AI and Compassion Project - 2020
Why do some people go out of their way to help others? Why do some people turn their backs when they see others in suffering? How is it that those who have so much can do so little to help those who are less fortunate? How is it that those who have so little will still offer everything they have to help others in needs? These are not just my questions as a tech entrepreneur. These are also the very questions asked by Dr. James Doty at Stanford Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education.
What is compassion? “Compassion is putting yourself in the shoes of another person and seeing the world through their lens for the sake of alleviating their suffering. Put another way, compassion is empathy plus action.” said Jeff Weiner, CEO of Linkedin. Putting it under the context of tech, compassion in tech is seeing all of us as being connected and building technology for the good of humanity.
In tech, we often talk about how we are going to change the world through technology. But, what good is changing the world if we are not compassionate about the world we live in and the very people around us. Being a technologist, I see a need to get a better understanding of compassion because it has a profound impact in everything we do from the customer experience we provide, the product we design, the company culture we foster, all the way to the community we build around us. If we believe in doing good for the world, what are we doing locally to help others immediately around us? Being trained in engineering and science, I want to get a better understand of why some of us are compassionate, while others are not. If you already have a compassionate mindset, I would love to seek you out. We need learn from you so we can help many others to understand the why behind what you do.
Over the past decade, we have learned more about the human mind than we have ever known. Through science and technology, we are getting a better understanding of human motivation and how our environment is affecting us in unexpected ways. We are very grateful for leaders like Dr. James Doty, Jeff Weiner, and Marc Benioff for speaking publicly about the importance of compassion. We need more people to talk about compassion under the context of tech. We believe it is not enough just being compassionate at the top. We need compassion at all levels starting with people around us.
We thank you for your interest in the work that we are doing. We invite you to join us!