concept of an AI-based voice assistant, known as the Socratic assistant or SocrAI, which aims to help improve our reasoning and moral decision-making through dialogue. The idea is to emulate the Socratic method and provide guidance on complex moral issues without dictating what is good or bad. However,

What is a "Polycrisis" and Why You Should Care About It

The World Economic Forum (WEF) recently released its “Global Risks Report 2023”, warning that eroding geopolitical cooperation will contribute to a potential "polycrisis" of interrelated environmental, geopolitical, and socioeconomic risks relating to the supply of and demand for natural resources. The term "polycrisis" was popularized by historian Adam Tooze and has become a buzzword in the world of business and finance. But what exactly is a "polycrisis" and why should you care about it?

A "Polycrisis" is a concatenation of shocks that generate crises that trigger crises in other systems, making the combined effect far worse than the sum of its parts. The notion of a "polycrisis" is based on the idea that the world is becoming increasingly interconnected and complex, making it vulnerable to an interconnected, complex global catastrophe.

Bureaucratic Incompetence: A Deliberate Sabotage or Just Human Failure?

As a writer, I have often gazed upon the intimidating maze of government and corporate entities that control our lives, and wondered what could be the root cause of their perplexing inefficiency. 

Is it due to the human failings of managers and executives, as the theory of The Peter Principle suggests? 

Or is it a result of something more insidious, a product of deliberate sabotage, as hinted at by the declassified Simple Sabotage Field Manual written by the CIA's precursor, the Office of Strategic Services? 

In this article, I delve into the latter possibility, exploring the timeless relevance of the manual's instructions and how they seem to mirror the dysfunctionality that plagues modern-day organizations. Brace yourself for a journey that will make you question the reality of bureaucracy and laugh ruefully at the same time.