Saumen Chakraborty
Founder Good Human Being Index
Good Human Being Index
For millennia, philosophers have pondered what it means to be a good human being. Different philosophical traditions have offered their own interpretations, such that it seems as though the number of answers is equal to the number of people who have answered the question. While deontological ethicists like Immanuel Kant stress the importance of adhering to universal moral obligations, utilitarians like John Stuart Mill believe the only moral duty is to increase the well-being of the largest number of people.
This pursuit is not confined solely to the realm of philosophy. Scientists and entrepreneurs have weighed in, bringing their own conceptions of the ‘good’ to bear on their inventions. Einstein’s equation may have formed the basis for the atomic bomb, but he dedicated his last few years to controlling nuclear proliferation.
Technology and philosophy are often separated into the pursuit of empirical knowledge to answer our deepest questions about the universe and the pursuit of normative guidance on unanswerable questions about humanity. In today’s world, as artificial intelligence, a product of scientific advances, begins to ponder normative questions, this distinction may prove untenable. Ethics codes abound, seeking to reign in the power of emerging technologies and to ground our scientific future in a shared conception of the good. But what is our shared conception of the good? Now more than ever, there is a need to generate a consensus on this question.
The world is passing through a tempest: – huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons, arms and ammunition threaten to lead us towards extinction. Wars abound, as does religious intolerance and hate, terrorism, extreme polarized wealth distribution, gender bias, climate change issues. The list is almost endless.
At the root of human suffering is the human being itself and its own transformation as a race is probably the only remedy to the human condition. While all of us were taught since childhood”, to change the world, you need to change yourself”, it is probably the greatest lie that was preached. It has never happened and will never happen, because if you change and the others don’t, you are stuck in your own island. Each one of us uses our own subjectivity in our own narrow environments to define the good and in the process emerged as differentially abled so-called good humans.
While we all would agree that a baby born in any part of the world is as innocent as the other beyond caste, creed, race, color, religion and nationality but the environment around us i.e social, behavioral, cultural, religious and political molded us to become human predators. We had to create social, religious and legal frameworks to contain us within a country and amongst nations, rearing to break free at the slightest provocation.
Since birth a human life is governed by objectivity and numbers: – the date of birth, age, physical attributes (height, weight etc.), body vitals (blood pressure, glucose etc.), educational scores, commercial transactions, financial indices, credit ratings, currencies, science, technology, sports etc. and the list appears to be almost endless. are all numbers. The only areas where humans did not let numbers come in are their emotions (love, hate, greed, happiness, sadness, lies etc.). Those who argue that these cannot be made objective, is probably another untrue statement. The Lie detector test is the living proof of quantifying a human emotion. Likewise, every emotion brings about certain chemical changes in the human body which can be measured and with significant improvement in neurosciences, genetics, technology and the likes can actually measure the same through rapid scientific developments, starting from now to the near future.
While subjective consensus is almost impossible to achieve yet subjective traits of other behavioral attributes when given some objectivity has yielded results. The financial credit score of a human being for one has by now attained acceptance across humanity, irrespective of its flaws. Similarly, the happiness index across nations, though far from being perfect, has brought about some objectivity and global acceptance. Another good example is the mathematical grading in our globally implemented education systems which has been universally accepted. Hence, we notice that when the subjective is given an objective purpose it yields certain positive results.
Our search across human history led us to just finding only one human who has almost been able to erase the boundaries between subjectivity and objectivity. Two thousand five hundred years of human history has not been able to erase his name. Where countless kings, religious leaders, philosophers, scientists, spiritual gurus have faded away, it is the “Budda” who has remained. Even today in every nook and corner of the world heads bow down in respect to probably the “Only Good Human” known to mankind. He seems to have remained that innocent child till he left the planet. It would indeed be a tribute to start our consensus from the model of traits and teachings of this good human being.
If we go to any congregation of people and ask them, “how many of them would want to lead their lives ethically? We assure you every hand would be raised. If we asked a follow up question of how many of them have not lied since their birth, we once again assure you that not a single hand would be raised. So, here we have a whole congregation of so-called ethical liars trying to define ethics and then incorporate that through technology that touches every facet of their lives as in Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Time has probably come to set afloat the Noah’s Ark with the world’s best minds of philosophers, artists, scientists , technologists, doctors, engineers entrepreneurs, spiritual leaders, cultural and social leaders, sociologist’s,, mathematicians, neuro scientists , genetic engineers, biologists, environmental experts, lawyers, leading consultants and the like to deliberate, debate and define a consensus driven framework of an objective measurable index – “ The Good Human Being Index” – for generations to come, so they can lead their lives in the promised the land.
Let the “Good Human Being Index” be the objective score of our AI driven destiny for future generations. At the intersection of Science, Technology, Philosophy and Spirituality will lie the future generations of good human beings guided by unbiased, ethical and immortal collective AI, in a measurable and rectifiable objectivity for our future generations.
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