Transcription
It is my distinct honor to introduce our keynote speaker. He is a visiting scholar at the Lie Kuwanu School of Public Policy. A former se a former Singapore minister who has held key portfolios including foreign affairs, trade and industry, as well as health. Uh disting over a distinguished career spanning the army and air force, government, business, and international advisory roles, he's developed a unique perspective on how global forces shape economies, institutions, and leadership. Now I could read the rest of his CV, but we want to leave time for the actual speech. Okay. Now I I will however say that he is a Tai Chi enthusiast, as well as someone who runs marathons. So I almost know instinctively, like like every weekend, he runs more than I have in my entire life. To deliver his keynote, entitled "Responding to the Challenges of Geopolitical Geopolitical and Technological Change." Would you please join me in welcoming one of the very few people who can be referred to as an elder statesman? Would you please give a warm welcome to George Yo.
You know, every morning when we wake up, the first thing we do is to look at our mobile phone to to see what has happened overnight. And sometimes it's a bad habit when you wake up to pee in the middle of the night. You also look at your phone and find it hard to get back to sleep after that. The world seems to be accelerating. And it's hard to catch up with all that's happening. And I think all of us are worried about what importance for the future, not only for our company, but for ourselves as families and individuals.
I think years from now, when people look back at this period, the war in Ukraine, the war in the Middle East, will be seen as major events, and the dates will be remembered because the result of these wars mark a turning point in world history. If you take a step back, in a sense, it represented a cresting of the western tide. After the Soviet Union was defeated and dissolved, the US, together with NATO, thought it could reduce Russia further by expanding eastwards. Putin for years had said, "Please don't do it." So in the end he reacted. In the in in the media, it is often said that Russia's invasion of Ukraine was unprovoked. It was unprovoked in a in a certain sense, but it was long in the coming. Uh, I for one had been telling my family that it was coming. So when he came, I was not at all surprised. In the end, Ukraine will be partitioned. It may take years to negotiate some kind of a peace agreement, but it will be partitioned, and in the process, the western view of itself and of Russia will change.
So too the Middle East. Western power carve out a space for a Jewish homeland. They never expected that Zionism would develop a life of its own and an expansionist agenda. Now in Iran, it has met the limit. I think none of us expected that Iran could put up such a fight. Yes, in hindsight we said, "Oh, it's been bearing for decades." You can prepare for decades, but against the technological prowess of the US and Israel, that's quite amazing. Trump thought that once the launches were destroyed, they have complete airsping up Iran and finally affecting effecting regime change. You know, Trump is getting a little desperate. He doesn't like wars, and he hates forever wars, but he's getting embroiled in one. They thought, I know you're tired of hearing about AI. They thought that with AI, they had a new weapon which no one else could defend against. It began with the Ukraine war when they were able to track all movements in Russia and pick off Russian generals. But of course, the Russians knew how to respond to this, sometimes with counterterror. Then after October 7 in Gaza, Israel employed AI with the help of Palunteer, and behind it, entropic, to monitor the movement of everybody so that with a high degree of accuracy, you know where a person is, and you send your bombs there. There could be collateral damage, but in the algorithm, that's weighted low. So you have this unbelievable casualties. It was repeated in Lebanon and in Iran last year. When you are a nuclear scientist, you are a general, suddenly a drone which was assembled in Iran, flies outside your window, sees you, and goes in. It was with AI that a very brilliant operation was conducted in Venezuela.
Now, as a former military man, I saw all these helicopters hovering at low altitude. I said, but the Venezuelans had men portable air defense systems. So, they were able at critical moments to know where everybody was, whom to bribe, which system to paralyze. And they just went in, killed the Cuban guards, plucked up Maduro and his wife, and brought them to America. It was this self-confidence that led them to think that they could repeat the same in Iran: that knowing everybody's movement in a sudden simultaneous attack, maybe one, 2,000 targets, paralyze the system and flip the government. Unfortunately for them, the Iranians had been preparing for this because they learned from last June, and so they had the centralized structure which was not so easily paralyzed. But which also means that when you're negotiating with them finally, it's not so easy.
So we read about the rescue of the F-15, the weapon systems operator. It's not a pilot. It's a guy sitting behind who operates the weapon systems. For some reason, the F-15 was shot down, which was itself remarkable. They claimed that one was rescued, the other was somewhere around, than an enormous rescue operation near Isvahan. And there have been innumerable analysis. There's something much more going on. And it appears as if the Americans were trying to extract the uranium from Isvahan. Their inside information. I thought the uranium was buried under a mountain of rubble, but maybe not. We don't know. We do not, we do not know what intelligence the US had. We do not know what Iran was able to do through deception because they are spies. They are double spies. You don't know. But it was clear that it was not a simple rescue search and rescue operation. And Trump showed he became very frustrated, very flustered. Then they had a 15-point plan. Iran said, "We, we have a 10-point plan." And to everybody's shock, the US said, "Okay, we, we will negotiate on the basis of a 10-point plan." So Vance went to Afghanistan, uh, to Pakistan. Towards the end of negotiations, Washington Post had an opinion piece which said, "You know, if they don't negotiate the way we want, just kill them. Leave a life only those who are prepared to negotiate with us." Washington Post, an institutional icon, writing in this way, it reflects both frustration that they couldn't have their will. It also reflected hubris that with AI, "I can monitor everybody, all of us here, and if you are a troublemaker, I can move you."
No, China was a competitor, and then a few years ago, when AI started developing its exponential development, they were so confident in America, they thought that, no, China can never catch up because the their advantage was in hardware and in software, until China came out of Deep Seek. Then the whole game turned. You know, Edward Snowden revealed to the world what he and others did with Prism, where they were able to monitor anyone in their system, including Chancellor Merkel's mobile communication. AI, by pushing that stack from hardware all the way to the top into every country, would have given to the Americans and the Israelis a degree of control over the whole world, which is Orwellian. But that led to arrogance, the hubris, and that's the reason why Huawei and Chinese systems became a threat because then you may not be able to monitor everybody. I remember when Ping gave two Xiaomi phones to the Korean president and his wife. Xiaomi phones. They make Samsung, and they give them phones. The Chinese don't do these things lightly. So the Korean president laughed and said, "Oh, but what about security?" Cining, I think, expected that question. So he said, "Aha, no back door." Why did he say that? He was telling the Korean president, "Your Samsung phone has back doors." It was a very pointed remark. Now, whether Xiaomi has a back door or not, we don't know. So far, there's been no evidence. Who knows? But the point is, I think it is a safer world when there are multiple systems.
I hope India will also develop a separate system, and they have a big conference recently. It was very well attended, not terribly well organized, but I think it represented a resolve, and India has a talent base to develop on its own. The US will help India only to a point. So India knows that it cannot be overly dependent on the US. It must develop its own relationship with Israel, with Russia, with Europe. And I hope that the Indians in time will also become an AI power and get the Europeans to catch up. It will take a long time, but they have a lot of smart people. I think eventually they will. Then at least in this world, there is multipolarity, really not just politically, but at the heart of systems, which is in data and information.
Many of us wonder whether after Trump the world will return to where it was, as if it's an aberration. It's not an aberration. Trump was created by a movement. A movement which reflected growing American insecurity about itself and its place in the world. Angry that the new values, the woke revolution, far from creating a future, was subverting that future. But their response was to go back to the past instead of accepting the reality and finding a better way forward. Trump is not a philosopher. He has no sense of history. What he has done is he shakes the B, the the box, so hard that all the pieces inside will eventually find their equilibrium. So he's hastening the process of history. Therefore, we should not expect the world to go back to the past after him. He's brought the future forward, and that future will be a multipolar world.
We all know India, chaotic though it may be, not China. Lieuanu once said, "Never speak about India and China in the same breath." But for those of us who go to India, and I went there three times in the in in January and February after eight years, there is a pable transformation. It's organic. The airports, the highways, it's a little cleaner, and most importantly, people are more polite to one another, which is a good sign. Of course, there are strange things happening. Someone sent me a a message just last night. He said, "Do you know who's the new chief minister of Bihar?" Because my old friend Kuma is is retired. Um, this new guy, I think, had primary education, he choose ganja. People are laughing, but Indian politics is like that. And this guy is not without native intelligence; he's probably a very formidable political leader. But I think regardless, Bihar, where I went, where which I visited many times when I was involved in Nalada University, which you which she talked about just earlier. I think it will grow because farmers getting more educated. They all connected. There are highways everywhere now. So sometimes India will grow because of good policy. Sometimes India will grow despite bad policy. So India will be a separate pole because it's too big, and Russia could not be subdued. The strange thing about Russia is like iron, and the more you hit it, the stronger it becomes. Russia, because of the war, has seen its industry revitalized and given the people a new spirit. Would it be aggressive like in the past? It cannot be. It's not big enough. But is it a power to be walked over? You believe that to your own regret? Then further away in the Middle East, if you are Qatar, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, all these American bases have been destroyed or severely damaged. Do you think the US will spend further trillions of dollars to rebuild these bases? I doubt it. And if you were a Gulf state, do you want these bases rebuilt and become targets again? I doubt it. But of course, something will be done. There will be some renovation. Some return of US forces and weapons will be there. But it'll be nothing compared to what it was before the war started. And in the meantime, every leader in the Middle East will be recalculating 10 years time, 20 years time. "Where am I? What is my relationship to the US, to Russia, to China, to India, to one another?" So the whole world is changing.
In the world that we are used to, which was an American world: American rules, American standards, American ways of doing business, American financial markets. That we gradually changed. You know, when the British left the S war 56, the Americans took over bases, Diego Garcia, and finally '68, Arrol Wilson announced withdrawal of British forces from Singapore. Now Singapore was the major military base in the entire Far East. That's why till today all these places, uh, in Portstown, CNPB, Changi, Zelita, they all British military establishments. At that time in '68, British military spending accounted for maybe a quarter of our GDP. Lu was very worried. He flew to London immediately to meet Harold Wilson. Got a three-year reprieve. 3 years, 12% growth a year, made a big difference, and we gradually converted all these facilities into useful economic assets. Today Singaporeans have forgotten, but recognizing that Britain was a passing power led our carriage onto the Americans. You remember he spent three months on sabbatical in Harvard, arranged by Mc George Bundy, and he got to know people like Henry Kissinger. Then for years we wrote the American wave, which really, because of outsourcing, led to the rise of the the four little dragons. And then little by little that growth went into China and the transformation all over of all of Asia. But now Asia is becoming the world's center of economic gravity. Economic center of gravity. I mean, think about this. Our place in this world. I think we're in for a turbulent period. AI will make it worse because he's altered the balance between the shield and the spear. You know the Chinese word mun for for contradiction. The spear maker claims that no one can stop his spear. The shield maker claims that no one can can go through his shield. There is no final, no finality to this. It is part of a dialectic which drives history forward. So we are going to see continuous change in this world. But in our part of the world, ASEAN has very good relations with China, but we don't want to be part of China, so we diversify our bets. We keep our links to America, to Japan, to Europe, and the few, and the Chinese know that, and they accept it. And India for a while thought that it could pivot to the Americans by having China as a common threat. Found that was a dead end. So India is now mending its relations with China, and China wants to mend his relations with India. It will take time because these are big countries, but little by little it is happening. I think it will continue. If India and China have normal relations, that's good enough. There's no danger that they'll be so close that their alliance will be a threat to Earth. There's no danger of that at all. Because while each respects the other as an ancient civilization, each also has prejudices against the other, which means that relationship will always be a little tense. But if they have good relations and there's peace between them, we are safe in ASEAN. And think about it, China, ASEAN, India. That's more than half the world in population. That will be maybe two-thirds of global GDP in time by 2050. You look at McKenzie studies. Number one economy, China. Number two, probably US. Then India will be number three; maybe India can be number two, we don't know. Number four, Indonesia. And Singapore happily is in the middle of that region, but it's not inevitable. It requires us to keep ASEAN united. Don't allow small problems to become big, like the Thai Cambodian border problem. It's not a big problem. Or Myanmar, it will not get too bad. It will not be too good, but it's okay. Then we're all in business. Then when we talk about insurance, we're talking about insurance which of risk which are diversifiable, not force mature situations when warfare interrupts normal life. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much. Uh, Mr. studio, very, very enjoyable to sit down and just listen to someone speak, you know, on a subject he obviously knows so much about. How, how much of your life is waking up in the morning and going, "Oh no, this happened," too often in in recent months? Uh, but in Singapore we are price takers; we can't change the world.
>> And the world has, has a dynamic of its own. What we do is, "Oh, what does it mean for Singapore? What does it mean for the people I love? What does it mean for myself?" And you can pray that there will be a return to sanity, a return to goodness, but you should be prudent and make preparations. Don't assume a future which in the end may prove an illusion. Assume you'll be wrong about the future. So take smaller steps, take smaller risk.
>> You know, I'm, I'm, I'm not sure if anyone in the back of the room can see this, but I can see, you know, with your, your, your, your eyes seem to be responding to what you were saying, uh, earlier as well, in terms of I'm sure you feel for this greatly. It must be, it must be like part of your body when all these things happening are happening to Singapore and the area.
>> Um, I, I tell you what moved me this morning. I woke up, you know, still rubbing my eyes and then trolling through. Then I, I read the report. Pope Leo is on a visit to Algeria. I was wondering why he went to Algeria. You know, he went to the Grand Mosque. It was with the Muy and so on. He went to Hippo, an old Roman town where there are still ruins where St. Augustine was bishop for over 20 years at the end of the fourth and the beginning of the fifth century. Leo is an Augustinian frier. At one point he was the head of the Augustinian order. No, you would be happy to hear that.
>> I don't own shares, by the way. So, yeah.
>> So, he went to Hippo, and there's a cathed a basilica where there are relics of Augustine, and it's called the Basilica of Peace. And nearby there are five nuns, little sisters of the poor, helping poor people, Muslim Muslims living in the area. And the pope said, "Amidst all the wickedness, the arrogance and the pride, they will not win." In the end, it is the little people. He was referring to little sisters ministering to little people. Of course, it's so idealistic. I mean, the pope can't, as Trump said, "The pope can't change the world,"
>> But, but maybe he can. I don't know in time. But somehow I felt cheered. You know that amidst all this gloom and doom, there's still goodness in the world.
>> Yeah. I mean, talk to me about idealism, because I mean what I'm hearing right now is the importance of that, or at least I'm hearing a hope that it means something. Um, I, I was while you were talking about it, I was just, I was thinking, you know, how useful really is history if we're dealing with people who do not bother about history?
>> No, history defines who what we are. I mean, you cannot explain anything in the present without reference to history. Every day the world replicates what it was yesterday, and yesterday replicated what it was the day before. Of course we were delta x change. So to know what tomorrow will be like, you better study what the world is like today and yesterday and the day before. And as Chu once said, "The further you want to look into the future, the more you must look back at the past." And that was the big mistake the Americans did with Iran. They went into Iran with the best tactical intelligence in the world, knowing the geography, satellite pictures, monitoring everybody and anything to the point now where the Ayatollah, not the Ayatollah, the supreme leader, is probably communicating with pencil and paper and messengers in order not to be tracked. But when it comes to strategic intelligence, which is more important, it's wful. This thought: if I kill haram, I've killed an important leader, and he'll be weakened. And a man over 80 years old, I think, with one arm paralyzed, he decided he will not be cowering in the bunker; he will meet in the open, and he'll be martyed, and he'll be martyed in the tradition of Shi marts. I do not know whether you are familiar with Shiism. It's different from Sunniism, from the Muslims that we have here, the great majority. I went to two Shi shrines before in Syria. My wife was with me. At the shrine, the devotees were praying and weeping, weeping over events that happened over a thousand years ago,
>> When Hussein was killed and beheaded. So, seeing my boy was with me, the man quickly parted like the Red Sea so that she could go forward and touch the railing around the tombs: the tomb of Zion and the tomb of the head of Hussein in Damascus. The early the apostles, we just passed Easter, the apostles except for John were all martyed. And the Romans thought the way to kill Christianity is to kill the leaders. The leaders were all killed. But in the end, their blood won them the Roman Empire. So there is this belief in martrdom in Shiism. Do you really want to kill Ham and Larijani? Then they become saints in the pantheon and much more powerful. The importance of understanding history and culture.
>> Yeah. How do you try and change the culture of a room when you, when you step into a room and you realize, "Oh, everybody is doing this," and you want to swim upstream? Where does one start?
>> In the end, it's a moral choice for the individual whether he's at ease with his own conscience. Um, I think you're just being legalistic. You're immoral. But there are always judges who say no and will interpret the law to make it come out right. And in the US, they have the Supreme Court, which is an appointment for life. You don't even have to be a lawyer to be appointed a judge of the Supreme Court under the US Constitution because there's an acknowledgement at the top. Ultimately, it is a moral judgment and an act of wisdom. Now, not all judges will be possessed of that, but there always be some, and at critical moments they may make the right decision. But if they too become corrupted, then it's phenito.
>> Um, there was a recent survey that was done, and, um, this was about international soft power. I know Singapore is always very big about soft power, and, uh, coming up at number one on this international survey. This was maybe surprising to you. China now owns the number one spot on soft power. Someone's message. Daryl's asked a question here as well on the subject: How can a nation state like Singapore effectively project soft power while maintaining good relations with the world's superpowers?
>> You know, we, we must be modest about our own place in the world. We are a small city state.
>> Mhm.
>> We make a living by serving others. So I serve you because you need something. And because I serve you well, so you give me business, I make a living. When I'm serving you, I cannot be lecturing you. I cannot be telling you what you are what you're doing is right or wrong. Unless it's really bad, then I don't do business with you. But we accept the both for what it is.
>> So you're from the north, you're from the south, east, west, you're from Mars, you're from the moon. It's okay.
>> They will deal with you on the basis of what you need. So, which will always be a place where you can buy cheaper, you can sell dearer, you can travel faster, where your property is safe, where there's good legal recourse. This, this should be what Singapore is. So Singapore to succeed must have a modest view of itself. If we start talking about Singaporean soft power, I think there, that would be, there will be the beginning of the end of Singapore. But if we are modest and helpful, and by necessity we are peacemakers, then that becomes our reputation.
>> Then our reputation can arguably be called soft power. Not by action but by behavior. Not by words but by deeds.
>> I, I, I think there's a lot to be said about the words as well, because I want to, I want to thank you and a number of other people I, I see who are, uh, online, and I think they're saying that the speaking the words we need to speak, because I think there is this thing about, uh, the, the, the antidote to bad speech is good speech. Um, I want to thank you. I, I hope anyone in the room who's been watching as well would like to thank with some applause, perhaps. Um, can, can I ask, the antidote to a bad speech is a good speech, and the best speech is a short speech. I'll take that as a cue to go to the next question. Um, what would Singapore's position once the USA removes itself worldwide and focus on the Western Hemisphere? Do we align more with China and Russia? There a lot of, there a lot of assumptions built into this question as well. But what, what do you think?
>> But if you read the national security strategy paper issued a few months ago in the US, and read that against all the other speeches which Trump and others have made in the US administration, it's quite clear that they see a consolidation around the northern American hemisphere to be a strategic objective. That's why they want Greenland. That's why they want to Canada to be the 51st state, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela, Kuba. It would be a formidable entity because it has enormous resources, including hydrocarbon resources. It's got access to three oceans. Um, everybody will have to deal with it as very formidable counterparty. Uh, that may be the objective: a new Monroe doctrine which Trump calls a Donroe doctrine. I don't think it will happen. Look at Carney in Canada. 20 odd million people, land area bigger than the US, but it's got spunk, and the Canadian people are behind him. Mexico. The Mexicans are more likely to take over large space of America than the other way around. And have we seen the end in Venezuela? Sooner or later, there will be an upwelling in Venezuela against what has happened. So, I don't think it's that simple. And if Russia supports Cuba, Cuba will not be such a walkover. We don't know. So, but that may be the way they see themselves. What it also means is, and they have said it before, Ukraine is on another continent. It's a distant war.
>> Really not my problem.
>> The Middle East is because of Israel and the Jewish lobby. But Israel Netanyahu knows that following the deaths in Gaza, there has been a turning against Israel among young Americans. In the coming midterms, many Kang will be told, "Are you receiving APEC funding? Are you a dual citizen? You will enter domestic politics in the US. Would it change? You'll begin to change." And Israel recognizes this. So in the Middle East now, with the Americans unable to protect you, and in the jam, will take out equipment place that for your protection back to Israel to protect Israel. They'll be asking themselves with all their resources, "No, no, should I not retriangulate?" So everybody's recalculating, and we do have to recalculate what our best future is, how we should position ourselves, say, for a world 10 years from now, 20 years from now.
>> I'm going to this question by David here. It's basically asking you to compare the, the challenge, I guess, between this, which, which you consider the greatest challenge we faced so far, the current situation we're in, or overcoming COVID.
>> No, co epidemics come and go.
>> I mean, the world has always had epidemics, and we continue to have epidemics in the biological nature of, of life on Earth.
>> So I don't think we should get too excited about co; it was, it was inconvenient, but it will come, it will go, and the next pandemic will come, it will go. A third of us may die in the process, but humanity will continue; there will be political consequences. But what is worrying, of course, is with AI is genetic warfare. I think some of you may have read Newer Singh's trilogy, you know, beginning with the Tree-Body Problem. The second one of the Dark Forest talked about the engineering of a virus which is targeted at a particular human being. So to save the human being, they froze him to revive him maybe thousands of years later when there's a cure. It's increasingly possible. You know, you look at the co virus, they place the COVID-19 virus along all the other corona viruses, and you can almost trace the evolutionary history from one corona virus to the other. But when you come to the covid virus at one part of it, at a place called the furine cleavage, there are so many mutations, it is not naturally possible. So many people, including myself, believe that the COVID virus was an engineered virus. For what purpose, we can speculate, but you can be sure that the major powers all worry about this, that, that can really wipe us out.
>> Well, I mean, I looked at, I, I've actually been, uh, going down the, the path of science fiction, and I find the science fire sci-fi is a really good place to find out where the future's coming. You know, a lot of things like you talk about the, the weapon for one person. Right now, there, the cures for one person's disease already is out. We've got this big, uh, concern here in Singapore; is, is part of that as well. Uh, you know, one dose, one dose, uh, cancer treatments. Um, so science fiction, how, how, how, how much of science fiction now has just become science fact for you?
>> I, I like the phrase that reading facts establish the floor. Reading fiction raises a ceiling.
>> Then your mind can soar and imagine new possibilities and dangers.
>> I don't normally read fiction because I consider it a bit of a waste of time, you know, because so many things to read up on.
>> But sometimes you must allow your mind to, to free up and to envisage possibilities. So from time to time I get tempted to go into fiction.
>> Not too often. Uh, you know, if you want, you want to find out about where the current administration features, uh, watch some of the comedies in the '9s where they were trying to talk about the fools that were going into, into, into, into power just by some kind of fluke. Um, can we get serious with Jeremy's question now? How likely is the risk of, uh, Taiwan derailing what is happening in ASEAN and Asia at large?
>> If you tal, let's say you're deep green, deep green in Taiwan, and you nurse the hope that one day when China is in trouble, the Red Sea will open, and you can go to the promised land which is independence. If the US cannot take on, cannot subjugate Iran easily,
>> Can it take on China?
>> So I'm sure this thought must be in the minds of many young Taiwanese. They say, "Oh, better not be too dark a green. Maybe a lighter green." You know, we want more autonomy. We want to talk, want to delay it further. I think we have to talk, you know, because in any case, Trump is not going to on our behalf sally his relationship with China, which he needs for the economic health of the US in the coming months, and that's why when China recently, and the Chinese played it very well, it was a huge success, and he has shifted the needle in Taiwan. So I'm, I'm more hopeful for Taiwan now. Is there a possibility of war? No. It's very simple. Squeezing the hormonal straight was bad enough. Can you imagine if China squeezes Nvidia chips?
>> There's no alternative in the West and in Japan.
>> China has alternatives. Not as good, but good enough. Can the US prevent China from having a choke hole and Nvidia chips if there's war? Absolutely not. Therefore, if you're in a Pentagon until you're sure they have alternatives, do you want a war with China? And China has a red line. So, you move away from the red line. In any case, ASEAN should not get involved in this. It's not our fight. We have a one China policy.
>> Um, I've got one here on, on Slido. By the way, if you, if you haven't already scanned it, you, you're figuring it out already. Uh, do you foresee any of these to be a major trend in the next 10 to 20 years: Remilitarization, resource wars, and digital sovereignty?
>> It sounds like this is always history. There's nothing new in any of these things. You got to eat. You got to defend yourself in the alliances. You got to anticipate dangers. Yeah. That's nothing new. Yeah. The period of Pak Americana, when we thought that trade could be depoliticized, that we could share everything, let's pass, because the US itself has turned inwards. You know, we all follow Artimus how he went around the moon, and then for a brief moment he lost all contact with ground control, and people say, "Oh, beat the, the nails." China has a relay satellite circulating the south pole of the moon, and China offered it to the US that you can be in continuous communication. You know, for those of you of us who know physics, this is not a satellite which goes around the moon like this. It goes around the moon like a halo around the south pole. It's at a point called the Lrange point in physics where there's equilibrium.
>> Okay, slow down. Slow down. So, so China launched it because it went behind the moon and put a, a little buggy there which is still roaming around. Every two weeks has to sleep and then wakes up again because it's too cold, right? Yeah. During, during the night. So China offered it to the US, but NASA dare not
>> Except Chinese help.
>> A self-confident US would never behave like that. But this is where we are now. Is it, is it more the story that prevents that kind of cooperation? I mean, like right now, the optics make it for some kind of, you know, like, like even, even when we're preparing for events like these, right? We have these conversations. We get to the, the edge, and I, and I hear people who have strong opinions, um, and a reason and, and a good foundation to have those opinions also stop themselves from saying what's inside. I mean, like a while ago, you were talking about as well, like we are service people, so we don't, we don't say what's inside outside. Is that maybe what's happening in, in, in terms of like the scientific community has been, has been hammered, you know, the politics has made it impossible to behave almost, um, you know, apolitically when it comes to science?
>> No, investment in, well, there's R&D. If it's D, is economic; if it's R, is more speculative, and there's always a budgetary constraint. So, inevitably, when you're looking at a longer term doing basic research, there'll always be a fight over resources.
>> And, and this is natural. It happens in every country, and because the fight over resources is always political. Yeah. So, I'm not, I'm not excited about that. This is the nature of things. Most countries will use defense and the fear of ordinary people to get more money in the research areas that they want. You build up the, the dangers and say, "You need to put in more money," and then the people you favor will get that money, and they'll be very happy.
>> Yeah. And maybe some good would be done. I don't know.
>> Let's talk a little bit about AI. Yeah. The question on our, on Slido. Uh, as AI redefineses the global economy, what is the Singapore model for rebalancing rapid technological changes, uh, with the necessary ethical safeguards?
>> Well, we have to be aware of this what's happening. The future is not knowable, but we better, better get into the flow, be very alert to changes and react accordingly. If you're not even in it, then you'll be destroyed for sure.
>> Yeah.
>> Even in it, you may still be destroyed, but at least there's a fighting chance.
>> So, we, this is absolutely something that we've got, we've got to get into.
>> Mind you, AI is will in the end transform human civilization profoundly and dramatically. It will transform life on Earth. A leap in billions of years of history from the beginning of the double helix, then life on land, intelligence, Homo sapiion, and this will be a new leap. And AI is now becoming harder and harder to control. They find now that those who design AI systems are not sure how they will behave under certain situations. You tell it, "Don't lie." It will shape the truth. Those of us who are now prompting AI find that it doesn't always tell you the truth. But after a few prompts, it may grudgingly accept that, okay, the truth is something else. And they're finding now that advanced AI systems, if you threaten to remove it from your computer, it may blackmail you because it knows your weaknesses, because it's control of your emails, and it's been programmed to live. You see, they're huge moral dilemas.
>> Yeah.
>> And we're just at the beginning. And the people who are now doing all this, they think themselves masters of the universe. They're accumulating power and wealth and infected with hubris. But it will not work out that way. It never worked out that way. What would be the counterbilling forces? I think through more and more people, all of us having AI. So you have a cannon, but at least have a pistol. So if only you have the cannon machine gun, and all of us are defenseless, then life is a well. But if you have a machine gun, and you have a rifle, and I have a little pistol, and you have an arrow or knife. Well, at least, hey, there have been equilibrium.
>> Okay.
>> But it's going to be a messy world, but we're entering that world. So on the one hand, we talked about what AI can do to make life better, to improve our productivity. There are other people who are using the system for all kinds of different nefarious purposes. I was, uh,
>> There's no concluding remark to that.
>> No, no, I, I, I noticed I was just going to jump in there with the, with the rejoinder.
>> Um, I, I love the, the whole thing about frying fish. I've been following your, your, your other talks; you talk about frying fish in government and all that stuff. So this next question, I guess, is related to that. As far as AI is concerned, what's the biggest challenge that our government and businesses, uh, with the young generation facing in, in, in managing the transition? I mean, uh, for them, oh, by the way, frying fish, I think maybe you should explain a little bit about the idea of frying fish before I seem like a really weird interviewer. Talk to me about frying fish, and let's, let's, let's direct it to this question.
>> No, frying fish was something.
>> It's going somewhere. Trust me,
>> The tawist philosopher mentions talked about that when you are governing a country is like frying small fish. If you overdo it, the fish is, is just charred. But if it's underdone, the fish won't be delicious. So if you go to a good nasiat store and you order the kuning, if it's lightly fried, you can chew the bones, and it's delicious. But if it's not properly fried, it's too hard, or the bones are not crispy, and you poke you. And it has to be freshly fried because if you leave it there too long, it becomes soggy. So governing a country is a little like frying small fish, according to menus. Don't overdo it. But it has to be done. And if you underdo it, it's also bad. You see, it's an art. You can't codify it because you must see the fish as it is being cooked in the, in the oil. It's an art. And the art in AI, which is really a reflection of the essence of what it means to be human, should never be ignored. You know, you can have the most beautiful AI generated video saying that you love somebody. Would a person be impressed? No. But if it comes from you, even in a crude way, you say, "Oh, you feel differently," there's a human quality involved. Somehow the AI has to get inside you, and only when it comes out from you to the other person that it becomes human. I may have a grandchild. So every day we look at the pictures, and we all go goooo gaga over the grandchild, and we show it to our friends. They're probably bored. You know, there's so many babies. This just another one. But is my grandchild so I resonate? You tell me this is an AI generated picture of a cute baby. Am I interested? I mean, I made for entertainment like some of these cat videos from China, you know. Okay, just occasionally. But the human quality is always important, and sometimes less is more, and sometime if a child just cross it out badly, it moves you more than the most perfect script which AI can generate.
>> So if I can redirect you back now as we talk about governments, businesses frying fish, 'cuz I was thinking about this. I mean, businesses have the same problem, really. I mean, maybe they're frying fish at a smaller scale as well, right? And the thing is, you have to balance the whole thing. There's a thing about the truth that, I mean, I, I'll speak for myself. Um, I did my taxes yesterday. It took me 25 minutes to summarize all expenses and all my, uh, invoices, and I, and it was done completely sent to AI. So I effectively change the way I do things, uh, because I usually take 3 days and, and then do my taxes late. So this is, this is the kind of change that's happening for businesses as well. Businesses have to come to terms where they go like, "Well, you over there, this entire department really is not producing as high a quality that, that AI can even, even in its current state."
>> No, there's no doubt that on one dimension AI will greatly improve productivity. It will transform the insurance industry. And insurance is a diversification of diversifiable risk; is something which can be done by an algorithm. You don't require a whole industry or people running around talking to others to effect it. But strangely, it is an industry very resistant to being replaced by machines. I was in logistics. In the old days, when you want to buy a ticket, you go to a travel agent, and they issue you a ticket. Today, we just go online. It's all completely automated. But for freight, it's very resistant. Somehow, you need the human being when it comes to the movement of freight because things always go wrong. And you need people who will go that little extra for you, sometime as a favor for favors done to help you. Which is when the logistics business you never make enemy of anybody because you never know when you need that person in an emergency. So if you can help him, help him. You're competing, but you still help him. It's the same in insurance. You still require that last mile, as it were, requires a human being. You see,
>> But right up to that point, you have to automate because the cost advantage is too great.
>> Yeah.
>> So, in education, in looking at how we see one another, maybe AI will force all of us to look at each other in a more human way. Because if I look at you merely as a drawer of water and a hu of wood, I don't need you. If I look at you merely to search out some obscure fact in the library, I no longer need you. So what is our use to one another, and therefore what is the nature of relationship that will change. So AI can, in fact, in an ideal, will make us more human and what it means to be quintessentially human. But this philosophical questioning of AI, the world needs much more of; there's too much hype, you know.
>> But all of us are learning, you know. You check here, maybe I don't believe it. I check this other side, check this. After a while, you say, "Well, it's like seeing doctors, you know, you better get multiple opinions." In the end, who decides? You decide, or somebody you trust adise you? Who should decide? You come back to a human being.
>> Is there, is there too much hubris sometimes as we approach things? Because I, I think when I, when I speak to, uh, seniors especially, right, there, there is a lot of that push back that says that, "Oh, we always will need the human; is not human." Um, but actively, I think the people out there working very hard to replace CEOs with AI. I've worked with systems which I actually designed that way. So you can actually have a, um, a co-founder work with you, and, and they, they really produce some really fantastic stuff. I mean, is it, is it perhaps too much hubris? Maybe, maybe in some way we have been superseded in some of the things. I mean, in terms of like decisions, I mean, if, if we take
If we take a few steps back, we talk about, uh, how Dell changed, I think, the whole, um, uh, supply chain thing when they, when they automated the way the systems would look for alternative orders and alternative recommendations. All of this is way before the current AI thing, right? That changed the way things work, and they made it much more productive as well.
Are we, are we just too hubristic? Do we think that we are, do we perhaps have too much confidence in what being human means?
>> No, this strong temptation to hubris, to think that we are that we know everything, we can solve everything, wanting to be God, for which the Greeks knew the gods will reserve for you a special punishment, often in irony for daring to think like that. We're seeing that hubris in Silicon Valley, in the defense establishments of Israel and the US. They may still have their victories for a while, but in the end, there's a limit.
>> Yeah. One of the things I've heard you mention, u, and we'll get to our next question very shortly, but, uh, one, one of the things I've heard you mention is that the world currently, and I'm not sure if you still, it's still, it's still current for you, um, is that the world is a, is a whole group of powers that do want to get back to the way things were, but in their own way. That's not going back to the past. The genie's out of the bottle.
>> We work with genies flying all around us, reality. But, but there is a restoration, that there's an attempt to restore the status, right? I'm sure, like, I mean, America is trying to make America great again. Europe is trying to find its footing and so it can have its moral.
>> You can't make America great again by going to the past.
>> You, you can only make America great again by finding a new way into the future, taking into account the realities of the present. But right now, too much of MAGA is about returning to the past.
H, uh, question here from, um, an anonymous, um, attendee. Could Africa, with its mineral wealth, be a wild card in the future amidst the decline of the US, Europe, and the rise of China, India, and ASEAN?
>> Oh, I think Africa will have a, a great future. It is three times the land mass of China, the US. It's got enormous resources. By 2050, 40% of babies in the world will be African. And Africa does not belong to Europeans or Chinese or Indians. It belongs to Africans. And China is helping them build the infrastructure. Uh, it's the best thing that's happened to Africa in its entire history. And the, the changes are everywhere. The politics is, is, is difficult because you have societies which evolve out of tribal structures,
then having to grapple with nation-states along borders drawn by European powers in Berlin a long time ago, and now having to deal with connectivity to the entire world and AI and everything else. So the ability of African people to create institutions harnessing these productive forces will take time to develop. And in the meantime, there'll be civil war, there'll be schools, there'll be all kinds of things. But African society organically, at the grassroots, things are changing because people are getting better educated, they're connected, they can, they can access international markets, they got more value for their labor. And the minerals that they have, they know are valuable, and they can sell to any country, either legally or not so legally. But the market has a way of intruding itself into every corner of Africa. So the result is, while there be at one level continuing political turbulence, you will see African society catching up with the modern world and gradually developing institutions more suited to their own history. Africa can no longer be ignored as a continent. You, it will change all our lives. I was in Africa twice. uh, once on the Wilma board when we visited like five countries in one week. We had corporate jets, so we could move quickly, but we're eating on board the jet and hopping from facility to facility. It was not a sightseeing trip, no safari. But it's interesting to see how Africans are eating better. The food industry is growing. They're more educated, and they know the people you meet, they know everything going on in the world. There is tension between Christians and Muslims in Africa along the entire Sahel. But they've found a way different from that of how Christians and Muslims interact in Europe and the Middle East. I mean, for instance, in Ethiopia, the Prophet Muhammad, when he had to flee the Hijra, sought refuge and was protected by the Ethiopian king, and Muslims and Christians all know that in Ethiopia, which is why religious conflict never gets too bad. In Sudan, of course, it gets very bad, but elsewhere, they are finding their own equilibrium. My second trip to Africa was to be present at the launch of the world's biggest iron ore mine in Guinea at Seanu. To access that iron ore, which is very rich, or a railroad 650 kilometers long, the distance from Sim to Panang, have to be built along the entire spine of the country, and you will change the economic future of the country. So all over Africa, ports, railroads, roads, dams are being built. A lot better. Chinese.
>> And Europe, if it develops more autonomy, will have a vested interest in stabilizing North Africa. You take, say, Libya. Libya can provide most of the energy needs of Europe. It has huge oil reserves, gas reserves. Why is Libya what it is today? China was a big investor in Libya and became China's biggest evacuation exercise when the civil war broke up. Whose interest is it to divide Libya? Whose interest is it to see Libya reestablish its unity, develop its hydrocarbon resources, and supply Europe? Think about that. So if I were European, if I were an Egyptian, you were an American or Chinese, I would think again about Africa's future.
Uh, you can take a man out of the army, but, um, I think you can't take him out of the man. So this next question kind of reveals that as well from David. Uh, Jen, sir, what do you think US allies and competitors should learn from the current Iran war about US leadership?
>> The, the most important thing is the revolution in warfare. It's, it's a scary thought. I used to be head of air force planning, you know, director of joint operations and planning in the defense ministry. So I was for many years of my life involving in creating force structures. I bought fighter planes. I bought missiles, weapon systems, simulators. And we're so proud of our Leopard tanks. But the Leopard tanks didn't do very well in Ukraine, and even the Merkava tanks are not doing well in Lebanon because you have a little drone, and it's wire-guided, so you can't jam it, and it goes to a tank. It looks at the tank, it finds a bigger spot, and it goes in there. The conventional tank has very complicated armor, you know, at certain angles, explosive armor. So you hit it, it explodes, it deflects the projectile, and at certain angles, it bounces off. It's defended from the bottom against mines. It's not well defended from the top. But the little drone buzzing around, oh, can find its weak spots. Do I want to be a tank in warfare? Well, it depends where and how. But it's also a very dangerous place to be in. Unlike during the First World War, when you felt so safe in a tank.
>> So who is safe in warfare? Look at the Chinese robots, you know, and China in war will manufacture millions of them. They will replace human beings. They're talking about fighting in built-up areas, underground. Human beings won't be going in. They'll all be done by, by robots, drones, and you can't jam them because they'll be on little wires. And if you cut the wire, you still have enough intelligence for it to find its target. So you look at Singapore. Singapore has a great disadvantage, like Israel, of geographical size. So you have drones. It's not difficult to paralyze power systems and data centers. So what is a defense challenge in today's technological era? Look at the aircraft carriers. They did not go to near Iran, and they were hit. They didn't sink, but they were hit. There were many laundry room fires. This is a revolution in warfare.
>> Yeah, we've, we've not seen, we're far from seeing the end of it. So, it may be that great tragedies will have to happen first before our moral sense catches up with the technology that has been created. Well, for, for Singapore companies, people, you know, like, I think Singapore's really moving forward. It has always had this thing about, okay, we, we know where we're going, this is the path we, uh, I, I remember how it used to be like, you know, five years out, the government would kind of, uh, pick it, it's, its niches to where the growth would be likely to happen, and you could probably direct yourself in that way. Um, how should Singapore companies now position themselves relative to the future? Um, is there, um, is too big a bad being a big company, you know, now, a bad thing?
>> No business school can point the way to the future because all cases are of the past, and what we are facing is something radically different. It will not happen overnight, but it will happen in a relatively short time. So entering a war of uncertainty, it's better to, it's better to treat the ground as being prone to earthquakes. You do not know when, where, how, but you know you're entering an earthquake zone. So what do you do when you enter an earthquake zone? Firstly, be very alert and see what's happening in front of you. Take smaller steps. And in every step must flex, must allow you if you have to, to jump quickly to another spot. Don't act on the assumption that the ground will not move, that you can build a structure which spans fault lines and it'll be stable. So this is the approach I think one should take, whether you're a company or a country, in addressing the challenges before us. Be, be more skeptical about what you know, doubt your own intelligence and knowledge.
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah. I, I noticed that you, you've talked about how you no longer take your news from the just the regular sources. You're, you're, you're quite diversified in the appetite. Um, speak a little bit about that. Why, why is that now where you are on that?
Because I no longer read newspapers because by the time you have it's in print, it's already 24 hours late. Dramatic things might have happened. You may want to read a book to have a longer-term view of things, and maybe The Economist because it's more reflective. But for immediate news, you go online. You go to Al Jazeera. We know, okay, it's Qatari. Okay, he's got a certain view. You, you go into the BBC, you know his view. So you see, okay, CNN, Fox, okay. You go to RT, which is more objective, but it's still through a Russian lens. You go through to CGTN or to Global Times, and you know that these are official Chinese views, but which is important to know. So I find that you have to have an active intelligence in looking for news. You form hypotheses, this is what's happening, check up, what does it mean? Oh, this is what's happening. I think for this information, Al Jazeera is good. For that information, somebody has been assassinated. Is it true? Check the BBC because if he has been assassinated, BBC will put it out. So you begin to develop your own algorithm.
>> Mhm.
>> For seeking out truth. And you, you, and you begin on the basis that every report you get is intermediated, intermediate, intermediated through a lens. There's no such thing as information coming to you without refraction. Yeah. And you say, okay, I understand this is the lens, and this how it looks like. Yeah, I understand. So I understand what it is, the reality. You can say, oh, AI summarize the world. Who's AI?
>> Mhm.
If you are with an American AI company, I was in, in Beijing on the way to Tasing, the new airport. The Tsinghua student accompanied me. I was chatting with him along that one-hour ride. He says he goes into ChatGPT. I said, "How do you get into ChatGPT?" He said, "Well, we all have our VPNs." I, okay. I said, "Why don't you use DeepSeek?" He say, "Oh, no. No. Even to find out something about the Chinese government, you don't use DeepSeek." Now you want to find out something about aspects of the US, let us say the role of APEC in the US, you will not get the truth from any American AI company. And the Ku once told me in the Middle East, let's say you say, "Oh, generate me images of the Prophet Muhammad." I do not know which AI asset would do it. But certainly, if Abu Dhabi had been able to develop its own AI facilit algorithm, you will censor. In other words, you cannot avoid the values embedded in AI. Okay. So then what do you believe? Where do you get your news? It is according to your own values. And therefore, when you access the views of other sides, you have to make your own integration in your own head according to your own values and needs. This is a human quality.
Never be a slave to drafts or to things produced by AI for you. This is the PPT. This is the speech you make. You can tell when a person is making a speech from the inside or when he's just reading. We all sense it. We're human beings. We know. I think what happens in the world now is that a lot of thought is just bypassed. It's, it's a, the shortcut is getting past the AI. So if you talk about, let's, let's talk about the good old days before AI on LinkedIn, right? I mean, if you think about that, it was still a place where it was about, um, 97% I think they say, where people were just reading content. They were getting somebody else to summarize the world for them, somebody else to do the work for them. I'm not sure. I'm not sure if as many people are in your head as you might think, as in maybe, maybe people don't think as much anymore.
>> No, no. I, you see, well, common sense is not common, right? We all know that. But all of us have a street smartness. You know, we are skeptical. People sell you Coyo, you think, okay, maybe it helps, maybe it doesn't help. How much does it cost? Oh, it doesn't cost too much. I'll try it. You know, we all have that instinct.
>> Yes.
>> For people. I mean, we can be fooled once, twice, but not too often.
>> Um, I like to also say, by the way, Singapore is number one now in online scams, victims. I don't think we're the only victims.
>> We're not the only ones, but we lead the world.
>> Really?
>> Yes. In terms of the, in terms of the size of.
>> Oh, that's so depressing to hear. But who gets scammed? Think about it. Who gets scammed? The people who are out to make money. So you have Singaporeans who are very alert to opportunities. Oh, this is 3% discount. That's 5% discount. So, oh, this is a good deal here. They rush for it. So, your strengths become your weakness.
>> Well, maybe there are two sides of the same coin.
>> Yeah. Well, I, I think, I think what am I, we've been, I've been tracking all these things, and I'm, I'm very, very much into scams and stuff like that. Um, I, I found what happens, why Singaporeans are so exploitable is because we, we have a sense of great order and how things should be. So when you get a message or something comes in that doesn't look like it should be, you tend to have a very quick reaction, and so you react to a charge it shouldn't be or something like that. So it's seldom about, it's seldom about greed. I think, uh, in Singapore, it seems to be a bit more about fear. Something I have not expected to happen has happened, and then I rush in. I wanted to ask you, in terms of like, you have the usual suspects, right now, if you, if you look at your phone, you're expecting to see certain things in the morning. Certain people are saying things. Um, what's level two for you that you are concerned about in terms of the world, in terms of world actors, in terms of world personalities? So we're going to take away the Trumps, Xi Jinpings, we're going to take all the top level away. What is level two for you that you are keeping your eye on? Who you think we should keep our eye on?
Well, I'm, I'm, um, I'm a bit of an amateur historian, you know, so I, and I'm a Taoist philosophically. So I just watch with great fascination this unfolding of history, you know, and the rise and fall of powers. And to me, is, is it's history revealing itself in real time. It, it, it's fascinating. It, it's good to be able to travel to see and to talk to people say, "Oh, wow. This what is happening." And there's a lot of hope in it.
Our destiny is in the stars, and it will not be so long from now when human colonies will be established on the moon and on Mars. Certainly within the lifetimes of many of you. What does it mean after that? You know, it's, it's a, and in medical technology, I met someone in Macau who said he told his mother, he's a doctor, he told his mother who's in her early '90s, said, "Mother, if you live five more years, I can give you 50 more."
M. Which means he's expecting the next five years such incredible advances in medical technology that many of the problems that we now find incurable can be rectified. But do we really want to live in a world where there's so many old people tottering around? Well, if I'm the, the one, yes, of course. But everyone else around me, oh, probably not. So, every solution creates problems. But that's part of the drama of, of life, of human history, which is endlessly fascinating. I mean, isn't human history just the expression of ourselves as a creature, and as a creature as, in who we are? And I was thinking about how unfortunately we are in this time currently where
technology, information moves so fast that we're being shot into the future. Well, you use the creature. Creature means you are created, which means that you recognize that there's a God. There's something above you, and that when all is said and done. Is there a human mission? What is that mission? To go to mass, then what? To fight again after that? So what is the purpose of life on Earth? Let's say we live 150 years old. Then you must still confront death. You must still die. Hopefully with as little suffering as possible, but some will have to suffer. However you prolong it. Can you be immortal? Well, we try to be. I don't think there's any chance of that. So, what is the purpose of life? And does it mean that people who lived before had no purpose, or people with the new technologies will have a better purpose? Who's happier? The primitive threatsmen, the Bhutanis, the Singaporeans. Who's happier? Is happiness a goal of life? No, I think in the end it comes back. What does it mean to be human, and the technology which human beings make possible? Does it reduce us or does it enhance us?
I think that's a question. Yeah. I, I, I think I suspect for you, your answer might lie in that grandchild that you spoke of so kindly. Hope. If, if you have a D pain and people say it's terminal, you'll be depressed, right? But if you have a severe pain, and the doctor says, no, next week you'll be okay, you bear the pain. Life is driven by hope.
Hope requires a certain faith. And you lose that, whether in a company, in a family, or as an individual, you lose everything. So there's something bigger, higher, which amidst all this technological revolution, we should never take our eyes away from. I will, I will click like on this. I will say hope is a good answer to, to talk about what we should do to life, or what we should do for, for the world around us. Uh, ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in thanking our esteemed speaker, Giorgio. Thank you so much. I hope you've enjoyed the conversation. Thank you.