There are big questions floating around the internet. Not to mention on the street, where people talk face to face. Notwithstanding some of the algorithm content meant to promote doomscrolling, there’s quite a bit of grassroots concern about AI: what will it do to us and our social worlds? What will it do to the job market?
We saw, recently, the sending of the “We Must Act Now” letter, which I covered. My colleague Erik Brynjolfsson was only one of many signing this important document, which you could characterize as short and sweet, but also, very relevant and timely, as everyone continues to ponder the right path to effective AI regulation.
One prominent opinion on this comes from a rather unlikely place, in a way. That’s where I got the above phrase, “widening the aperture,” along with more articulation of some of the ideas that we need to foster in this interesting time.
The Boston Conference
I was at a recent TedX Boston event (and I was involved in hosting it) where I heard remarks by Megan Smith. Smith was the third United States Chief Technology Officer, from 2014 to 2017, under Obama. She also has MIT ties, and a unique viewpoint given her combined experience, on what it takes to empower Americans in an AI age.
History as Prologue
Early in her presentation, Smith mentioned Vannevar Bush, one of MIT’s bright stars, and his role in the Roosevelt era, where FDR was looking to shore up the prosperity of everyday Americans.
“Before the war, science was in poverty,” she said. “They described science as ‘in poverty’ because, if you were someone like Galileo, you needed a patron, like the Medici. You had to be wealthy, or supported by wealth. There wasn’t a funding system. People were certainly doing science and technology, but it was much more random.”
So, Vannevar went asking Roosevelt for funding.
Roosevelt, she recounted, said yes, and later, apparently, drafted a letter to the innovator, brainstorming, in her words:
“How do we get all the Americans returning, all the Americans here, everybody, to have jobs, to have opportunity? How can we increase the quality of life? How can we deal with disease? How can we help our youth? How do we help young people be inspired?”
She noted the result, the reality, this way:
“(These goals) can be achieved only by releasing the full creative and productive energies of the American people,” Smith said.
History of MIT
Smith also talked a little about the history of our illustrious alma mater:
“We’re a land grant university,” she said of MIT. “So during the guilded age, again, … I think it was Lincoln who helped put things in motion saying we needed to prepare people.”
Adding notes on some of MIT’s great luminaries, she quoted Grace Hopper, who famously said:
“Ships are safe in a harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.”
She added her own insight:
“The thought is: how do we widen the aperture to include everybody in full participation, bringing their full creative and productive energies?”
She continued:
“Why don’t we prototype and brainstorm for the future? We can work on all kinds of methods for that: hackathons for foster care, a 10th grader teaching the police to code in New Orleans and releasing police use of force data, officer-involved shooting data, making more peaceful societies, working on the Sustainable Development Goals by finding the people already fixing them and helping them, looking at all the Americans already having tech meetups and STEM programs, and accelerating them faster.”
Fostering Awareness
In a side anecdote, Smith talked about giving the Pope a book about Ada Lovelace, trying to keep networking and getting the word out about the best way forward.
“Today we have a lot of people on stage talking about innovation, and a lot of people from this university working on defense technology innovation,” she said.
Of Vannevar Bush, Smith suggested that his work came to fruition, with human-first principles being pursued.
“I think (Bush) really understood that excellence comes from finding people and helping them bring forward what they have to contribute,” she said. “During the war, everyone rose to the challenge and worked on these technologies. But afterward, the question became how to pivot into the imagination that we have today. I think he would push us harder to, as I personally call it, widen the aperture. What is all this technology for?”
Education, she said in closing, is paramount.
“Teach (people) the tools of the world,” Smith said. “Let’s work on peace, quality of life, and those kinds of goals as part of defense work. Because the more capable everyone is, and the more included everyone is, the less need there is for fighting. More people will have what they need, work together, and be able to push back on those who may be heading in the wrong direction.”
I thought this was fairly inspirational, and I’m glad to share it with you. Let’s wish all of us the best of luck as 2026 rolls on.
