Innovation without Wisdom Is like Life without Love

EDITORIAL, 8 Dec 2025

#928 | Marilyn Langlois – TRANSCEND Media Service

Technological innovation is far outpacing social, economic, and political innovation to our extreme peril.  More precisely, the implementation of technological innovation, driven by profit motives, is suppressing our potential to harness advancements in all of these areas towards making life more wonderful for the entire human family, not just the privileged few.

If human beings are smart enough to create a flat little gadget I can hold in my hand and carry on video chats with my grandchildren hundreds of miles away, why haven’t we yet figured out how to accomplish the relatively straightforward task of utilizing the earth’s abundance to ensure a dignified life for all people on the planet?

We have enough apocalyptic nuclear weapons to destroy all life on earth many times over, yet we have failed miserably at preventing millions of Palestinians, Sudanese, Rohingya, and Congolese, who have done nothing to harm anyone, from being mercilessly massacred.

We can perform miraculous heart transplants but can’t find a way to heal the mangled spirits and hearts of greedy, oligarchical megalomaniacs who constantly run roughshod over masses of people deemed unworthy.

We push lipid nanoparticle enclosed mRNA injections with serious side-effects as a quick fix, but neglect the root causes of poor health, trauma and despair.

Surely we have sufficient intelligence to drastically reduce and largely prevent suffering.  What good are mind-blowing high-tech advancements and the wonders of artificial intelligence when we’re stuck in sorely malfunctioning social, economic and political frameworks?

By social advancements, I mean how people relate to each other.  When conflicts arise, too often people either ignore them (letting them fester and get worse), walk away from them (letting them resurface later) or use violence to get their way, rather than try to solve the problem and repair the relationship.

When conflicts arise among nations, similar behavior patterns persist.  The current US leadership, in particular, is sorely lacking in skills of diplomacy, as evidenced by its use of bribes and coercion to eke out UN Security Council approval of a so-called “peace plan” for Gaza that Jan Oberg points out is more like a cruel joke in a conflict and peace illiterate world.

Meanwhile neocons in Europe and Washington, who pride themselves on being “advanced”, persist in obstructing a negotiated settlement of NATO’s proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. Rais Neza Boneza notes that for certain leaders, losing the war is less terrifying than losing the story that justifies the war.

We’ll know we’re making progress when public education’s core curriculum includes conflict literacy, when all parents are supported in socializing their children within their communities,

and when the profession of mediator is elevated in stature above that of judge or military commander.  When people are able to view all others as fellow human beings, trusting in each others’ ability to solve problems of how we relate to each other.

By economic advancements, I mean how all the resources of the earth are put to use.  In what universe can it be deemed acceptable for 1% of people to live in excessive luxury while 99% struggle to barely survive?  For 0.1% or 0.01% to own astronomical amounts of money that they could never use up in thousands of lifetimes?  How does a rich nation like the US end up with throngs of isolated, disabled, troubled people sleeping on the streets in all of its major cities?

To ensure ample funding for job security and meeting everyone’s basic needs, fair tax policies such as high-end wealth, transaction and land value taxes, have yet to be fully fleshed out and widely implemented.

Public banking expert Ellen Brown offers another obvious tool for uplift of societies, as the public Bank of North Dakota has demonstrated for over 100 years:  … public banking … is not speculative, extractive, bubble-producing, inflationary or offshore. It designed to channel capital into the real economy — into goods, services, and livelihoods that nourish communities. Public banking keeps money local and accountable.

We’ll know we’re making progress when public education’s core curriculum includes cooperative economics based on the principle of abundance rather than scarcity.  When the poor everywhere are uplifted and the super-rich reigned in, such that wealth differences are greatly reduced. When money becomes a tool for exchange rather than an object for unlimited accumulation.  When all residents of countries rich in natural resources, incl. Haiti, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Sudan, enjoy a comfortable standard of living.

By political advancements, I mean how decisions are made that affect people’s lives.  In families, work places and in public life, too often people are accustomed to letting bosses and strong leaders call the shots.  Even most countries labeled “democracies”, are in fact far from it.  Highly concentrated wealth and power control much of the media with divisive and fear-mongering narratives to promote outcomes that ultimately serve the few and not the many.   Just because people can vote in elections doesn’t mean they have a say in who becomes a candidate, or to what extent (if at all!) reliable and pertinent information about candidates is available. The citizenry should rule, not money.

Brazen murder on the high seas near Venezuela and genocide against innocents in Gaza have been perpetrated by “elected” officials in the US and Israel.  Saying no to war criminals and bullies is essential.  Recall the two courageous former and current Georgia Congress members—Cynthia McKinney and Marjorie Taylor Greene—who, from opposite ends of the political spectrum, have said No to the Zionist lobby that demanded US fealty to Israel.  What if the entire Congress were to muster sufficient backbone to do so?

Rather than get stuck in “left” and “right” polarities, let’s take an honest look at actual strengths and weaknesses of any given perspective.  The sacred cow of capitalism needs to be sharply critiqued for its role in exacerbating poverty, while the maligned concepts of socialism and communism must be seriously considered for aspects of worker empowerment and universal meeting basic needs that they can bring to the table.  As Richard Rubenstein points out, avoiding political taboos can severely limit options available for successful conflict resolution.

We must reject the capitalist trap of believing money and profit are the primary motivators of productivity and innovation.  Just look around you and marvel at the creative ideas and constructive activities people pursue all the time, not for money, but for the sheer satisfaction of having done something meaningful and purposeful for and with their fellow human beings.

Cuba has been slandered for 65 years as being a “dictatorship”, yet communist Cuba is, I maintain, more democratic than the United States.  Cubans can and do debate and critique their government.  What the West calls “oppressed dissidents” are often CIA assets trying to engineer regime change, a phenomenon not welcome there.  Major policy decisions, such as the recent family law overhaul to strengthen all kinds of families, or revisions in economic policy allowing privately owned businesses within non-exploitative parameters, took many years to achieve.  Extensive input and discussion in social circles and workplaces at all levels ensued before being widely accepted by the whole population and approved by the National Assembly.

As the thriving 70 year old Mondragon cooperatives in the Basque region of Spain have shown, worker ownership and shared decision making provide another robust model for giving workers meaningful input into the success and sustainability of their enterprises, along with the overall health of their communities.  Mondragon workers view capital is a tool to serve the people rather than the other way around.

We’ll know we’re making progress when public education’s core curriculum includes learning modes of shared decision making, propaganda awareness, and how to gather reliable information from multiple sources for making sound decisions; when money is removed from electoral politics; when everyone feels they have a say and their voices are heard.

It’s not that there aren’t plenty of pathways already out there for transforming conflicts, ending the slaughter, healing trauma, and meeting everyone’s basic needs.  All merit further exploration.  It’s those pathological bully billionaire gate-keepers who have washed enough brains that insufficient numbers of the many are prepared to band together and say No to them and Yes to humanity.  Innovation without wisdom is like life without love, and we should demand no less.

Let’s heed the observations of a hospice nurse who accompanied hundreds of people on their deathbeds, revealing what really matters in life:  love, presence, solidarity, courage, honesty, giving and receiving joy.

Tribute to Venezuela’s deceased President Hugo Chavez ‘the best friend’ by Cuban tile artist Fuster in Havana

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Marilyn Langlois is a member of the TRANSCEND Media Service Editorial Committee and of TRANSCEND USA West Coast. She is a volunteer community organizer and international solidarity activist based in Richmond, California.  A co-founder of the Richmond Progressive Alliance, member of Haiti Action Committee and Board member of the International Center for 9/11 Justice, she is retired from previous employment as a teacher, secretary, administrator, mediator and community advocate.

This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 8 Dec 2025.

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