Inventing a Better World

I find that most of us delude ourselves by thinking that what we do is important. I know countless actors, artists, social workers and of course preachers who see their job as no less than a cosmic duty to fulfill a purpose. In general when divine consultation comes into the discussion I dismiss it as either completely delusional, or utterly arrogant. Rather than judge people who have the audacity to claim a calling for a profession, I should be more humble myself and think about why I do the things I do, and whether it is not the same human drive of self importance that is calling me to business, teaching, music and most obviously writing all of these blogs. I am aware that part of anything we do, other than roll out of bed, and watch football all day, has some sort of pointless, yet intuitive feeling of purpose attached to it. Sometimes there is an obvious benefit to what I do, like some small philanthropy, but most of the time I feel as if my contribution is myself, which if I contemplate this further doesn't hold much weight. There are very few if any people that the world could simply not do without, and a professor with a specialty in rheology, who starts tiny tech companies, and plays experimental free jazz music is certainly not one of them (yes that is me!). The accepted evolutionary evidence for this type of mild narcissism was described in the famous Richard Dawkins book "The Selfish Gene" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Selfish_Gene ) , and in many more recent genetics studies, which find ancestral evidence of a time when knowledge of our own mortality may actually have been a useful survival tool. This is not impossible to imagine, even as it now, in the age of western wealth, can seem paralyzing. Imagine that in some stage of our evolution we no longer needed the fur that protected our primate cousins, as we could build shelter and prepare clothing. At the same time those technologies were rather basic, making life less enjoyable than we might want. We had hunting tools, while other primates had none (or at least only very basic ones). We eventually had language and music. Which of these two came first is a long debate that I am greatly interested in, but since I have no reason to know the answer to it, will not even take a guess. It must have been that survival was not the efficient sort that many animals experience. We were not trying to survive momentary harm only, but the entire season, and then multiple generations. Death then could be pondered, and purpose became an abstraction, which was different from the rest of the animals. This is so basic and obvious that I don't know why I mention it here, except that I believe this unique survival instant is very relevant not only to the things I am doing with my life, but with the larger moral decisions that we are faced with as humans collectively.
After reading Jeffrey Sachs' wonderful book "The Common Wealth", (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Sachs) I was again moved by his optimism, and saw my place in his global vision from environmental solutions, to ending world poverty. Dr. Sachs taps into that part of me, and likely others, who are self confident (or self delusional depending on your perspective) to think that we can participate in fixing the world. His statement that we must look at what is needed, not what others say is "politically impossible", is so attractive and inspiring. As a technologist and small time entrepreneur, I am attracted to the often criticized sentiment that we can invent our way out of all of our problems. Though Sachs is much more nuanced than this, as he addresses political, economical and geographical issues, I do think that in all of this there is a sentiment that technology created and dispersed with the right intentions, and with appropriate resources could indeed solve most problems. Whenever I speak about this, I am reminded that it is more complicated. When I wrote a blog about the importance of thinking about GM foods and human genetics research in the same way, I was criticized by friends who are very much trying to find other, non-technical solutions to poverty and climate change. Still everything I read I think of as a technical challenge that can be solved.
As inspiration I often go to the classic sources. Last week however I was surprised when a universally praised genius actually discouraged me some. I was looking at the scientific notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, because as with generations of others, he has let me see that human potential for creating art, technology and business are all possible. I may have some arrogance, but not the type of arrogance that would think that comparing me to Da Vinci is even a worthwhile thought. Still, looking at a master is what keeps museums going, and biographies selling, and for me it often works. This time though it had a rather sobering effect on me. I looked through the pages of his detailed drawings and explanations of inventions, none of which were to be realized. These were stunning, and brilliant, but because of the lack of supporting technology available in renaissance Europe, they were impossible. We can look at this and say that they were still brilliant and important because they inspired engineers of the future. This is likely true in an abstract way, as many of us looking at them are motivated to find our own creative vision. Still the times were so wrong for them that by the time the inventions could be created which were in some ways similar to Da Vinci's, his designs seemed simplistic and wrong. There is no question that he was right to do them, because they were every bit as imaginative as his other creative endeavors. The more practical, and at the same time existential question though is; did he invent solutions that helped the world? In a purely practical sense he did not, which is shocking. He had designs for water relocation systems that would end wars without violence, but violence continued. He had designs for machinery that would not destroy peasant workers, but they didn't yet work. The list goes on. So, they were indeed ingenious efforts, but if really pressed on whether he invented the world out of any problems, I would have to answer no.
A counter argument to this has to do with the exponential rate of technology growth that we are experiencing now. For Da Vinci, a concept for a flying machine just couldn't happen in a few generations. Now the distance between imagination and integration is so small that we all can experiment and experience it. What I mean by this can be seen in some profound examples, and some less important but still telling ones. On the latter point, I recently heard an interview with James Cameron about the technology that he used for "Avatar". He said that he had written "Avatar" in the early 1990's before Titanic, but because the technology wasn't available to make the movie as he wanted, he made Titanic first, and waited (helped a bit too) and eventually cameras, computer graphics, and optics caught up with his vision. This is a shame for Da Vinci that things couldn't move as fast in his time. The other example really did save lives, and very quickly. 10 years ago it was discovered that the HPV virus was responsible for 95% of all cases of cervical cancer. This is an incredibly high figure. There had not been an HPV vaccine in the past, but because of this new knowledge a vaccine was developed very quickly and it saves thousands of lives. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have recently donated huge quantities of the vaccine to the world's poorest countries.
So this leaves an important question: Are we diluting ourselves that what we do is important? I would say that we might be doing just the opposite. We might be thinking too small. It is possible that I am telling myself that it is important that I play jazz on a Friday at a bar. This is underselling real important contributions I could be making, either as a composer of an important work, a producer of a film that changes the way people think, or more likely by inventing a solution to a technical problem that could save lives or save the planet. We should all be inventing everyday in notebooks (computer or otherwise) like Da Vinci did, because it is now possible for the wildest of ideas to become reality.