Baha'i Perspectives

nadim January 9th, 2009

Crowdsourcing is the act of taking a job traditionally performed by a designated agent (usually an employee) and outsourcing it to an undefined, generally large group of people in the form of an open call.

Among the big Internet breakthroughs of 2007/08 (although in truth signs appeared well before this) was the emergence of a new breed of websites which utilized crowdsourcing, defined above, to generate new knowledge across a variety of disciplines. Here’s an interesting video by Jeff Howe describing this phenomenon:

We’ve all used these sites before — the most well-known of which is probably Wikipedia — and are certainly grateful for having them around (particularly the night before an essay deadline)! With the glut of encyclopedic knowledge literally a click away on sites such as Wikipedia, it seems unthinkable that just a few years ago we relied so heavily on that set of dusty old books tucked away in grandpa’s wooden book cabinet. Trouble was, even if the encyclopedia had the entry we were looking for, the date of publication could still have rendered the information useless, which meant forking out a chunk of money to get the latest set of “certified” knowledge. Sounds a little ridiculous doesn’t it?

The early attempts at digitizing encyclopedias, in products such as Microsoft Encarta, still followed this centralized model. “Here’s a CD with this year’s knowledge, and the good news is that we are working on next year’s version. Just $xx.99 for the upgrade!” Thankfully, the emergence of Web 2.0 technologies, which allow formerly passive consumers of information to become active contributors, broke this trend. And the result is as we see it today. A huge spiderweb of information, built up strand by strand, in which the tiny data banks once locked in our heads have been woven into a seamless whole: free, accessible to all and always up-to-date.

This same “Wisdom of Crowds” idea that resulted in Wikipedia has found more specialized applications too. One that I find exciting due to its potential contribution to curing diseases is called FoldIt (www.fold.it). Without going into too much detail, the makers of this site have turned a daunting scientific problem into a computer game that can be enjoyed by anyone! To quote the site:

The number of different ways even a small protein can fold is astronomical because there are so many degrees of freedom. Figuring out which of the many, many possible structures is the best one is regarded as one of the hardest problems in biology today and current methods take a lot of money and time, even for computers. Foldit attempts to predict the structure of a protein by taking advantage of humans’ puzzle-solving intuitions and having people play competitively to fold the best proteins… The more we know about how certain proteins fold, the better new proteins we can design to combat the disease-related proteins and cure the diseases.

Who would have thought? Play an online game, fold some proteins, and just maybe, cure cancer in the meantime.

Back in the 19th century, Baha’u'llah, the great spiritual Educator of this age, undertook a mission to revolutionize the outdated structures of religion (which, much like our dusty encyclopedias, had worn out with age). Faced with an entrenched religious orthodoxy that had become absorbed with greed and lust for power, and had long-ceased to satisfy the spiritual needs of an advancing human race, He swept away the influence they had enjoyed for so long. No longer would they control empires and hold sway over the masses. He called on them to reform their ways, rebuked them for the arrogance of their response and warned them of their imminent demise.

But that’s just one part of the story, for in its place Baha’u'llah planted the seeds of a totally new system. This new system, He said, would be participatory instead of passive. Each and every follower, far from being content with listening to a weekly sermon while simultaneously watching society spiral towards seeming doom, would be an active builder of a new spiritually-founded civilization. Knowledge discovery and decision-making would no longer be the domain of a privileged few, but would instead be “crowdsourced” to the masses.

Baha’i administrative institutions (usually comprising of nine adults) would reach their decisions through a process of open consultation, where each individual’s ideas would be given expression and discussed in an honest, frank way by the group. Once a thought is expressed, it would no longer belong to the individual but to the entire group (similar to a Wikipedia entry you might say). In so doing, the harm caused by individual egos would be negated and ideas would always be subject to the scrutiny of peers. Membership on these institutions would be characterized by a spirit of humility and service, entirely far removed from the power games so pervasive in every sphere of society. No attention would paid to the level of formal education of the members – “Not infrequently, nay oftentimes, the most lowly, untutored, and inexperienced among the Friends will, by the sheer inspiring force of selfless and ardent devotion, contribute a distinct and memorable share to a highly involved discussion in any given Assembly.” The inspired consultations during the current series of 41 conferences, held by Baha’is across the globe, have borne testament to this spirit of inclusivity. People of all backgrounds – whether rich or poor, young or old, light-skinned or dark-skinned, educated or uneducated – have been directly engaged in charting the course of their activities over the next few years. Unlike in the past, now every single individual has a voice.

The parallels between the online crowdsourcing phenomenon and elements of the Baha’i administrative order are certainly worthy of note. No one doubts that Wikipedia/FoldIt-style applications will continue to develop organically into the future, at the expense of centralized, proprietary data sources. So too it seems, as Baha’i institutions continue to advance towards the ideals described in the Baha’i Writings, will humanity become more keenly aware of a breakthrough model of social organization, sitting in its midst, that caters for the realities of this day and age.

Tags: 41 conferences, administration, crowdsourcing, Internet

• General Interest , News & Current Affairs , Principles in Action
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