The Social Labs Revolution

The Food Lab, and other social labs, generate at minimum four sets of outputs: physical capital (new services or infrastructure), human capital (new capacities and skills), social capital (increased trust and collaboration), and finally, intellectual capital (new knowledge and learning).

In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few. — Shunryu Suzuki

Food is perhaps the first complex challenge humanity has faced.

In other words, if we expect politicians to take the rational recommendations made by well-meaning experts and implement them, then we are living a fantasy.

As Michael Lewis points out, “It still matters less how much money you have than how well you spend it.”

At the heart of all BAU responses sit experts. They are the muscle behind BAU responses. And what experts do in response to complex social challenges is formulate plans.

How and what we eat determines to a great extent the use we make of this world—and what is to become of it. — Michael Pollen, The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals

#5: SET DIRECTION

“IBM estimates we are generating 2.5 quintillion bytes of data per day, more than 90 percent of which was created in the last two years.”