HPU - Human Processing Unit

“The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and think critically. Intelligence plus character; that is the goal of a true education.” – Martin Luther King Jr.

Democratic countries had witnessed how politics had established as the common ground where the policies are made with enviable citizen involvement. Often people are proud about the changes their elected governments are bringing forward and even spend their value time watching on air how policy makers decide and arrive at those future directions. Having said that, we also often see a consciously unconscious bias which is driven based on the majority elected members affinity towards different political dogmas. In few countries, the dogmas doesn’t limit to polity but also religion and color too.

The art of critical thinking in humans is a dying one with the advent of AI. Though we value the inputs and respect the wealth of knowledge that AI could bring to our fingertips, it is no substitute for human mind in the present world. Most of the corporates today are trying hard to keep the human in loop and continued relevance in the AI space. While we leave the technology to the experts, it is once again time to focus on the basics for rest of the world before humanity in humans are questioned. 

I often wonder what can be done to raise the participation of the general public beyond once in five years action of voting and contribute to the countries growth in an active manner. Of course it is not for everyone and everyday, but for the few who desire to do so. The British establishments like civil services had always done great contributions to the growth of the nation however Indians are blessed with two billion brains which could make AI wonder. How to use all these HPU(Human Processing Units), and make it count is the premise of this write up. This is not limited to the topic in discussion but it welcomes you to trigger your imaginations to make a difference in various aspects of nations growth.

The power lies in the children who are touted to be the future citizens or decision makers who could take countries to greater heights. While there is no rush in becoming a super power economy wise but focusing on human aspects at this men and AI intersection point would be an interesting dimension which can harness more from both to make this world a better place. What we need in a nation is a set of thinking children and that is all that matters. There are more than one ways different countries are doing it, some focusing on no exams like Finland, outdoor learning by Norway, problem based learning in Netherlands, inquiry based courses in Japan, structured thinking routines in Singapore, while few other developing countries which has high population and aiming for future business and services industry monopolies continue to focus on skill building like India and few others. 

The question lingers in our mind, with all the national goals linked with achieving higher GDP, how can we get our little ones develop more fully as a thinking adult of future. One simple idea that stands out is having a structured debating society which questions the countries current abnormalities, failure points, future policies and improvement areas. How can we make it structured? What challenges can it bring to future citizens and how can we engage the present children to such a goal? We as a country in India is well structured considering eighteen general elections had been successfully conducted in India until now. We can form debating societies at ward level where the schools every month would compete with each other on contemporary issues and challenges of a citizen of the country. This will encourage a large chunk of school going kids to understand the country and its challenges better and start thinking about solutions. At a school level speakers and contributors can be identified every year based on the interests and energies that are spotted in kids, this society participation should not be an optional one for schools. School going kids could take help from newspapers, internet and their brains too to study a problem or situation in depth and look for solutions. As it is a contest with rewards which can boost the schools performance in the society, there are chances of good interests from the school authorities too. This is guaranteed future business for them as every parent wants their kids to think beyond what they learn.

The children are given time to learn in detail and encouraged to develop critical thinking as a by product, this also gives a chance for the society to understand the real solutions are solved not by violence but by thoughts and acceptance of each others ideas and ideologies. Children would learn to tolerate each other at the same time understanding different perspectives gives them a chance to think deeper. No kid would represent the same school for more than one year but is welcome to continue as a contributor as rest of school which schools could reward or grade as per their system.

Every quarter the best schools would get a chance to participate in district level debates where the local elected leaders are also given chance to discuss and debate with them. At a higher level, every year there would be a state level debate competitions where in the focus would be on upcoming challenges for the nation and the policies. It would be best to consider children who are 9years and above when the critical and abstract thinking in children emerges. This should be a common program until 16years and no separate age wise debates. This avoids higher management efforts and also better exposure for the young ones. When we look back in history, the debating societies had created great leaders in this world however a framework is still lacking in India to take it to next stage. The whole program need to be aired in regional and national channels for better reach among young viewers and also live online in various platforms guaranteeing viewerships.

The program should have good weightage determining grades for children to encourage better participation and also has the potential to create future leaders nation-wide. A debating society could change our future politics similar to what IPL did to Indian cricket. A large group of smarter thinking kids could make bigger difference to a countries future than a group of civil servants and ministers could do together. Debating society has the potential to make children aware of things a civics text book can’t teach and look at opportunities to make their own civic behaviour and contributions better. The importance of skill development and mugging up skills is at its epitome now and this is the right time to make a change with AI and social media lurking down the corner to eat up our brain space and its thinking power which is the most sustainable CPU/GPU/TPU, the HPU that world need forever. 

Read HPU as Human Processing Unit and not Heterogeneous Processing Unit. Few of the great personalities that debating societies produced includes John F Kennedy, Abraham Lincoln, Margaret Thatcher, Winston Churchill, Oprah Winfrey, Nelson Mandela, Richard Nixon and the list continues beyond this post. For sharper mind and better thinking capacity, the basic human understanding is that we need to keep the brain active and challenge it to think more and more critically. Scientifically thinking is expected to help neuroplasticity, enhancing cognitive functions like memory and executive control, and building resilience against decline. Such an exercise helps in better civic behaviour, enhanced presentation skills and enriched souls!