So, imagine that you had your smartphone miniaturized and hooked up directly to your brain. If you had this sort of brain chip, you'd be able to upload and download to the internet at the speed of thought. Accessing social media or Wikipedia would be a lot like -- well, from the inside at least -- like consulting your own memory. It would be as easy and as intimate as thinking. But would it make it easier for you to know what's true? Just because a way of accessing information is faster it doesn't mean it's more reliable, of course, and it doesn't mean that we would all interpret it the same way. And it doesn't mean that you would be any better at evaluating it. In fact, you might even be worse, because, you know, more data, less time for evaluation.
Zamislite da ste umanjili svoj pametni telefon i direktno ga prikačili na svoj mozak. Kada biste imali takvu vrstu moždanog čipa, mogli biste da postavljate i skidate stvari sa interneta brzinom misaonog toka. Pristupanje društvenim mrežama ili Vikipediji bilo bi kao - pa, barem iznutra - kao da tražite informacije u svom pamćenju. Bilo bi to jednostavno i intimno poput razmišljanja. Ali da li bi vam to olakšalo da znate šta je istinito? Samo zato što je način pristupanja informacijama brži, to ne znači da su one pouzdanije, naravno, niti da bismo ih svi tumačili na isti način. To ne znači ni da bi vam išta bolje išlo njihovo procenjivanje. Zapravo, možda bi vam išlo i gore, jer, znate, više podataka, manje vremena za procenjivanje.
Something like this is already happening to us right now. We already carry a world of information around in our pockets, but it seems as if the more information we share and access online, the more difficult it can be for us to tell the difference between what's real and what's fake. It's as if we know more but understand less.
Nešto slično ovome nam se sada već dešava. Već nosimo sa sobom čitav svet informacija u svom džepu, ali se čini kao da, što više informacija delimo i što im više pristupamo onlajn, može nam biti teže da razlikujemo ono što je istinito i ono što je lažno. Kao da znamo više, ali razumemo manje.
Now, it's a feature of modern life, I suppose, that large swaths of the public live in isolated information bubbles. We're polarized: not just over values, but over the facts. One reason for that is, the data analytics that drive the internet get us not just more information, but more of the information that we want. Our online life is personalized; everything from the ads we read to the news that comes down our Facebook feed is tailored to satisfy our preferences. And so while we get more information, a lot of that information ends up reflecting ourselves as much as it does reality. It ends up, I suppose, inflating our bubbles rather than bursting them. And so maybe it's no surprise that we're in a situation, a paradoxical situation, of thinking that we know so much more, and yet not agreeing on what it is we know.
To je karakteristika savremenog života, pretpostavljam, da širok krug javnosti živi u izolovanim mehurima informacija. Polarizovani smo ne samo u pogledu vrednosti, već i činjenica. Jedan razlog tome je što nam analitika podataka koja pokreće internet pruža ne samo više informacija, već više informacija koje želimo. Naš život na internetu je personalizovan; sve od reklama koje čitamo do vesti koje nam stižu putem Fejsbukovih ažuriranih novosti prilagođeno je da zadovolji naše preferencije. Tako, dok dobijamo više informacija, dosta tih informacija na kraju predstavlja naš odraz isto koliko i odraz stvarnosti. Na kraju se dešava da, pretpostavljam, naduvaju naš mehur umesto da ga rasprsnu. Tako da možda nije iznenađenje da smo u paradoksalnoj situaciji da mislimo da znamo toliko više stvari, a da se ipak ne slažemo oko toga šta znamo.
So how are we going to solve this problem of knowledge polarization? One obvious tactic is to try to fix our technology, to redesign our digital platforms, so as to make them less susceptible to polarization. And I'm happy to report that many smart people at Google and Facebook are working on just that. And these projects are vital. I think that fixing technology is obviously really important, but I don't think technology alone, fixing it, is going to solve the problem of knowledge polarization. I don't think that because I don't think, at the end of the day, it is a technological problem. I think it's a human problem, having to do with how we think and what we value.
Pa, kako ćemo rešiti problem polarizacije znanja? Jedna očigledna taktika je da pokušamo da popravimo našu tehnologiju, da iznova osmislimo naše digitalne platforme, tako da ih učinimo manje podložnim polarizaciji. Drago mi je da vas obavestim da mnogi pametni ljudi u Guglu i Fejsbuku rade baš na tome. Ovi projekti su od vitalnog značaja. Mislim da je popravljanje tehnologije očigledno veoma značajno, ali ne mislim da će tehnologija sama po sebi, njeno popravljanje, rešiti problem polarizacije znanja. Ne mislim tako jer ne mislim da je, na kraju krajeva, u pitanju tehnološki problem. Smatram da je ovo ljudski problem, da ima veze sa time kako razmišljamo i sa onim što vrednujemo.
In order to solve it, I think we're going to need help. We're going to need help from psychology and political science. But we're also going to need help, I think, from philosophy. Because to solve the problem of knowledge polarization, we're going to need to reconnect with one fundamental, philosophical idea: that we live in a common reality. The idea of a common reality is like, I suppose, a lot of philosophical concepts: easy to state but mysteriously difficult to put into practice. To really accept it, I think we need to do three things, each of which is a challenge right now.
Da bismo ga rešili, mislim da će nam biti potrebna pomoć. Biće nam potrebna pomoć psihologije i političkih nauka, ali će nam, takođe, biti potrebna pomoć, prema mom mišljenju, filozofije. Jer da bismo rešili problem polarizacije znanja, moraćemo da se iznova povežemo sa jednom osnovnom filozofskom idejom: da živimo u zajedničkoj stvarnosti. Ideja o zajedničkoj stvarnosti je poput, pretpostavljam, mnogih filozofskih koncepata - lako ju je iskazati, ali misteriozno teško primeniti. Da bismo je zaista prihvatili, mislim da treba da sprovedemo tri stvari, od kojih svaka trenutno predstavlja izazov.
First, we need to believe in truth. You might have noticed that our culture is having something of a troubled relationship with that concept right now. It seems as if we disagree so much that, as one political commentator put it not long ago, it's as if there are no facts anymore. But that thought is actually an expression of a sort of seductive line of argument that's in the air. It goes like this: we just can't step outside of our own perspectives; we can't step outside of our biases. Every time we try, we just get more information from our perspective. So, this line of thought goes, we might as well admit that objective truth is an illusion, or it doesn't matter, because either we'll never know what it is, or it doesn't exist in the first place.
Kao prvo, moramo da verujemo u istinu. Možda ste primetili da je naša kultura trenutno u nekakvoj problematičnoj vezi sa ovim konceptom. Deluje kao da se toliko ne slažemo da, kako je to jedan politički komentator nedavno formulisao, kao da više ne postoje činjenice. Ali ta misao je zapravo izraz nekakve zavodljive argumentacije koja je prisutna u vazduhu. Ide ovako nekako. Jednostavno ne možemo iskoračiti iz svoje perspektive; ne možemo izaći iz svojih predrasuda. Svaki put kada pokušamo, samo dobijamo više informacija iz sopstvene perspektive. Tako, prema ovakvom toku misli, mogli bismo priznati da je objektivna istina iluzija, ili da nije bitna jer je ili nikada nećemo spoznati, ili uopšte ni ne postoji.
That's not a new philosophical thought -- skepticism about truth. During the end of the last century, as some of you know, it was very popular in certain academic circles. But it really goes back all the way to the Greek philosopher Protagoras, if not farther back. Protagoras said that objective truth was an illusion because "man is the measure of all things." Man is the measure of all things. That can seem like a bracing bit of realpolitik to people, or liberating, because it allows each of us to discover or make our own truth.
To nije nova filozofska misao - skepticizam u pogledu istine. Krajem prošlog veka, kao što znaju neki među vama, bio je vrlo popularan u izvesnim akademskim krugovima. Ali zapravo datira još od grčkog filozofa Protagore, ako ne i ranije. Protagora je rekao da je objektivna istina iluzija jer „čovek je mera svih stvari“. Čovek je mera svih stvari. Ovo može delovati kao okrepljujući deo realpolitike ili oslobađajući, jer svima nama omogućava da otkrijemo ili stvorimo svoju istinu.
But actually, I think it's a bit of self-serving rationalization disguised as philosophy. It confuses the difficulty of being certain with the impossibility of truth. Look -- of course it's difficult to be certain about anything; we might all be living in "The Matrix." You might have a brain chip in your head feeding you all the wrong information. But in practice, we do agree on all sorts of facts. We agree that bullets can kill people. We agree that you can't flap your arms and fly. We agree -- or we should -- that there is an external reality and ignoring it can get you hurt.
Ali, zapravo, mislim da je ovo pomalo racionalizacija koja služi samoj sebi, prerušena u filozofiju. Meša poteškoće da se bude siguran u nešto sa nemogućnošću istine. Vidite - naravno da je teško biti siguran u bilo šta; možda svi živimo u „Matriksu“. Možda imate čip u mozgu koji vam daje pogrešne informacije. Ali u praksi se slažemo oko raznoraznih činjenica. Slažemo se da meci mogu ubiti ljude. Slažemo se da ne možete zalepršati rukama i poleteti. Slažemo se - ili bi trebalo - da postoji spoljašnja stvarnost i da vam njeno ignorisanje može naškoditi.
Nonetheless, skepticism about truth can be tempting, because it allows us to rationalize away our own biases. When we do that, we're sort of like the guy in the movie who knew he was living in "The Matrix" but decided he liked it there, anyway. After all, getting what you want feels good. Being right all the time feels good. So, often it's easier for us to wrap ourselves in our cozy information bubbles, live in bad faith, and take those bubbles as the measure of reality.
Ipak, skepticizam u pogledu istine može biti primamljiv, jer nam omogućava da racionalizujemo svoje predrasude. Kada to činimo, na neki način smo poput lika u filmu koji je znao da živi u „Matriksu“ ali je odlučio da mu se tamo sviđa bez obzira na to. Na kraju krajeva, dobar je osećaj dobiti ono što želite. Dobar je osećaj stalno biti u pravu. Tako nam je često lakše da se zavučemo u udobne mehure informacija, živimo u obmani i prihvatimo te mehure kao merilo stvarnosti.
An example, I think, of how this bad faith gets into our action is our reaction to the phenomenon of fake news. The fake news that spread on the internet during the American presidential election of 2016 was designed to feed into our biases, designed to inflate our bubbles. But what was really striking about it was not just that it fooled so many people. What was really striking to me about fake news, the phenomenon, is how quickly it itself became the subject of knowledge polarization; so much so, that the very term -- the very term -- "fake news" now just means: "news story I don't like." That's an example of the bad faith towards the truth that I'm talking about.
Jedan primer, prema meni, načina na koji ova obmana otpočinje je naša reakcija na fenomen lažnih vesti. Lažne vesti koje su se širile po internetu tokom američkih predsedničkih izbora 2016. godine osmišljene su tako da pothranjuju naše predrasude, da naduvaju naše mehure. Ono što je zaista bilo upadljivo u vezi sa time nije samo to da su prevarile mnogo ljudi. Ono što je za mene bilo upečatljivo u vezi sa lažnim vestima, fenomenom, je koliko je brzo postao povod polarizacije znanja; toliko da sam termin „lažne vesti“ sada samo znači „vest koja mi se ne sviđa“. To je primer obmane protiv istine o kojoj govorim.
But the really, I think, dangerous thing about skepticism with regard to truth is that it leads to despotism. "Man is the measure of all things" inevitably becomes "The Man is the measure of all things." Just as "every man for himself" always seems to turn out to be "only the strong survive."
Ali zaista opasna stvar, po meni, u vezi sa skepticizmom u pogledu istine je da vodi despotizmu. „Čovek je mera svih stvari“ neizbežno postaje „jedan čovek je mera svih stvari“. Baš kao što „svako za sebe“ uvek ispadne na kraju „samo jaki opstaju“.
At the end of Orwell's "1984," the thought policeman O'Brien is torturing the protagonist Winston Smith into believing two plus two equals five. What O'Brien says is the point, is that he wants to convince Smith that whatever the party says is the truth, and the truth is whatever the party says. And what O'Brien knows is that once this thought is accepted, critical dissent is impossible. You can't speak truth to power if the power speaks truth by definition.
Na kraju Orvelove „Hiljadu devetsto osamdeset četvrte“ pripadnik policije misli О'Вгајеn muči glavnog lika Vinstona Smita da bi poverovao da je dva plus dva jednako pet. Ono što O'Brajen kaže je poenta, a to je da on hoće da ubedi Smita da je šta god partija kaže istina, kao i da je istina šta god partija kaže da jeste. O'Brajen zna da je, kada se ta misao prihvati, kritičko neslaganje nemoguće. Ne možete govoriti istinu moći ako moć prema definiciji govori istinu.
I said that in order to accept that we really live in a common reality, we have to do three things. The first thing is to believe in truth. The second thing can be summed up by the Latin phrase that Kant took as the motto for the Enlightenment: "Sapere aude," or "dare to know." Or as Kant wants, "to dare to know for yourself."
To sam naveo jer, da bismo prihvatili da zaista živimo u zajedničkoj stvarnosti, moramo da uradimo tri stvari. Prva stvar je da verujemo u istinu. Druga stvar se može sažeti pomoću latinske fraze koju je Kant uzeo kao moto prosvetiteljstva: „Sapere aude“ ili „usudi se da znaš“, ili, kako to Kant želi: „usudi se da sam saznaš“.
I think in the early days of the internet, a lot of us thought that information technology was always going to make it easier for us to know for ourselves, and of course in many ways, it has. But as the internet has become more and more a part of our lives, our reliance on it, our use of it, has become often more passive. Much of what we know today we Google-know. We download prepackaged sets of facts and sort of shuffle them along the assembly line of social media. Now, Google-knowing is useful precisely because it involves a sort of intellectual outsourcing. We offload our effort onto a network of others and algorithms. And that allows us, of course, to not clutter our minds with all sorts of facts. We can just download them when we need them. And that's awesome.
Mislim da je na začetku interneta mnogo nas mislilo da će nam informaciona tehnologija uvek olakšavati da sami saznajemo i, naravno, umnogome i jeste. Ali kako je internet sve više postao deo našeg života, naše oslanjanje na njega i korišćenje često je postajalo pasivnije. Veliki deo onoga što danas znamo, znamo preko Gugla. Skidamo unapred upakovane skupove činjenica i nekako ih povlačimo na traci društvenih mreža. Saznavanje putem Gugla je korisno upravo zato što podrazumeva neku vrstu intelektualnih spoljnih usluga. Rasterećujemo se naprezanja na račun mreže drugih ljudi i algoritama. To nam omogućava, naravno, da ne zatrpavamo glavu najrazličitijim podacima. Možemo prosto da ih skinemo kada su nam potrebni i to je sjajno.
But there's a difference between downloading a set of facts and really understanding how or why those facts are as they are. Understanding why a particular disease spreads, or how a mathematical proof works, or why your friend is depressed, involves more than just downloading. It's going to require, most likely, doing some work for yourself: having a little creative insight; using your imagination; getting out into the field; doing the experiment; working through the proof; talking to someone.
Međutim, postoji razlika između skidanja skupa podataka i stvarnog razumevanja kako i zašto su ti podaci takvi kakvi jesu. Razumevanje razloga zašto se određena bolest širi, kako funkcioniše neki matematički dokaz ili zašto je vaš prijatelj depresivan podrazumeva više od jednostavnog skidanja podataka. To će iziskivati, najverovatnije, da sami uložite nešto truda: sticanje malo kreativnog uvida, korišćenje mašte, izlaženje na teren, sprovođenje eksperimenta, rad sa dokazima, razgovor sa nekim.
Now, I'm not saying, of course, that we should stop Google-knowing. I'm just saying we shouldn't overvalue it, either. We need to find ways of encouraging forms of knowing that are more active, and don't always involve passing off our effort into our bubble. Because the thing about Google-knowing is that too often it ends up being bubble-knowing. And bubble-knowing means always being right. But daring to know, daring to understand, means risking the possibility that you could be wrong. It means risking the possibility that what you want and what's true are different things.
Ne poručujem, naravno, da treba da prestanemo da saznajemo putem Gugla; samo kažem da ne treba ni da precenjujemo to saznanje. Treba da pronađemo načine za podsticanje načina saznavanja koji su aktivniji i koji ne podrazumevaju da ćemo uvek prebaciti trud na svoj mehur. Jer stvar je u tome što se saznavanje putem Gugla često završi kao saznavanje putem mehura, a saznavanje putem mehura znači uvek biti u pravu. A usuditi se da znate, usuditi se da razumete podrazumeva rizikovanje mogućnosti da grešite. Podrazumeva rizikovanje mogućnosti da su ono što želite i ono što je istina različite stvari.
Which brings me to the third thing that I think we need to do if we want to accept that we live in a common reality. That third thing is: have a little humility. By humility here, I mean epistemic humility, which means, in a sense, knowing that you don't know it all. But it also means something more than that. It means seeing your worldview as open to improvement by the evidence and experience of others. Seeing your worldview as open to improvement by the evidence and experience of others. That's more than just being open to change. It's more than just being open to self-improvement. It means seeing your knowledge as capable of enhancing or being enriched by what others contribute. That's part of what is involved in recognizing there's a common reality that you, too, are responsible to.
To me dovodi do treće stvari koju mislim da treba da činimo ako hoćemo da prihvatimo da živimo u zajedničkoj stvarnosti. Ta treća stvar je da posedujemo malo skromnosti. Pod skromnošću ovde podrazumevam epistemičku skromnost, što znači, na neki način, znati da ne znate sve, ali takođe označava više od toga. Podrazumeva da vidite svoj pogled na svet kao otvoren za poboljšanje kroz dokaze i iskustvo drugih. Da vidite svoj pogled na svet kao otvoren za poboljšanje kroz dokaze i iskustvo drugih. To je više od otvorenosti za promenu. To je više od jednostavne otvorenosti za lični napredak. Podrazumeva da sagledavate svoje znanje tako da je u stanju da se poboljša ili obogati kroz doprinos drugih. To je deo onoga što obuhvata prepoznavanje da postoji zajednička stvarnost za koju ste i vi odgovorni.
I don't think it's much of a stretch to say that our society is not particularly great at enhancing or encouraging that sort of humility. That's partly because, well, we tend to confuse arrogance and confidence. And it's partly because, well, you know, arrogance is just easier. It's just easier to think of yourself as knowing it all. It's just easier to think of yourself as having it all figured out. But that's another example of the bad faith towards the truth that I've been talking about.
Mislim da nije preterano reći da naše društvo nije naročito sjajno u pogledu poboljšanja ili podsticanja takve vrste skromnosti. To je delom zato što, pa, znamo da pomešamo aroganciju i samopouzdanje, a delom je i zato što, pa, znate, arogancija je jednostavno lakša. Lakše je da imate mišljenje o sebi kao sveznalici. Lakše je razmišljati o sebi kao da ste sve dokučili. Ali to je još jedan primer obmane naspram istine o kojoj sam govorio.
So the concept of a common reality, like a lot of philosophical concepts, can seem so obvious, that we can look right past it and forget why it's important. Democracies can't function if their citizens don't strive, at least some of the time, to inhabit a common space, a space where they can pass ideas back and forth when -- and especially when -- they disagree. But you can't strive to inhabit that space if you don't already accept that you live in the same reality. To accept that, we've got to believe in truth, we've got to encourage more active ways of knowing. And we've got to have the humility to realize that we're not the measure of all things.
Stoga koncept zajedničke stvarnosti, kao mnogi filozofski koncepti, može delovati tako očigledno da ga možemo prevideti i zaboraviti zašto je važan. Demokratija ne može funkcionisati ako njeni građani ne nastoje, bar neko vreme, da nastanjuju zajednički prostor, prostor u kome mogu razmenjivati ideje kada - a pogotovo kada - se ne slažu. Ali ne možete nastojati da obitavate u tom prostoru ako niste već prihvatili da živite u istoj stvarnosti. Da bismo to prihvatili, moramo verovati u istinu, moramo podsticati aktivnije načine saznavanja i moramo posedovati skromnost da uvidimo da nismo mera svih stvari.
We may yet one day realize the vision of having the internet in our brains. But if we want that to be liberating and not terrifying, if we want it to expand our understanding and not just our passive knowing, we need to remember that our perspectives, as wondrous, as beautiful as they are, are just that -- perspectives on one reality.
Možda ćemo tek jednog dana ostvariti viziju da imamo internet u svom mozgu. Ali ako želimo da to bude nešto što oslobađa a ne zastrašuje, ako želimo da proširimo svoje razumevanje a ne samo pasivno saznavanje, moramo da upamtimo da naše perspektive, koliko god bile čudesne i lepe, jesu samo to - perspektive vezane za jednu stvarnost.
Thank you.
Hvala.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)