This document discusses a proposed "EarthMoonshot" quest for global thrivability to address complex issues like health epidemics, climate change, and asteroids. It notes the opportunity for a global knowledge garden that brings together relevant information from diverse sources on various topics. However, it also notes current problems like information overload, lack of access to some information, incomplete recording of tacit knowledge. The document proposes that the knowledge garden could help by federating topic-based information from all perspectives to make it trustworthy and account for different views while capturing implicit knowledge. It discusses how complex systems and shared stories through collaboration in the garden could help new insights emerge to solve complex problems.

1. Questing in the
age of Complex
Issues
Jack Park
Problem Solving Round Table
Cisco Systems
23 May, 2016
© 2016 TopicQuests Foundation CC by SA 4.0

2. Key Opportunity
• A planet-wide, collaborative quest for Global
Thrivability*.
– Issues include
• Sociological events
– Health, epidemics, wars,…
• Geophysical events
– Climate change, earthquakes, volcanoes, …
• Astrophysical events
– Asteroids, our Sun. …
• A Global Knowledge Garden
* Let’s call the quest: EarthMoonshot

3. Problem Space
• Too much information (info glut)
• Missing information
– Proprietary and not available
– Not proprietary, but hasn't been brought
to addressable space
– Massive amounts of tacit knowledge
– Native intuition not captured
– Incomplete recording
• Trust
• Heterogeneity
– Language (vernacular, dialects, etc.)
– Different world views on same topic

4. Opportunity Space
• Topic based information that is:
– Brought together through federation with relevance
– Freely available
– Recorded, easily found and built upon
– With tacit knowledge and native intuition captured
• Trustworthy
– All sides of the story are covered
• Heterogeneity
– Information is captured in a format
that takes into account vernacular,
dialects, different world views, etc.

5. From the perspective of
complexity theory, emergence
arises from complex systems
that create new properties
from “autonomous unities
coming together into larger,
more powerful unities”*
Complex Systems
Shared Stories
Collaboration in the Garden
The emergence we seek is that of
insight into the nature of and
solutions to complex problems

6. Augmenting Social Sensemaking
1
2
3
Creating Ideas
Refining Connections
Connecting Ideas
Cancer patient

7. Core Garden Architecture
AI
Harvest & Study
AI
Assistants
Conversation

8. Garden Connections
Globally federated
topic gardens
enable wormhole-
like connections to
emerge in and
between topic
gardens.

9. Why Quest?
37

10. Completed Representation
antioxidants
kill
free radicals
Contraindicates
macrophages use
free radicals to
kill bacteria
Bacterial Infection Antioxidants
Because
Appropriate For
Compromised Host
Let us co-create our future