The second 'Strathclyde Dialogues' event of 2012-13 in Dubai took place on March 13 at the CERT/HCT campus, where the Strathclyde Business School Dubai regional centre is located.
A number of Strathclyde Business School alumni and current students attended the event, entitled, "Braver new world: taking a closer look at the impact of technology on societies."
The Dialogue panel was composed of a combination of experts in the field of technology and human interaction, representing the business, academia and governmental perspectives.
Mrs Haifa Al Mubarak, Managing Director of Know-How Training presented the case of technology systems for supporting attention skills, memory improvement and task-related behaviours for individuals and organisations. Today's fast-paced world is characterised by conditions which can be challenging for the individual directing and sustaining attention at will, whilst behavioural issues such as distractibility and hyperactivity are also frequently observed. Mrs Al Mubarak demonstrated technological systems utilising wireless technology, developed to support the improvement of learning-to-focus skills, through the use of visual tracking, on-task timing, short-term memory sequencing and discriminatory processing.
Dr Nikolaos Mavridis, a graduate of MIT, founder of the Interactive Robots and Media Lab, and TEDx speaker, demonstrated his award-winning work on artificial intelligence technologies emulating human processes and emotions through enhanced interactivity. These included Ibn Sina, the world's first Arabic-language android robot, as well as "facebots", Microsoft-award-recipient social robots which access information and publish on Facebook. Dr Mavridis put forward the thesis that humanity is progressing towards a state of advanced collective intelligence which is co-defined by the interaction between the human mind and non-human entities belonging to technological networks; he showcased examples of related experiments which took place in the USA, whilst he also made wide reference to the use of similar technologies in societies of the past.
Mr Shukri Eid Atari, Director of the Emerging Markets theatre of the Cisco Internet Solutions Group, presented his work on the use of ICT for enabling national and regional economic and social development agendas, and the creation of new models to respond to related challenges and opportunities. Mr Eid Atari advanced the thesis that we are currently living in a world of transition, which is experiencing big shifts in underlying environmental, economic, political and social architecture. Such disruptive transitions are impacting the public sector via the appearance of trends such as open innovation, open public information, user-centred design and networked place making; forecasted trends which were presented, included connectivity for healthcare, smart grids, energy, transportation as well as education.
The event concluded with open discussion between the panellists and the audience, and with networking between the event participants.
The Strathclyde Dialogues series is in its third year currently; the Dialogues aim to bring together panels of experts who, by exchanging views and perspectives, promote the sharing of knowledge in various fields of contemporary interest globally, and with particular application to the UAE.
For more information about the Strathclyde Dialogue series, contact the Strathclyde academic in charge, Dr Katerina Nicolopoulou (katerina.nicolopoulou@strath.ac.uk)