David Gosset believes in progress. Generation Alpha will show the way towards a more cohesive mankind
Date：2023-02-02
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Ladies and Gentlemen, dear friends,
I am happy to address your important event in the city of two Olympics, Beijing. Beijing, both ancient and at the vanguard. That makes it unique.
I was born in Paris in 1970. I belong therefore to Generation X. I am aware of the criticisms about the generation labels. Gender, class, education, ethnicity are also elements that shape an individual. However, the concept of generation remains a rich and stimulating one.
Here is a story that had a major impact on my generation.
You have recognized, of course, Neil Armstrong touching the moon’s surface in July 1969. “That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind”, he said. He pointed at a combination of technology, at progress unfolding in front of our eyes, and at the possibility to always enlarge the horizon. Since Generation X was also the TV generation, Apollo 11 mission was followed across the world.
Armstrong was mentioning our human family, mankind, but 50 years ago the world was profoundly divided. It was the time of the Cold War. The tragedy of the Vietnam War caused enormous sufferings. Armstrong’s moon exploration also preceded Nixon’s visit to China.
However, in 1978 Deng Xiaoping put China on the path of reform and opening up. Globalization intensified. Our planet became smaller. As a result, Generation Z in the West and China’s post-90s increasingly converged. China joined the World Trade Organization with the beginning of a new century.
The emerging generation has now been named Generation Alpha. A question arises: Have differences between the West’s Generation Alpha and China’s one further diminished? Or, on the contrary, has, what some call de-globalization, reintroduced diverging dynamics between youths from different regions?
It is obvious that some have attempted to decouple the West from China. We should not underestimate the impact of the Trump’s moment taking the US on a dangerous path towards unilateralism. Generation Alpha will also be marked by the COVID-19 pandemic and the various policies to fight it. It has, to a certain extent, separated young people from
However, it remains my conviction that Generation Alpha whether from China or from other parts of the world shares an unprecedented awareness of belonging to the same mankind. It is one of the reasons why I do not believe in the notion of de-globalization as a deep long-term trend.
Look at Wang Yaping, China’s taikonaut in the Tiangong space station, a space station constructed and operated by China.
Wang Yaping feels what others have felt before her: the “overview effect”, this cognitive change that brings with it a sense of responsibility for our planet, our common home.
Through her eyes, China’s Generation Alpha dreams the dreams of the West’s Generation Alpha. In 2019, LEGO and the Harris Poll conducted a survey among children aged 8 to 12 from China, the US, and the UK. 95% of Chinese children said they’d like to go into outer space or visit a different planet. It was 68% for the US, and 63% for the UK.
This emerging generation has unprecedented instruments to explore our universe and to solve complex problems.
Think about what is called Moore’s Law named after Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel. The year I was born, 1000 transistors on integrated circuits. Today it is 50 billion! The system on a chip (SoC) Apple A12X Bionic can complete 5 trillion operations per second.
With such tools, global and hyper connected Generation Alpha will better understand the cosmos. The images that the James Webb Space Telescope is currently taking could become the symbols of a generation. Galaxies believed to date from around 250 million years after the Big Bang have been identified. We are all getting closer to the first stars, to the formation of the first galaxies, to potentially habitable exoplanets.
Generation Alpha will also take us closer to a better understanding of the brain. The US, Europe and China have designed their own neuroscience programs. But, in reality, scientists do exchange and cooperate to master the way our 86 billion neurons interact. These exchanges will intensify.
I wish to end my remarks with a reference to one of the most fascinating cooperative projects that is going on in a world characterized by a complex globalization that is neither unidimensional nor unidirectional.
The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) aims at replicating on Earth the fusion processes of the Sun. I invite you to have a look at what is 80% completed.
You have seen indeed the most complex machine ever designed.
China, the EU and the US are among the seven signatories of the ITER agreement. 500 companies are involved in the construction of what could make our future truly sustainable.
It is Generation Alpha that will finalize one of the most challenging megaprojects that mankind has ever conceived.
Such an accomplishment will be possible thanks to a higher collective intelligence at the service of sustainability. Generation Alpha has inherited the severe challenges that come with the Anthropocene. It will act to re-harmonize the interactions between Man and Nature. To be effective such actions require a global mindset and a multilateral approach.
Dear friends, I hear as well as you do, the rhetoric on decoupling, divisions, and de-globalization. Today, I have come to tell you that a community of shared future for mankind is closer than you might think.
Since the generation of the great classical thinkers, we have been imagining Great Harmony – Da Tong. The youths of today and tomorrow will know how to bring this most noble vision into reality.
