Grand challenges

Introduction
While progress is rapid in many areas, particularly in advancing technology, increasing communications, and acquiring information, it is not as clear that our overall well-being is increasing. The grand challenges described here represent not only the greatest, most pervasive and persistent problems facing humanity but also the most promising opportunities.

Only forty-six percent of people in Africa have safe drinking water.

The objectives of this course are to:

• Identify the greatest problems now facing humanity,
• Describe the extent and human costs of those problems,
• Begin to identify causes and conditions contributing to these problems,
• Begin to understand why these problems remain persistent,
• Suggest approaches to solving these problems, especially by adopting a Global Perspective.
• Describe the great opportunities we have for increasing well-being and creating the future.

This course is part of the Applied Wisdom Curriculum.

Mountains of Problems:

A problem is a gap between a perceived state and the desired state. Huge gaps between what is and what could be are apparent throughout large populations in these areas:

Individual Well-Being

• Physical Health
  • Malnutrition — Malnutrition is the condition that results from an unbalanced diet in which certain nutrients are lacking, in excess, or in the wrong proportions.
    The World Health Organization cites malnutrition as the gravest single threat to the world's public health.
    According to Jean Ziegler (the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food from 2000–2008), mortality due to malnutrition accounted for 58% of the total mortality in 2006: "In the world, approximately 62 million people, all causes of death combined, die each year. One in twelve people worldwide is malnourished. In 2006, more than 36 million died of hunger or diseases due to deficiencies in micronutrients".
    According to the World Health Organization, malnutrition is by far the biggest contributor to child mortality, present in half of all cases. Underweight births and inter-uterine growth restrictions cause 2.2 million child deaths a year. Poor or non-existent breastfeeding causes another 1.4 million. Other deficiencies, such as lack of vitamin A or zinc, for example, account for 1 million. Malnutrition in the first two years is irreversible. Malnourished children grow up with worse health and lower educational achievements. Their own children also tend to be smaller. Malnutrition was previously seen as something that exacerbates the problems of diseases such as measles, pneumonia and diarrhea. But malnutrition actually causes diseases as well, and can be fatal in its own right.
  • Inadequate access to safe drinking water—Waterborne diseases and the absence of sanitary domestic water are one of the leading causes of death worldwide. For children under age five, waterborne diseases are the leading cause of death. At any given time, half of the world's hospital beds are occupied by patients suffering from waterborne diseases. According to the World Bank, 88 percent of all waterborne diseases are caused by unsafe drinking water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene.
  • Obesity— Obesity is a medical condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to the extent that it may have an adverse effect on health, leading to reduced life expectancy and/or increased health problems. Obesity is a leading preventable cause of death worldwide, with increasing prevalence in adults and children, and authorities view it as one of the most serious public health problems of the 21st century. Obesity is stigmatized in much of the modern world (particularly in the Western world), though it was widely perceived as a symbol of wealth and fertility at other times in history, and still is in some parts of the world
  • Suboptimal Physical Fitness
  • Disease
• Mental disorders
  • Depression — Depression is a state of low mood and aversion to activity that can affect a person's thoughts, behavior, feelings and physical well-being. It may include feelings of sadness, anxiety, emptiness, hopelessness, worthlessness, guilt, irritability, or restlessness. Depressed people may lose interest in activities that once were pleasurable, experience difficulty concentrating, remembering details, or making decisions, and may contemplate or attempt suicide. Insomnia, excessive sleeping, fatigue, loss of energy, or aches, pains or digestive problems that are resistant to treatment may be present. A recent survey of depression in the United States found that 9.0% met the criteria for current depression, including 3.4% who met the criteria for major depression.
  • Chronic stress is the response to emotional pressure suffered for a prolonged period over which an individual perceives he or she has no control. It involves an endocrine system response in which occurs a release of corticosteroids. If this continues for a long time, it can cause damage to an individual's physical and mental health.
  • Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse. Pressures or misfortunes such as financial difficulties or troubles with interpersonal relationships often play a significant role. Over one million people die by suicide every year. It is a leading cause of death among teenagers and adults under 35.
  • Addictions including addictions to drugs, alcohol and other substances, and destructive behaviors.
• Healthcare
• Emerging infectious diseases (EID) are infectious diseases whose incidence has increased in the past 20 years and threatens to increase in the near future. Emerging infections account for at least 12% of all human pathogen
• Aging and senescence
• Poverty — Poverty is the lack of basic human needs, such as clean water, nutrition, health care, education, clothing and shelter, because of the inability to afford them. This is also referred to as absolute poverty or destitution. Relative poverty is the condition of having fewer resources or less income than others within a society or country, or compared to worldwide averages. About 1.7 billion people live in absolute poverty.
  • Economic inequality (or "wealth and income differences") comprises all disparities in the distribution of economic assets and income. The book The Spirit Level claims that negative social phenomena such as shorter life expectancy, higher disease rates, homicide, infant mortality, obesity, teenage pregnancies, emotional depression and prison population correlate with higher socioeconomic inequality.
• Tyranny
• Crime
• Divorce
• Teenage pregnancy
• Low Job Satisfaction
• Violence
  • Child Abuse — Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of children. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or other caregiver that results in harm, potential for harm, or threat of harm to a child. A child abuse fatality is when a child’s death is the result of abuse or neglect, or when abuse and/or neglect are contributing factors to a child’s death. In the United States, 1,730 children died in 2008 due to factors related to abuse; this is a rate of 2.33 per 100,000 U.S. children. Child abuse fatalities are widely recognized as being under-counted; it is estimated that between 60-85% of child fatalities due to maltreatment are not recorded as such on death certificates.
  • Domestic violence
  • Sexual abuse, also referred to as molestation, is the forcing of undesired sexual behavior by one person upon another.
  • Human trafficking is the illegal trade of human beings for the purposes of reproductive slavery, commercial sexual exploitation, forced labor, or a modern-day form of slavery. In 2008, the United Nations estimated nearly 2.5 million people from 127 different countries are being trafficked into 137 countries around the world..
• Incarceration
• Substance abuse
  • Under age drinking
  • Alcoholism
  • Addictions
• Bullying
• Street Gangs
• Urban decay

Environmental Stewardship

• Environmental Protection and Sustainability
  • Limits to Growth
  • Ecocide
• Global warming
• Destruction of natural habitats
• Depletion of natural resources
• Natural disasters
• Extinction of species
• Forest Preservation

Government Policy

• War
• Population growth
• Armaments
• Lack of Global democracy
• Sustainability
• Ineffective Global justice
• Genocide
• Oppression
• Malnutrition

Assignment

Choose one of the problems listed above (or from some other source) to study in detail. Describe the costs of the problem in human, social, cultural, and economic terms. If possible, suggest systemic factors that contribute to prolonging the problem or delaying solutions. Describe your insights.

Do you see any causal or temporal relationship among these challenges that suggests a starting point for a solution?

The Range of Opportunities:

Well-being is more than the absence of problems. Here are some opportunities to live more fulfilling lives and enjoy more of our potential.

From Problems to Opportunities

• Achieving the Millennium Development Goals
• Increasing healthfulness, physical fitness, and flourishing.
  • Spending more time at play.
• Strengthening our communities.
• Attaining sustainable energy.
• Migrating to the Genuine progress indicator
• Attaining World Peace
  • Preserving and protecting human rights, worldwide.
• Becoming more creative.

Intellectual and Artistic Opportunities

When we reach a level of affluence and abundance where deficiencies are no longer a problem, we can turn our attention from solving problems to enjoying opportunities.

• Establishing priorities of research and development to benefit humanity.
• Exploration and Discovery
• Participation in the arts
• Savor nature's awe.
• Mindfulness
• Pursuit of happiness
  • Gratification
  • Contentment
  • Peace of mind
  • Compassion
  • Fun
  • Flow

Assignment

Describe the distinction between pleasure and gratification. Give an example from your own experience. If you were unencumbered by problems, how would you choose to spend your time? Why?

Case Studies

There are several examples where well-meaning people worked hard to solve a problem, yet later it became obvious that the entire endeavor was foolish. Often the problems arose because the planners adopted a narrow point of view, rather than adopt a global perspective. Several examples are described and analyzed here:

Tobacco use is the leading preventable cause of death worldwide currently causing an estimated 5.4 million deaths per year. Could adopting a global perspective have taken us down a different tobacco road?

The Péligre Dam is a hydroelectric dam located off the Centre Department on the Artibonite River of Haiti. It has caused several problems, described by Tracy Kidder in his book Mountains beyond Mountains. See this relevant excerpt. The dam is also a topic of the film: "Once There was a Country: Revisiting Haiti".

René Jean-Jumeau summarizes, in an article A dam for the people, and a people damned: “Everyone continues to finance the same things: more production generation, more networks, more grid. But nobody’s financing the development of a new framework to be able to essentially modernize the Haitian energy sector.. . . To put the sector into a more sustainable situation, a more sustainable state.”

Project Greek Island was a United States Government continuity program located at The Greenbrier hotel in West Virginia. The facility was decommissioned in 1992 after the program was exposed in a U.S. newspaper article. The overall plan was folly because there was no practical way for members of congress to arrive at the shelter in time to avoid radiation exposure.

The Crusades were a series of religiously sanctioned military campaigns, called by the pope and waged by kings and nobles who volunteered to take up the cross with the main goal of restoring Christian control of the Holy Land.

The Balbina Dam on the Uatumã River in the Amazon Rainforest, Brazil was established to provide a renewable electricity supply to the city of Manaus but was considered by locals a controversial project from the start, due to the loss of forest and displacement of tribal homes grounds. It was also criticized for its expensive construction and maintenance costs.

The Requerimiento

Tulip mania

A series of devastating events killed almost the entire population of Easter Island in the 1860s.

Prohibition in the United States was a national ban on the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol, in place from 1920 to 1933. Organized crime received a major boost from Prohibition. A profitable, often violent, black market for alcohol flourished.

McCarthyism

The Dust Bowl

Widespread use of asbestos as a construction material.

China's Great Leap Forward ended in catastrophe, resulting in tens of millions of excess deaths. Estimates of the death toll range from 16.5 to 46 million.

The Khmer Rouge government arrested, tortured and eventually executed anyone suspected of belonging to several categories of supposed "enemies". This resulted in millions of deaths from executions, starvation, and disease.

Status thymicolymphaticus (also status lymphaticus, status thymicus) is an old term for a syndrome of supposed enlargement of the thymus and lymph nodes in infants and young children, formerly believed to be associated with SIDS; it was also erroneously believed that pressure of the thymus on the trachea might cause death during anaesthesia. Unfortunately infants were routinely irradiated to shrink their thymus and this has lead to many thousands of cancer cases.

The United States Presidential $1 Coin Program has stockpiled 1.4 billion uncirculated $1 coins since the program began on January 1, 2007.

Assignment

Choose one of the case studies listed above (or some similar example) to study in detail. What problem did the project intend to solve? What were the original goals of the project? What went wrong? What was the earliest opportunity to avoid the most serious loss or damage from the project? Why were these opportunities for success missed? How could a global perspective have helped? What can we learn?

Resources:

• The UCL Grand Challenges Initiatives.
• Knowledge to Wisdom — helping humanity acquire more wisdom by rational means.
• If the GDP is Up, Why is America Down?, October 1995, The Atlantic Monthly, by Clifford Cobb, Ted Halstead, and Jonathan Rowe
• Wilkinson, Richard; Kate Pickett (2011). The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger. Bloomsbury Press. pp. 400. ISBN 978-1608193417. 
• Union of International Associations, Encyclopedia of World Problems and Human Potential.