Why Intellectual Humility is the Key to Thriving in the Smart Machine Age (with Ed Hess)

We are on the leading edge of a Smart Machine Age led by artificial intelligence that will be as transformative for us as the Industrial Revolution was for our ancestors. 

Smart machines will take over millions of jobs in manufacturing, office work, the service sector, the professions, you name it. Not only can they know more data and analyze it faster than any mere human, but smart machines are free of the emotional, psychological, and cultural baggage that so often mars human thinking -- which we discussed in depth in the THINKERS Manifesto.

So we can’t beat the machines, and we can’t join them, but we can play a different game. And we must.

Edward D. Hess and Katherine Ludwig wrote the book Humility is the New Smart: Rethinking Human Excellence in the Smart Machine Age. In it, they offer a game plan for how we can excel at critical, creative, and innovative thinking and at genuinely engaging with others—in other words, the things machines can’t do well. 

The key is to change our definition of what it means to be smart. Hess and Ludwig call it being NewSmart, and the crucial mindset underlying NewSmart is humility.

In this webinar, Mr. Hess and I discuss:

• How he defines "humility" -- because it's probably a little different from the way you normally see it defined. 
• How to cultivate a mindset of intellectual humility, and what the short-term and long-term benefits are.
• The four NewSmart behaviors that will help you navigate the Smart Machine Age effectively.
• What role pride and ego still have to play -- if you're able to make the right shift in mindset.
• Strategies for adapting -- even at an advanced age.
• What parents and schools can do to cultivate NewSmart behaviors in children.
• How to navigate the me-first incentives social media.

And much more.