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Engineering in the
last century gave us large, systematic, exciting new ways to sense
and measure our environment, in the process creating (and more
importantly distributing) massive universal social benefits,
not only for people everywhere, but even for other species in our
ecosystem. Satellite mapping of the earth, combined with the GPS
network, has given anyone anywhere the ability to map geo-space with
a precision and utility unimagined by our ancestors. Similarly, VLS
Radio Telescope Arrays have given us the ability to map and
understand outer space and our position in the universe in ways
previously impossible. Yet for one of the most important
environments of human well-being--social space--we don’t even
have a good map, let alone an active sensor array. And such an array
would be, for the social sciences, the kind of engineering feat that
the telescope has been for astronomy, and the microscope for biology.
For Peace
Engineering, a good map of social space is both a necessary technical
foundation, a worthy
research
challenge, an eminently fundable proposition, and--bonus--a very
buildable project, requiring no new technology. And, through a
convenient and fortuitous alignment of pre-existing technologies, it
is a massively
collaborative
research project that, it turns out, any engineer (or engineering
student) in any workplace in the world, has multiple opportunities
and incentives to participate in. In this talk you will get an
overview of this fascinating opportunity, and an introduction to how
you can
be a part of this
inspiring project.
A former relief-worker, investment banker, and social
entrepreneur, Mark Nelson founded the Peace Innovation Lab to create
innovative and profitable solutions that create positive behavioral
change. Nelson draws from his decade of research experience to advise
businesses, NGOs, universities, and governments on how they can
leverage open-innovation platforms and use mass collaboration tools
to influence human behavior. Nelson’s research lies at the
intersection of mass collaboration and mass interpersonal persuasion
and is focused on generating resources to scale up collective
positive human behavior change. He has described a functional,
quantitative definition of peace in terms of technology-mediated
engagement, automated ways to measure peace (both at the neighborhood
and global level); and developed a formal structural description for
peace data. He aims to create an entirely new, profitable industry,
where positive peace is delivered as a service.
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