Professor Alex Pentland’s new book Shared Wisdom offers a timely and profound foundation for the development of the AI World Society (AIWS) model. His central message is clear: to build a flourishing society, we must design our technologies based on deep understanding of human nature — not allow technology to reshape humanity blindly. In Shared Wisdom, Pentland traces the great leaps of human civilization — from the birth of cities to the Enlightenment to the Scientific Revolution — demonstrating that progress has always depended on cultural inventions that strengthened cooperation, accelerated innovation, and expanded collective wisdom.
Today’s global challenges — climate change, pandemics, declining trust, and fragile institutions — require similarly transformative cultural architectures. Pentland shows how AI and digital systems, if designed with human deliberation, dignity, and social cohesion at their center, can become tools that amplify — rather than replace — human judgment and creativity. These ideas directly inform the AIWS Model: a framework for building the next stage of civilization by aligning technology with human values, shared purpose, and enlightened governance. Shared Wisdom contributes essential insights that help AIWS design a society where AI strengthens democracy, empowers communities, and accelerates cultural evolution toward peace, creativity, and global flourishing.
