In addition, vast amounts of materials and energy are required to build and maintain the facilities, equipment, and infrastructure needed for processing, storage, and delivery. The same goes for other necessities such as clothing, shelter, medicine, and education, all of which are deeply interconnected with innumerable interdependencies. This results in an extremely fragile global supply chain.
Ensuring a steady and resilient flow of life-sustaining resources means having adequate knowledge and insight into the myriad elements and processes involved. We can only imagine the size of the knowledge graph needed to represent and manage such a massive network.
Virtually Unlimited Resources
I’ve only touched upon some of the precious resources in limited supply that are growing increasingly scarce. We can always hope for new discoveries, even moonshot breakthroughs such as mining asteroids, to help replenish some of these diminishing supplies. But how can we realistically move from scarcity to abundance within the necessary timeframe? We can start by looking at resources that are essentially unlimited and see how we can best put them to use.
Make that resources that actually increase in value and volume the more that they’ re used. Of course, we’re talking about knowledge and its close relative, innovation. That’s where abundance really starts to kick in. Here are just a few examples ...
We’re already seeing promising increases in food production through innovations such as vertical farming, precision agriculture, synthetic biology, bio-pesticides and fertilizers, and the development of more climate-resistant crops. With the right knowledge, certain resources are being made infinitely available, at least locally, through a continuous process of regeneration. Examples include managed reforestation, rainwater harvesting, and cover cropping to improve soil fertility and reduce erosion.
It’s exciting to think of a world populated with friendly humanlike robots walking around waiting on us hand and foot so we humans can do higher-level work instead. But just as people need food, robots and their GPU-powered brains need vast amounts of energy.
Enter the potentially unlimited supplies of energy through small thorium- or fusion-based reactors, with far less environmental impact than the large solar and wind farms dotting the landscape. All supported by a vast, interconnected human and machine knowledge-based global ecosystem linking communities in ways that increase efficiency and reduce scarcity through sharing, thereby optimizing the entire resource lifecycle.
Just don’t get taken in by the bright shiny object of a future of overflowing abundance. As KM’ers, we know the importance of applying critical systems thinking. And don’t forget one of our favorite frameworks, the Gartner Hype Cycle. It’s all part of the ebb and flow, ups and downs, of technology evolution.
Overflowing abundance is wonderful and something to which we should all aspire. But the tooth fairy isn’t going to waive a magic wand and make it all happen. We need to be keeping it real, even in the midst of the future-casting. The good news is, we know how to do this. And we have a huge opportunity to not only ride the coming wave, but also to be out in front, leading the way.
The Knowledge Age we’ve been talking about for so long has finally arrived. The potential for scarcity is real, but so is the potential for overflowing abundance. Let’s bring every tool in our KM arsenal to bear, along with our decades of experience, and help make it happen.