Why to run, if we are in the wrong pathway?
Today, I am surprised to see the avalanche of opinions that this pandemic has unleashed, mainly in the field of organizations, about the need to promote “the development” of people, their training in capacities of “critical thinking “, as well as their initiative and desire for entrepreneurship, together with creativity and innovation capacity.
And I say with surprise because, if we think about it, current society (western or “advanced” society as we like to call it) is built and supported on solid pillars that represent just the opposite, indeed, they represent exactly the opposite; These principles are very well reflected in an axiom of modern marketing that says:
“Happy people don’t consume”
And it is that, people with sufficient “critical capacity” are able to realize how they are being manipulated to consume what they don’t need, or to realize how they are overcharging for low quality services, or how they have been gradually losing economic power or rights, with the demolition of public health, education or justice structures. They are also aware of how the State has ceased to be a means to become itself an end, ceasing to “serve the citizens “and beginning to” use the citizens” to maintain its own structure, oversized in some areas, while in others, very important, it is fading.
Likewise, someone with “critical capacity” and human values looks around and sees the inordinate power that large companies and governments are acquiring thanks to technological advances, originally intended to “free” the human being from the most automated tasks and that, paradoxically, have become the way to “automate” human beings, thus becoming the Achilles heel of freedom and critical thinking.
All of this is interesting because, deep down, what many of the great gurus and the reports produced by those great political and economic actors seem to mean is: we are going to develop people, but only a little bit, only to the point that best serves our purposes, but not to a further level, where they actually become “critical” and can then turn against our interests.
“Paradoxically, the system now needs people to acquire intellectual capacities that, if developed to their full potential, will make people capable of questioning the very foundations of the system”
And this whole situation has became a curious paradox. During the industrial revolution, and from then until a few decades ago, it was possible to “develop” people’s skills and knowledge through education, because the knowledge required was primarily technical, in the purely pragmatic sense that it should serve only to design and to manufacture, as well as to consume products (eg Henry Ford selling cars to his employees). This technical knowledge did not “develop” people in a broader sense, understood from the current humanistic point of view, but expressly qualified them to solve merely operational problems. In fact, our school, the current one, is still anchored, with some exceptions, in the original model of the eighteenth century, designed to exclusively serve the interests of the industrial revolution; that is, memorization and practical application, but no reasoning beyond what is essential, nor critical or analytical thinking. That is reserved for the elites.
However, the situation has radically changed in recent decades. The level of complexity that technologies, products and the social, economic and business structures themselves have reached can no longer be sustained and developed without the intervention of a much deeper and more transversal intelligence. The old recipes of merely “technical” development of people are no longer valid. Paradoxically, the system now needs people to acquire intellectual capacities that, if developed to their full potential, make the people capable of questioning the very foundations of the system. In this way, the current paradox arises, and it is that we cannot develop people’s minds so that it is only critical, creative, innovative and entrepreneurial in just those facets that interest us. Once liberated, the human mind is capable of providing a lot of economic value, but it is also capable of continuing to evolve by itself and asking itself questions that are not the ones to be asked. Could that be why it is so difficult to agree on the basic fundamentals for education? If the Greeks were already clear about it more than 2000 years ago!!! Maybe that is the reason for eliminating the philosophy from the curriculum?
From the market perspective then the dilemma arises about how to “cut off” that intellectual overcapacity that the human mind tends to acquire naturally. Thus, we see how the technology industry and the media, whether on the internet or in the most classic media such as television or the press, have found, in that need to limit people’s intellectual overcapacity, their reason for being, improving themselves to fulfill, synergistically with the industry, that mission. Thus, they have evolved to a point where their main objective is no longer to inform, educate or provide entertainment, but to use all their knowledge and ability to not leave a single free moment in people’s minds; not allowing a single space for dialogue, reflection or introspection. It does not matter what is the theme that motivates us. The “psychological profiles” created by artificial intelligence from our own interactions allow them to maximize the impact that the content, selected ad hoc for us, has on our attention. The ultimate goal is to maintain us “hooked” as long as possible to monetize our attention as the “attention cattle” that we are. In addition, and collaterally, they achieve the effect sought by the system of not allowing the incredible intellectual capacity and reflection, that almost all of us have, to flourish too much.
Oh, and if by chance they can’t achieve it, then let’s feed them with an excess of contradictory information, in which it is impossible to discern between the truth and the lie, or the half-truth, where the truly relevant information does not appear.
At this point, please forgive me but, no matter how hard I try, I don’t see anywhere a real desire to develop the human being to its full potential. What I really see is a clear intention to subject the human intellect to a kind of “tight control” so that it performs extremely well in the complex tasks we face today, but only as far as it is interesting, and no further.
This fact is very well reflected in one of the most intelligent memes that I have seen during this pandemic and that I reproduce below:
The depth of this sentence during a pandemic is brutal, and is directly related to what has already been expressed. Do we really want to develop people? If so, what are we willing to sacrifice to achieve it? The disproportionate benefits of organizations? The techniques of manipulation, coercion, control and alienation of people? The oversized and inefficient parts of the state structures? nothing…? all…? Will we find an original way to develop people, but just to the right extent so that it does not affect the spurious interests of the actors involved?
It will be interesting to see how all these tensions are resolved to achieve, not a new normal, but a “new balance”, since, a priori, it does not seem that we can have both at the same time …
… or maybe yes?
Mario Garcés
