Ever get the feeling you have heard this before? Seen it happen somewhere else? The feeling that your connected already but don’t know how and due to that fact, it just feels wrong – turn it off, quick! Somebody call David Attenborough. 

Well, it’s more than likely right that you have felt this way before (well maybe not in your current state).

We are living in the age of unconscious connectedness, a skillset that nature has delivered here on Earth for a millennium, but now humans have emerged and developed a mechanism, albeit technology driven, that enables this unconscious connectedness on almost a natural neuropathic level, predictive but intuitive at the same time. 

The three main forms that have pushed us closer to natures secret networks have been the emergence, adoption and evolution of Machine learning, Deep Learning and now generative intelligence, all of which have a natural and necessary symbiosis, stitched in ever so politely into the behavioural element of privacy (secrecy). Let me draw some comparisons for you and quote the great Forrester of our time, Peter Wohlleben and his work from – The Secret Life of Nature.

Did you know that trees can influence the rotation of the earth?

Or wolves can alter the course of a river?

Or that earthworms control wild boar populations?

Connectedness in nature looks a lot like where we are right now with Ai and enabling the unconscious connectedness.

We humans now harness this unconscious connectedness via technology that indeed rivals/mimics the pure and supreme approach nature has taken to get us to where we are today. Nature being the most trusted form/knowledge on earth now mimicked by technology for human sake, it will offer us so much more IF we choose to trust Ai as much as we trust nature, so why aren’t we already……….

One view is that humans tend to chase every breaking wave, by that I mean, knowing full well there will be another one they hunt the first as if it’s the last. In the words of U2, “every sailor knows that the sea is a friend made enemy”. Respect tends to start its manifestation from fear of the unknown or yet to be experienced. 

Where others look to encircle and almost enslave this new technology (its already been in use in one form or another since the 50’s….) the fastest growing nation on the planet (India) has put it to good use, recently documented in a Time magazine article “Ai by the people, for the people” showcases the way in which a not for profit is harnessing the use of the technology pursuing the advancement of language generative Ai for a country that has 22 official languages and over 780 more indigenous ones. Education and information on a whole are difficult to almost impossible to find online so Ai is enabling a nation to rise and emerge very quickly as a global superpower. 

This NFP model shares the profits directly with-it contributors, who are mostly unemployable and or living on or below the poverty line. Accelerating the Ai and offering education and information to the fastest growing middle and lower class on the planet. 

This will have generational impacts for this nation and our region (remembering we are part of Asia, contrary to popular belief by many “Austrayans” and not part of America or Europe). 

So, this will happen, a person living in the ghettos in India talking into an application, enabling language modelling for information translation will indeed impact the next flight into outer space and possibly even our very existence, not only on Earth but in our solar system. If you consider the parallels of Peter Wohlleben’s work of course. 

So, what next you ask…….

A recent article composed by a leading CEO in local government, Scott Waters from Moreton Bay Regional Council in Queensland, suggests Government has a critical role to play, 

“AI will revolutionise the face of local government by transforming various aspects of governance, decision-making processes, service delivery, and citizen engagement.”

“Furthermore, AI has the potential to improve transparency and accountability in local government. By automating processes and reducing human bias, AI systems can ensure fairer decision-making processes. Additionally, blockchain technology combined with AI can enable secure and transparent record-keeping for transactions and contracts within local government operations.”

…..The opportunity that presents itself to the sector is profound – an unparalleled boost in productivity. The recurring problems of repetitive road maintenance in identical areas will be a thing of the past. Instead, AI will swiftly pinpoint these persistent issues, determine the most effective solution, and align it seamlessly with our long-term financial plans, asset management strategies, and budget programming. Is this the envisioned utopia for Local Government? Yes, it is. Will it grant us additional bandwidth to address our community’s pressing challenges? Certainly. We’ll have the capacity to tackle more intricate problems. Yet, the real question remains: Are we prepared for this transformation, and how long will we delay its implementation?

Well done Mr Scott Waters CEO Moreton Bay Regional Council! Let’s get MBRC familiar with Ai shall we? 

I put it to the rest of you in government, what if we could save 40% of time associated with permit approvals from your local council, the same again for development applications? How about customer service requests actioned immediately? Intuitive preventative maintenance and asset planning for all service industries, it really does go on and on. There is little to no reason why this can’t be applied now other than the education and understanding of the implementation process. 

We are sitting on the solution. Literally. Get off the fence or the fence may disappear entirely. Why do I picture images of Humpty Dumpty right now….

Ai, it’s not an evil tech thing, it’s a systems approach that has been copied from nature, to which many of us are only now just starting to realise and to be honest with you, it’s about bloody time. 

Authored by Joshua Sattler

October 27, 2023