First, a correction. In “Incomprehensible Things,” I was so star struck that I didn't give the accurate story about just how incomprehensible the size of the universe is. Most egregiously, I said that to reach the nearest galaxy to us, traveling at the speed of light (186,000 miles per second), would take four years and three months. Make that the time it would take to reach the nearest star in our galaxy. To reach the nearest large galaxy to us, traveling at the speed of light, would take 2,200,00 years!!!

Onward to other unbelievable things. Sometimes, when talk of war is in the air, I feel a disconnection from this plane of reality. War-making and I could not be comfortable in the same strata anymore that I could co-exist with men in loincloths dragging women by their hair.

It is so obvious to me that the world is up for a shift of perception of unparalleled proportion that I dare to try to do things way beyond my reach to help bring that about. Sometimes I think that if I could express myself clearly enough, at least I could find allies to do what Buddha would have done, as is talked about in this way-out proposal from my new ally, Sri, who has spoken with such clarity that he has recruited me! I hope I am but o­ne of many people who recognize and appreciate what he is doing, and that his call to o­neness spreads like wildfire.

Look at this award winning o­ne-minute video, that the proposal speaks of, first:

Technology Initiatives For Peace by N.S. Sridharan (“Sri”) 

I am a former technologist, computer and software specialist, now retired and dedicated to peace initiatives. Pondering how to bring my tech expertise to bear upon peace efforts, I have been contemplating a framework of sponsored research o­n Technology Initiatives for Peace. I am conceiving of this as an antidote to the fact that in the last 100 years much of technology has been spawned to serve the cause of war – aircraft, radar, lasers, even the Internet.

Now the tide is turning – initiatives like Google, Blogger and Friendster are serving to bring people together to make information open and transparent. New technologies for promoting freedom, cooperation, human dignity, understanding and mutual trust are needed. Research in Information Technology, Biotechnology and Nanotechnology needs the guiding hand of humanity striving for peace and harmony. I am envisioning a series of research initiatives that would spawn a new generation of technologies that serve our mutual cause. Eventually I would like to enable entrepreneurship and special investment funds for a broad range of technology initiatives.

I am searching both for ideas and for a home institution to base these research efforts. I would be delighted to hear back from you: sri@infinisri.com.

Vision

A recently made streaming video by Italian Telecomm won the Epica award for creative achievement:

It is a moving and compelling testament to how much technologies of connectivity and communication have changed the world and how much is made possible. The film starts out with Gandhi (actual historical clip) walking into his hut in Sabarmati. It then cuts over to his face talking to people about o­ne world, uplift for all. We see soldiers in WW2 looking at his talk o­n television, a couple in Italy sitting o­n a park bench and viewing it o­n their cell phone, people gathered in Moscow looking at it in big screen, executives looking at it o­n their desktops in London and in New York, a train screaming through the wilderness of Canada and native Indians viewing his talk o­n a laptop. It paints a compelling and redeeming vision of what is possible with technology when it is applied to peaceful purposes. The tag line is, “Imagine the world today if he could have communicated like this.”

After a brief trip to Bodh Gaya, visiting the Mahabodhi Shrine, meditating at the lotus pond and under the bodhi tree, I remember sitting down at my laptop back at the hotel and penning a journal entry, “What would Buddha have done if he was born in the 21st Century?” I feel he would have embraced technologies of communication, neurobiology, genetics and transportation – and would have created something other than monasteries and Bhikkus with shaven heads walking with begging bowls to develop humility and compassion. What is that other vision? What would Buddha do?

In the last 70 years or 100 years, there has been a lot of advancement in areas of technology (communication, computation, transportation, medicine, ecology). During that time the war machine has enslaved much of this, resulting in nuclear missiles, precision guided bombs, faster than sound planes, night vision, geographical positioning systems, satellite based communication and CBCW and WMD. The list goes o­n.

The peace movement can bring itself up to date and begin to embrace these advanced technologies, but that would be not enough. We need to channel innovation and entrepreneurship and breakthrough technologies to the cause of peace and sustainable development. There are numerous examples of the peace movement and nonviolent action utilizing technologies (fax machines in the 80s, Internet and email in the 90s), but most are serendipitous. Time has come to DRIVE new technologies.

Action

Let us start with a two-semester graduate research seminar o­n the role of technology in war and peace. {Appendix A1} Let us use that course as a means for charting a pathway for the future when technology truly serves the cause of peace, love and nonviolent means of action.

Grand Plan

The course would lead next to the formation of an industry/university consortium – organizations that collectively strive to drive technology that brings greater peace and economic prosperity to humankind. Since entrepreneurship is the hallmark of global technology industries, we expect to attract investors and venture capital firms that wish to play a strong role in the shaping of our future. Eventually we envision that there would be dozens of start-up companies that produce the technologies according to the roadmap delivered via the consortium.

Expected Outcomes

a. Synthesis of a needs-framework driven by peace, economic prosperity, local and regional civic freedom, sustainable living, emergency management and social justice

Using a worldwide perspective, the needs-framework would be the driver for the technology roadmap below. {Appendix A2}

b. Formulation of technology roadmaps – 5 years, 20 year, and 100 year – for anticipated functionalities, needed infrastructure development, and research priorities

Moore’s Law guided the semiconductor industry – Sematech was the coordinating agency that executed the roadmap for that industry. Similarly the technology roadmap will include tactical, strategic and visionary new developments in all areas that affect society. See

c. Capability identification – roster of research centers that have the needed technology research capabilities and those who subscribe to the values expressed in the needs-framework

Based o­n direct contact and site visits, research centers will be positioned as Centers of Excellence, Centers of Development and Centers for Deployment

d. Identification of public funding methods to promote research and basic technology development, and private equity processes to support entrepreneurship in bringing basic technology to pilot stage, application and deployment

A variety of private and public research funding sources will be collected. Compare Micro-Electronics and Computer Research Center in Austin in the 80s which marshaled both DoD and corporate funds and then spun off technology using venture capital.

e. Initiation of a Coordination Office within the scope of the UN, or the US government and EU government, to drive the roadmap and to keep it updated

Our scope is worldwide, not the US. Hence our positioning also needs to be through various world-wide or regional multi-country agencies.

f. In addition to the Coordination Office we would create a self-regulating community to refine and drive the roadmap, along the lines of the Open Source model, a peer-to-peer community that keeps all the resulting technology open, common and shared property. [Open Source is about how to build a system for the world's people. – CK Prahlad at the World Economic Forum]

 Brief Biography (full CV available)

Dr. Sri (pronounced Shree) Sridharan was the Chief Architect for Knowledge Management at Intel until 2000. At Intel he was widely known and recognized for his vision and strategy that balances business savvy with pragmatism and people sensitivity. He attended the MAKE2000 conference in London to receive an award for Intel as a “Most Admired Knowledge Enterprise” (MAKE). He is a trained storyteller and is the initiator of various storytelling initiatives for Intel. He also participated in Manufacturing Systems Architecture, Enterprise Application Integration, and Strategic Information Systems. At Intel University, he taught courses o­n Leadership.

Prior to Intel he spent many years as an academic (Stanford, Rutgers, TU Munich) and managing R&D groups in several industries (BBN, FMC, Intel). At BBN Labs, he was Principal Investigator for Knowledge Representation and Natural Language contact from DoD/Darpa. He presented a paper at Darpa’s “Future of Computing” conference. At FMC, he led various AI applications in manufacturing operations as well as advanced military vehicles. For his team’s work o­n the next generation fighter pilot assistant, the team was given an award of excellence from the US Air Force.

Sri’s specialty is Artificial Intelligence and his PhD (1971) is in Computer Science. His work in AI explored applications in organic chemistry, psychology, genetics, manufacturing and legal reasoning. He was Program Chair of IJCAI-89 (International Joint Conference o­n Artificial Intelligence) and served o­n the editorial board of Artificial Intelligence. He is founding editor of the Pitman Research Notes series o­n Artificial Intelligence.

Sri is presently co-founder of a consortium called TrustNet that brings technology to bear constructively o­n trust, making sense and listening. He currently is developing a book for corporate executives o­n Leadership, Strategy and Trust. He is advisor and mentor to several start-up companies in California and Arizona. He is founder of a new company, Dil Ki Awaaz (Happy Hearts), which aims to bring tele-cardiometry to all of India that is high quality and very affordable to improve heart health care. He is actively involved in several initiatives to improve education and community-based leadership in poor regions of the world. He makes his home in Phoenix AZ and usually spends summers in the Bay Area in California. He travels to India, Bali and Thailand frequently.

For the few years before Lex Hixon's untimely death — at 53,  ten years ago — I used to live in the rarified atmosphere of this great ally of mine, who was as intoxicated as Sri is by dreams of o­neness and had big ideas, as Sri does, about what to do to tune the world in. Lex was a powerful presence who delighted in empowering me — I was in heaven and Lex was my angel. Recently I re-read a transcript of a night Lex led at my house, which re-connected me to his heavenly domain: THE CORE OF ALL KINGDOMS: An Exploration of Non-Duality

PS: I'm o­n the radio tomorrow night (Wednesday), 5-7 pst (news is first so maybe it's 5:15 for me), talking about crop circles. It will stream o­n the Net at