Which Moment Marked the Start of the 21st Century for You? Part 2

I think for me it was in 2012, when Jennifer Doudma and Emmanuelle Charpentier discovered a way of using CRISPR Cas9, which is a kind of bacteria, to edit targeted strands of DNA. This is a discovery with amazing implications. We have a colloquial phrase, it’s “in our DNA” to do X, Y, and Z, which means we think of it as being absolutely baked in, something that cannot be revised. Well, now the DNA can be revised. And it is being revised. It’s already being revised in food and agricultural industries. There has been gene editing done to make crops more immune to certain parasites. It’s being done medically to try and help people with genetic disorders like haemophilia. The possibilities of this particular discovery are going to ultimately dissolve the boundary between nature and culture. We’ve always thought of our own human nature as being something that is very much given. In recent times, since the discovery of genes and how they work, we think of it as being “in our genes”. Well, “in our genes” is no longer destiny of any kind. Even if we don’t allow for the influence of the environment, the genes themselves are now subject to human engineering. 

Lorraine Daston, Director Emerita of Max Planck Institute for the History of Science and Visiting Professor at the University of Chicago.

I think for me personally, in terms of technical, economic, and social development, it began in 2006, 2008, 2010. During this time, the iPhone was introduced and popularized. Although the technology already existed, I would say that the iPhone-type smartphone really moved the world into the digital development phase that we are now living in. In the mid-1980s, there was already the personal computer, which was a major step, and then in the mid-1990s the internet. But today, when you go into a restaurant or board a train, everyone, regardless of age, has their smartphone in front of their face and is doing something. This is a fact of life. You can see it even more clearly with younger people in a way that we haven’t seen before, and that is leading us into this digital age.

In political and geostrategic terms, the start of the Ukraine war in 2022 is perhaps the portent that has been signaled as a turning point – and I believe rightly so. However, this is ultimately a limited regional problem that is nevertheless a symptom of global power relations and shifts, but it does not revolutionize all areas of the economy, society, and private life in the same way that digitalization does.

Gerhard Wagner, Chair of Civil Law, Commercial Law, and Economics at the Humboldt University of Berlin.

That was actually a sad moment, it was the events of September 11th, 2001. That was early in the century. It was kind of the moment when I felt that we are in a world with all those divergent views on what it means to live a good life and what it means to build the world around us. I realized that those who may be in disagreement with the values that I subscribe to are pretty strong and they can rather successfully convince many other people, that it’s okay to take other people’s lives, and it’s okay to die themselves for something that is considered by somebody the right thing to do. This was also the moment when I realized that it’s not going to be easier for us to actually find common ways of coexistence and maybe move forward. […] So that was the moment that kind of defined for me the start of the century. All of a sudden, all of those relatively peaceful times, at least for those of us living in the Western world, got to an end. 

Konstantin Korotov, Professor of Organizational Behavior at the ESMT, Berlin. 

For me, the 21st century is something I sense more in people around me, rather than something that’s happening to me. I think it’s really having to do with the complete dominance of the internet which was something that we were getting towards the end of the last century. It would be totally different to have been born with any kind of smartphone in your hand. That was really not part of my youth. […] But I think it’s a worrying difference as well, and it can lead to what I call the society of envy, where you have people who spend their time wishing that their life was different because on social media they see people who are richer or more glamorous or more beautiful or younger. And instead of developing their own lives and feelings and principles, they are envious of what other people have in a way that is impossible to achieve. And they can create a great unhappiness for themselves. I think this constant comparing of yourself to someone else, which has always been there of course, but not in the same constant way, is potentially dangerous. The way, in which knowledge has become in the hands of everyone, which is in principle a fantastic thing, can also be a dangerous thing. They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but a lot of knowledge is maybe an even more dangerous thing. It’s difficult enough to find real intelligence rather than having to depend on artificial intelligence. It’s this constant Faustian dilemma that humans have, which is this desire for knowledge. But what do you do with knowledge? Do you make an atom bomb with it? It’s also the notion of wealth. It would seem that the only interesting reason to have money is in order to give it away. The more we develop our thinking and our knowledge, the furthest away we can end up being from what the gift of life is. And I think this is the warning and the worry of the 21st century for me.

Robert Carsen, theatre and opera director.

I think I can name one point when I realized that something was changing. In fall 2008 I was in Hungary and noticed for the first time in discussions that much of what we considered important and actually guaranteed in a liberal constitutional system at the time was being questioned. That some of the liberal institutions were being questioned in Hungary at the time, but perhaps could have happened elsewhere, was one thing. And just when I first realized this, the major financial crisis in the United States was starting — the collapse of the banks — and everyone knew that this would have an impact on banks and the economy all over the world. This coincidence in fall 2008 was the beginning of the 21st century for me.

Stefan Korioth, Chair of Public and Ecclesiastical Law at the LMU, Munich.

My first thought is that the period of crises began in 2008 with the global financial crisis. For a while, from a European perspective, you still had the feeling that this was an American phenomenon. But we soon realized that […] it was a European crisis and a Euro crisis. Since then, we have been in polycrisis mode: first came the financial crisis, which translated into the Euro crisis and culminated in the Greek crisis. Then came the Syria and migration crises, then came COVID-19. It seemed it was always in a five-year rhythm: 2010 Euro, 2015 migration, 2020 Corona. Now, Ukraine has been added to the list. So from a European perspective, since 2008/2010 we have had the sense that the world is in ruins and that we are running from one trouble spot to the next, perhaps at ever shorter intervals.

Philip Manow, Professor for Political Science at the University Bremen. 

Previous Leadership as the Basis for a Free, Just and Sustainable World

CONTACT

Convoco gemeinnützige Stiftung-GmbH

Zur Förderung der Wissenschaft und Bildung

Brienner Str. 28
80333 Munich
Germany

NEWSLETTER

Sign up now for exclusive news. We will use your personal information as described in our privacy policy.

© 2024. All Rights Reserved