aza | ɐzɐ
Aza is a cofounder of The Earth Species Project
& The Center for Humane Technology,
as well as the co-host of the Your Undivided Attention podcast.
He makes language and change in the world.
”Truth is a process; more verb than noun.”
DECODING Aza
Aza is a National Geographic Explorer, Co-Founder and President of the Center for Humane Technology, and Co-Founder and President of Earth Species Project, a nonprofit dedicated to translating animal communication. He was an architect and subject of the documentary The Social Dilemma, and is the co-host for the popular podcast Your Undivided Attention. Trained as a mathematician and dark matter physicist, he has taken three companies from founding to acquisition, has been a co-chairing member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on the Future of Al, regularly advises heads of state and government officials, helped found Mozilla Labs, was named FastCompany’s Master of Design, and was listed on Forbes and Inc Magazines 30-under-30.
maps and metaphors
The first time I went canoeing, I remember noticing a mysterious phenomena no-one there could explain: as I pushed my paddle through the water, two little whirlpools spun from its edges, spiraling away into the lake long after I pulled my paddle from the water.
What were they and why did they form?
It was trying to figure it out for myself that pulled me into a love for physics and math: together, they give you a map by which you can work out the whys of the universe.
You can find the same vortex in the eddies at the edges of streams, in the rising warmth of dust devils, in the dangerous air-rotors lurking behind cliffs. There are simple, unseen rules that govern everything.
They’re gorgeous.
Metaphors are maps that preserve relationships.
They help you understand one thing by borrowing your understanding of another. They let you understand something huge by understanding something small; something you can’t touch by something you can.
The better your maps, the deeper variety of things you can understand with what you already know. The deeper variety of things you know, the more your maps can teach you how the world is actually the same.
By walking more territory and bettering your maps, you can find constant insight into whatever you care about most.These maps—your metaphors—help light the universe’s simple, unseen rules.
Maps comes with a warning: “The map”, they say, “is not the territory”. The menu is not the meal. The representation is not the thing it represents; some parts must be minimized to make others more visible.
Maps clarify by obscuring.
A metaphor—as a map—is like a set of many arranged bulbs in a dark forest: the trees flush with light hide those in shadow. There is no way to see that isn’t also blind.But moving between many maps and metaphors changes your perspective, moves the bulbs and their arrangement: lighting this way then that. Slowly—and sometimes all at once—you see patterns in what you can’t.
Truth is a process; more verb than noun.
As a teenager, I gave talks on interfaces and toured with the San Francisco Youth Symphony. I studied physics and abstract math in college.
In my final year, my father, Jef Raskin (who started the Macintosh project at Apple and used the word “humane” to describe its philosophy), died of pancreatic cancer.
His philosophy so informed my own thinking that several years later, I returned to my roots to co-found the Center for Humane Technology with my long-time friend Tristan Harris.
We saw the desperate need for a new movement that asked us to design technology for a more sophisticated humanity, not with the assumption that the best humans can do is race to the bottom of our brain stems. Technology isn’t about making us super human, it should be about making us extra human.
The following year, I launched Earth Species Project to help us build the mirror that would allow us to take a compassionate and clear-eyed look at ourselves through the eyes of the natural world around us.
I explore the spaces between awareness and matter.
Press
Aza Presents…
November, 2023 | “A Bit of Optimism” Podcast with Simon Sinek
Talking to Animals
When did we get so disconnected from the world around us? How can we find our way back? Aza Raskin thinks the answer might lie in humanity’s greatest adversary—listening.
October, 2023 | BrainMind Talk
The Promise and Peril of Neurotechnology
Actually getting to the future we want
October, 2023 | Near Future Summit Talk
Regenerative AI – AI for the Earth
The Earth Species Project
March, 2023 | The AI Dilemma Talk
Tristan Harris and Aza Raskin discuss how existing A.I. capabilities already pose catastrophic risks to a functional society, how A.I. companies are caught in a race to deploy as quickly as possible without adequate safety measures, and what it would mean to upgrade our institutions to a post-A.I. world.
September, 2020 | The Social Dilemma Film
Technology’s promise to keep us connected has given rise to a host of unintended consequences that are catching up with us. If we can’t address our broken information ecosystem, we’ll never be able to address the challenges that plague humanity.
Center for Humane Technology
September, 2023 | Politico
What’s Driving California’s New Move on AI Policy
March, 2023 | NYT Opinion with Yuval Harari
You Can Have the Blue Pill or the Red Pill, and We’re Out of Blue Pills
December, 2022 | Time
Aza Raskin Tried to Fix Social Media. Now He Wants to Use AI to Talk to Animals.
Earth Species Project
October, 2023 | Scientific American
Artificial Intelligence Could Finally Let Us Talk with Animals
AI is poised to revolutionize our understanding of animal communication
July, 2023 | Science
Using Machine Learning to Decode Animal Communication
New methods promise transformative insights and conservation benefits
August, 2023 | WIRED
How to Use AI to Talk to Whales—and Save Life on Earth
With ecosystems in crisis, engineers and scientists are teaming up to decipher what animals are saying. Their hope: By truly listening to nature, humans will decide to protect it.