Think more.

Question: Collectively what should we be doing?

Jimmy Wales: What do I think we should be doing that we’re not? Gosh. I don’t know.  I think a lot of things work themselves out over time through the actions of millions of people in concert in ways that are difficult to influence. You can influence them or you can think about them, but they sort of play out on their own schedule.

To my mind, it’s almost useless to think about things we should be doing but we’re not. I think it’s really hard to think about that.  If we’re concerned about, for example, the issue of carbon in the atmosphere, if that’s a big problem, it’s very easy to say, “Well we should be emitting less carbon,” right? Well that’s not a practical thing to even think about.

Instead we have to say, “Gee look. Here’s some trends. Here are some things that are going to happen.” We can start innovating and start thinking about how to deal with that. How do we reduce carbon emissions? Or how do we deal with carbon in a different way in the long run? But there are people working on that, and I feel they’ll come up with something.

I think we should individually be thinking. I think that’s something that I think is really, really important. The more people we have who are living a reflective life where they’re really thinking about their own life, and their own happiness in the context of a global society; in the context of modern technology and things like this, it’s really important. And I think it’s unfortunate sometimes that people seem to not be thinking about things as much as they should.

Recorded On: Aug 10, 2007