Dubai

Council on the Ageing Society, at the Summit of the Global Agenda

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Head­ing to Dubai today (a 15-hour direct flight!), com­ing back to San Fran­cis­co next Monday.

Last year I wrote about this remark­able new ini­tia­tive by the imagesWorld Eco­nom­ic Forum here (pro­pos­al) and here (reflec­tions, emerg­ing dis­cus­sion). This year’s update:

Twit­ter: #WEF­Dubai. Will tweet dur­ing the event, and blog about it next week.

Planet Earth 2.0: Yes We Can

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Imag­ine see­ing a top sheik from Dubai, wrapped in tra­di­tion­al Arab cloth­ing, exclaim “Yes We Can” in front of the 800 experts gath­ered dur­ing the Sum­mit of the Glob­al Agen­da that just took place in Dubai, co-orga­nized by the World Eco­nom­ic Forum and the Gov­ern­ment of Dubai. This same sheik added that “we build the future with our own hands”.

You can read more about the main points of the Glob­al Agen­da Coun­cils con­ver­sa­tion here: Dis­cus­sion High­lights. Below go some of my own still-jet­lagged reflections.

The finan­cial cri­sis has made obvi­ous the obvi­ous: that we live in a tru­ly new and glob­al world.

And that busi­ness as usu­al will lead to glob­al dis­as­ter — we need new approach­es to col­lec­tive­ly adapt to and thrive in this new envi­ron­ment. The answer is not to go back to any old par­a­digm, which sim­ply will not work in a new real­i­ty, but to imag­ine and build a bet­ter new way of doing things.

Some of the atten­dants urged us to “reboot” the sys­tem. I don’t think that a “reboot” is enough — we need to upgrade to a new oper­at­ing sys­tem. We can call it Plan­et Earth 2.0.Based on the group dis­cus­sion we had on Sun­day morn­ing, let me pro­pose some of the archi­tec­tur­al prin­ci­ples that should under­lie any emerg­ing Plan­et Earth 2.0 oper­at­ing sys­tem. [Read more…] about Plan­et Earth 2.0: Yes We Can

Online Cognitive Therapy OKed by Health Insurance

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My apolo­gies for not writ­ing in a few days…the Glob­al Agen­da Sum­mit in Dubai has required all my atten­tion — I will sum­ma­rize the great expe­ri­ence when I land back in San Fran­cis­co tomor­row night.

The con­cepts of night and day do become chal­leng­ing when work­ing for a few days in a place with a 12-hour time dif­fer­ence with one’s home base. Sleep is indeed very impor­tant to main­tain top cog­ni­tive shape…which leads me to a fas­ci­nat­ing news announcement:

Health insur­ance firms offer­ing online cog­ni­tive ther­a­py for insom­nia (Los Ange­les Times)

- “help­ing con­sumers get a good night’s sleep has become a pri­or­i­ty for most of the top-tier U.S. health insur­ance com­pa­nies, includ­ing Well­Point, Aet­na, Cigna, Kaiser Per­ma­nente and sev­er­al Blue Cross plans. Their new pro­grams don’t involve sleep­ing pills. Instead, insur­ers are advo­cat­ing the use of cog­ni­tive behav­ior ther­a­py. Tra­di­tion­al­ly, the ther­a­py has been done large­ly through face-to-face ses­sions, but many of the pro­grams are now avail­able online.”

- “And use of sleep­ing pills has sky­rock­et­ed. A study this year [Read more…] about Online Cog­ni­tive Ther­a­py OKed by Health Insurance

Update: Global Consortium for Neurocognitive Fitness Innovation

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As men­tioned before, the World Eco­nom­ic Forum asked me to write “an 800 words sum­ma­ry of your most com­pelling action­able idea on the chal­lenges of geron­tol­ogy”, in prepa­ra­tion for the Inau­gur­al Sum­mit of the Glob­al Agen­da that will take place Novem­ber 7 to 9th in Dubai.A good num­ber of Sharp­Brains read­ers and clients offered their insights — and expressed an inter­est in read­ing the draft. So below you have — a pro­pos­al to cre­ate a Glob­al Con­sor­tium for Neu­rocog­ni­tive Fit­ness Inno­va­tion, build­ing on our exist­ing mar­ket research and advi­so­ry ser­vices work. Your thoughts?

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The Con­text

Grow­ing Demands on Our Brains: Pic­ture 6.7 bil­lion Prim­i­tive Brains inhab­it­ing a Knowl­edge Soci­ety where life­long learn­ing and mas­ter­ing con­stant change in com­plex envi­ron­ments are crit­i­cal for pro­duc­tive work, health and per­son­al fulfillment.

Wel­come to Plan­et Earth, 2008.

Fur­ther stretched by increased longevi­ty: Now pic­ture close to 1 bil­lion of those brains over the age of 60 – and please remem­ber that, less than 100 years ago, life expectan­cy was between 30 to 40 years. The rapid­ly evolv­ing Knowl­edge Soci­ety is plac­ing new and enor­mous demands on our “prim­i­tive” human brains. And the longer our lifes­pans, the more obvi­ous the “cog­ni­tive gap”. Hence, from a health point of view, the grow­ing [Read more…] about Update: Glob­al Con­sor­tium for Neu­rocog­ni­tive Fit­ness Innovation

Global Agenda Council: the Challenges of Gerontology?

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I announced two months ago (Glob­al Agen­da Coun­cils: The Chal­lenges of Geron­tol­ogy) that I had been invit­ed to join a very stim­u­lat­ing new ini­tia­tive by the World Eco­nom­ic Forum.

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Update (Novem­ber 2nd, 2008): my pro­pos­al is to cre­ate a Glob­al Con­sor­tium for Neu­rocog­ni­tive Fit­ness Inno­va­tion. Thank you for your com­ments below!

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Next month, 700 experts will meet to dri­ve an inter­dis­ci­pli­nary agen­da cov­er­ing 68 top­ics (see below); 16 of us focused on the Chal­lenges of Gerontology.

Dubai To Host 700 Of The World’s Most Influ­en­tial Lead­ers From Acad­e­mia, Busi­ness, Gov­ern­ment and Soci­ety At First World Eco­nom­ic Forum Sum­mit on the Glob­al Agen­da (I did­n’t write the title of the press release…)

- “The World Eco­nom­ic Forum, in part­ner­ship with the Gov­ern­ment of Dubai, will hold its inau­gur­al Sum­mit on the Glob­al Agen­da in Dubai from 7 to 9 Novem­ber 2008. The Sum­mit is a new, unique gath­er­ing of [Read more…] about Glob­al Agen­da Coun­cil: the Chal­lenges of Gerontology?