I think with all technology, people have an idea of how it will be used, but then it has a life of its own and people use it in all kinds of ways. In… - Heather Brooke

Authoritarians offer citizens a deal: if we hand over our freedom, they will guarantee certainty and safety. This might have been possible in a closed society with little interaction between people, but it is a false promise in a knowledge economy where citizens are interconnected. If the best chaos theorists can't model the weather beyond a week, how does the National Security Agency think it can predict which of us will turn into a terrorist? If our intelligence agencies persist in monopolising knowledge we will see continued intelligence failures.

It’s action, not beliefs, that matter most. Thinking is great. Thinking leads to action, but too often thinking can hijack our higher wisdom. The wisdom of the human heart. Too often we discount cruel or unjust actions because of beliefs. If an action is immoral but we want to do it anyway, or someone else wants us to do it, justifications are made. Beliefs are created about the lesser value of others.

Why do women go around feeling so embarrassed of ourselves? Why do we wind up feeling we have to be perfect, or pure, pretty or agreeable just to gain a modicum of acceptance? I think it’s because that’s actually the fact of being a woman in a patriarchal society.