Are We Googling While Rome Burns?

On November 29th 1929, Byrd flew for the first time over the South Pole.

The headlines then were full of wonder. The frontier of human achievement opened to an applauding world.

But today, over 75 years after Byrd first surveyed it from the sky, the South Pole shrinks and thins as a result of human action.

Perhaps this offers a lesson for the future. So often we are dazzled by the great strides of invention, but we easily neglect the slow march of decline.

Today it is a world of geo-economics, geo-technology, geo-politics and geo-environment. Governments, corporations and citizens are required to learn a new art: balancing local needs and national identity in an international world. Not only are we challenged to think more globally, but also long term.

And today, with the Middle East at the front of all our thoughts, we see the precarious balance of the situation in Israel/Palestine. All of our futures will be defined by how we respond to this issue. The need for a solution has never been more urgent; the price of failure never more costly.

Within this context, this new inter-connected world, we face a dilemma identified long ago by Einstein: how do we stop our technology exceeding our humanity?

This dilemma could not be more important when we consider the internet. Let me give just a few examples.

A digital divide threatens us all. Both between rich and poor, but also in testing our values: pornography and violence are the underside of the web.

A new generation of children has grown with entirely new stimuli from the internet, yet we know so little about the effect of this new world on the brain.

Terrorists use the internet like caves, hiding in uncharted locations. We can swap recipes for bombs as easily as recipes for cakes.

So although we so rightly celebrate the breakthroughs of our age, we must ask ourselves a question: are we Googling while Rome burns?

Of course it is too easy to fear too much, and we must realize the other side of these threats: the internet offers a greater opportunity to unite and understand than any tool in history.

Dialogue is so easy now. Schools in Beijing talk to Berlin, the stories of the world are shared on the web. A new global conversation offers extraordinary possibilities to reach out to those furthest away.

If we can live second lives on the internet, surely we can create games that encourage cultural understanding and enhance creativity? The democratization of knowledge of the internet can build bridges of trust. And we can create stronger security - to protect both our children and our identities.

For I believe the great prize of the internet is to create together the most powerful tool for empathy the world has ever seen.

This is our next challenge. We need technology not just to take us to the skies. We need it to understand the ground we share with others. We need it to be the foundation of our common humanity.

Yes, technology can help to close the gaps of the world, but it must be built on respect, humility, and understanding of our neighbors.