Highlights of the State of Innovation Summit

Seed Magazine, who partnered with the Council on Competitiveness during the State of Innovation Summit, have written a wrap-up of the conference's events. Below are some of the highlights; the entire write-up is available here:

A panel discussion between Ben Fry; Julie Lasky, the editor of the forthcoming Change Observer magazine; and Claudia Kotchka, a former senior executive at Procter & Gamble: Moderator Paola Antonelli started things off with a call for a wider understanding of the role of design. "Design is still treated as decoration or beautification of life," she said. "Although it’s the designers that take revolutions from science and bring them home, down to earth, so that we all can use them as products or services."

Antonelli presented some of the emerging areas of design that are being informed by biological processes, such as biomimicry, nanodesign, and tissue design. Design is also borrowing from the social sciences, she said, pointing to collective open-source projects and the visualization of data. The latter gets at the heart of what much of design is about: making physical the hidden needs, wants, and behaviors of people in the real world. 

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Getting down to the issue of actually implementing some of the innovative solutions proffered at the conference was the next panel: "The Problems We Will Solve." ... In describing how "big science" can address the world’s most pressing problems, Tomás Díaz de la Rubia was optimistic. Díaz de la Rubia talked about the National Ignition Facility, the world’s highest-energy laser system that was officially dedicated at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory a few weeks ago. "We never talk about fusion because it’s always thought to be 50 years away. But now we are about two years away from actually doing the definitive experiments that will tell us whether we can make a miniature sun on Earth to produce energy to power the planet."

After remarks from David E. Shaw, the noted computational biochemist, hedge fund manager, and member of the President’s Council of Advisers of Science and Technology, E.O. Wilson closed out with some sage perspective. The father of sociobiology said he was so impressed by the imaginative solutions expressed by both panelists and guests he threw out everything he was going to say. But he did give his assessment of what he considers the most fundamental problem of complexity: "understanding the origin and the nature of the bizarre human brain and of consciousness." Without a deeper analytic understanding of the brain, all efforts in innovation and education will be ultimately lost and confused. 

Speaking with his usual avuncular charm, Wilson laid out the big picture as he sees it. "In our existence in this ‘Star Wars’ civilization, we have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology. That’s a very dangerous combination," he said. His only prescription was to bring together, in a focused manner, the three great domains of knowledge: science, social science, and humanities.

The next panel delved more deeply into the business side of innovation, joining Klaus Hoehn and Cory Ondrejka with Michigan State University President Lou Anna Simon and Pinnacle Investment’s CEO James Phillips. Hoehn emphasized the need for creating the right environment for the next big idea to grow. A 173-year-old manufacturer of farm equipment might not seem like the kind of organization that is quick to reinvent its offerings, but in 2014 Deere & Company aims to have 30 percent of its products and services be totally new to market, he said. “Creativity is not at all our problem,” Hoehn said, referring to both his company and the world at large. “The art really is: How do you provide fertile ground where creativity can flourish?” Hoehn pointed out that while the world still sees America as innovative, Americans themselves are missing the point: “This country needs to get its act together and make innovation the next man-on-the-moon thing.”

EMI’s Ondrejka recognized this imperative, but was also wary of companies or executives who think such goals can be accomplished in a top-down manner. “The idea that you can take innovation and put it in a corner somewhere is about as antithetical to the idea of innovation as you can possibly get,” he said. “It’s the collisions between different knowledge networks that are crucial to innovation.”

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The conference’s concluding remarks embodied what may have been the most powerful refrain from the day: We, as a nation and a species, are at a tipping point where thoughtful but decisive action can pave the way to a more prosperous and sustainable future. Adam Bly attributed this to changing winds in Washington, as well as technological advances and looming crises, but he said the key element was a widening appreciation of science and the value of the search for knowledge. Complacency about this appeal, however, can be treacherous, and Bly urged the continuing pursuit of greater scientific literacy and the merging of the “two cultures.” “Science can’t simply be this perfunctory pursuit of results; it is as romantic, as beautiful, and as complete as the arts and humanities,” he said. “We’re going to need to rethink and reframe science so it reaches all of us.”

Deborah Wince-Smith, an archeologist by training, framed this process as the journey of Odysseus to Ithaca: something with a promising endpoint, but the trip being even more rewarding. She also reflected on the juncture at which we all stand: "This is one of the greatest times in human history, and we have to help create the future."

To emphasize this point, Wince-Smith drew the day to a close with this passage from President Lyndon Johnson’s inaugural address: "For this is what America is all about. It is the uncrossed desert and the unclimbed ridge. It is the star that is not reached and the harvest sleeping in the unplowed ground. Is our world gone? We say farewell. Is a new world coming? We welcome it, and we will bend it to the hopes of man."