Digital Global Observatories

How Advanced Computing can help shaping our common future in times of increasing uncertainty and unsettled lives?

6th Gago Conference on European Science Policy

A joint organization of Ciencia Viva and Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC-CNS)

With the special patronnage of The Spanish Presidency of the Council of the European Union 

Barcelona , 23 – 24 October, 2023

Brief Conference Outline

How far advanced computing together with design and use of digital observatories making use of digital twins can help shape our common future in times of increasing uncertainty and unsettled lives?

This question has framed the 6th Gago Conference on European Science Policy, at the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre, under the scope of the Spanish Presidency of the Council of the European Union in 2023, and in a way to foster the impact of the Europe-Latin America Summit of July 2023.

It addresses novel forms of digital observation and governance in health, urban planning and the environment, including the development and usage of digital twins of our communities and landscapes.

The discussion is framed in terms of the challenges and opportunities to consider human agency, be centered on people and be based on changing collective behaviors leading us to safer, cleaner and more “collectively” resilient and cooperative societies.

Emerging trends in the growing digitalization of our communities and economies will be particularly discussed in terms of the increasing world relevance of the Global South and the critically relevant role of Europe-Latin America and Europe-Africa cooperation, as well as the opportunities for Europe to foster South-South cooperation.

Background note

The analysis clearly shows that every forecast for world societies in the coming decades will be strongly affected by the emerging trends in the growing digitalization of our communities and economies. It includes the increasing world relevance of the Global South and the critically relevant role of Europe-Latin America and Europe-Africa cooperation, as well as the opportunities for Europe to foster South-South cooperation.

Although the advantages and disadvantages of digital observation and governance based on centralized and decentralized digital networks are still subject to many uncertainties requiring comprehensive technical and policy debates, the use of advanced computing together with decentralized digital networks and blockchain control is only partially immune to biases. Blockchain algorithms incentivize and ultimately give preference to participants that have access to more nodes, therefore, to the most active ones. Artificial Intelligence (AI) can help by modelling the information flows and learning different participants' critical use patterns. Such practices can then provide input to set the parameters that govern the behaviour of blockchain algorithms.

However, the massified use of AI-enabled innovations is also not free of additional questions because the "power it has to make us act in the ways it predicts reduces our agency over the future". In predicting our behaviour, AI systems can end up changing it. Consequently, collective human wisdom needs to be strengthened so that emerging regulatory issues for an increasing digital age should help promote critical approaches to AI, with clear accountability and clarity about boundaries and purpose, as well as responsibility. ² Its requires rethinking of the techno-centric narrative of progress, embracing and harnessing uncertainty, as well as abandoning the fantasy of control over nature and the illusion of techno-centric dominance of AI-enabled innovations ³ .

The issue is clear in that it creates tensions between developers/promoters and human-led policy making, which need to be informed by negotiations of trade-offs. Above all, it requires a transdisciplinary approach to collective behaviours ⁴ and consideration of "human agency" across economics, philosophy, law, science and technology studies, history and sociology to engage with all the necessary ingredients of an emerging decentralized digital age and AI-enabled innovations.

Following Joseph Henrich (2016) ⁵ , among others, the "secret of our species success resides not in the power of our individual minds, but in the collective brains of our communities. Our collective brains arise from the synthesis of our cultural and social natures - from the fact that we readly learn from others (are cultural) and can, with the right norms, live in large and widely interconnected groups (are social)". He shows that larger and more interconnect societies produce more "know-how" and that “the challenge has always been how to pevent communities from fragmenting and social networks from dissolving".

In other words and following Helga Novotny (2021), digital observation and governance should be oriented to promote "digital humanism" and guarantee a transdisciplinary approach to collective behaviours and consideration of "human agency".

The rationale for this discussion also relies on the fact that the climate crisis is probably the biggest challenge humanity is facing. Its effects in the field of health led the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare that "the climate crisis threatens to annihilate the progress of the last 50 years in global health and poverty reduction. Further, it widened the inequalities in health that exist between and within different populations". It recognized that "climate change is the greatest global threat to human health. The Paris Agreement is perhaps the most impactful health agreement of the 21st century" (WHO, 2021); however, there is no sustainable development without guaranteeing the rights of all people. Future actions must take into account the connection between the "ecological footprint" indicators and those associated with the "social footprint" (i.e., poverty, inequality, and violation of basic rights).

The latter means changing and developing green/blue economies and healthier societies. It means changing our daily routines and work habits, as well as our cities, transport, agriculture, and industry, in a way achieving a balance between the carbon emitted into the atmosphere and the carbon removed from it. This balance - or net zero - will happen when the amount of carbon we add to the atmosphere is no more than the amount removed.

For this change to happen and be facilitated by digital observation and governance, we need to understand better "Human Agency" and our emerging collective behaviours to guarantee the sustainability of the populations, simultaneously with their right to develop. And this requires the governance of complex and massive amounts of data and their synergies (i.e., "data ecologies" ), including new satellite-based data, together with the necessary knowledge and innovation to improve land use management. Large amounts of data require new technological tools such as artificial intelligence, cloud computing, data analysis, and machine learning for handling, processing, understanding and exploitation, together with new in situ information systems and the knowledge and innovation needed to improve land use management and the development of sustainable and healthy territories.

Understanding knowledge as our common public good will allow citizens to be an integral and critical stakeholders in future developments. The latter will help policymakers better understand how decentralized digital networks and AI can be used to develop further to make public services more effective by delivering seamless services, cutting down digital bureaucracy and giving citizens back their most precious asset, namely their time. In addition, it will drive new policy options to enhance the governance and regulation of decentralized digital networks, including those in the public sector, ensuring high standards of conduct across all areas of public sector practice, promoting public sector effectiveness and delivering better service to its users.

These challenges and associated risks will possibly be mitigated in implementations using practices, methods and tools generated by a new trend in research and innovation: that of "Responsible AI", underscoring principles such as fairness, transparency and explainability, human-centeredness, privacy and security.

Considering this context, the Conference will focus on the following issues:

Emerging developments and challenges in digital observatories and advanced computing:

• Challenges for green and efficient advanced computing;

• Digital humanism; ethical and responsible computing; responsible AI;

• Digital observatories, digital twins and skill development: users, developers and promoters;

• Transdisciplinary approaches to collective behaviors: governance of data ecologies;

• Potential markets for digital twins: public and semi-public goods versus proprietary knowledge;

Application areas and policy implications:

• Disease observatories: advanced computing and digital twins of public health, the concept of "One Health";

• Urban observatories: digital twins of complex and vulnerable urban contexts, including the most vulnerable in the Global South;

• Forest observatories: digital twins of forest and remote areas, oriented to sustainable land use management, with an emphasis in Africa and Latin America, including in Amazonia and the other tropical biomes;

• Ocean/water observatories: digital twins of the ocean and rivers, oriented to sustainable blue economies, including in the Atlantic; North-South/South-North cooperation.

"Science is a battle ground, it's not neutral.And if you know it's not neutral, it becomes interesting. It can become part of the modern youth culture. You must choose between generosity and greed, between peace and war, and choose between disclosing or hiding the truth"

José Mariano Gago (2001)

• Pep Martorell,  Associate Director, BSC
• Pedro Russo , Leiden University, The Netherlands; Board of Directors of Ciência Viva, Portugal
• Judit Carrera , Director General CCCB
• Manuel Heitor, Former Minister of Science, Technology and Higher Education, Portugal

Chair 

• Manuel Heitor , Center for Innovation, Technology and Policy Research (IN+), Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon. Former Minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education, Portugal.

Keynote speech:

• Mateo Valero,  Director of the BSC-CNS

Presentation of Barcelona Manifesto : "Fostering Responsible Global Digital Observatories"

• Manuel Heitor ,  Center for Innovation, Technology and Policy Research (IN+), Instituto Superior Tecnico, University of Lisbon. Former Minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education, Portugal.

• Chair:   Ulises Cortés , Professor of A.I. and BSC AI coordinator at the BSC

 Keynote speeches:

• Speaker 1: Virginia Dignum , Chair of Social and Ethical AI; Department of Computer Sciences, Umeá University, Sweden

Roundtable discussion :

• Discussant 1. Paulo Dimas , Unbabel, Portugal.
• Discussant 2: Manuela Bataglianni, CEO of Transparent Internet, member of the NGI Ponter Advisory Board, Spain.
• Discussant 3: Juan Manuel del Pozo , Professor of Philosophy, Universitat de Girona (UdG), Spain
• Discussant 4: Liliana Arroyo, Director General of the Digital Society, Business and Labour Department, Generalitat de Catalunya, Spain.

Open Debate.

Concluding remarks:

• Manuel Heitor & Ulises Cortés

Chair:

• Mercè Crosas , Head of Computational Social Sciences Programme. BSC-CNS.

Keynote speech: 

• Paulo Ferrão, IN+/Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon, Portugal.   

Roundtable discussion:

• Discussant 1 : Michael Donaldson , commissioner for Urban Innovation ,of Barcelona City Council. Spain.
• Discussant 2 : Tatiana Roque , Secretaria de Ciencia e Tecnologia, Prefeitura do  Rio de Janeiro, Brasil.
• Discussant 3 : F ernando Cucchietti,   Date Pre and Post Proccesing Group Manager. Leader of Barcelona Digital Twin Depelopment. BSC-CNS .

Open Debate.

Concluding Remarks:

• Jose María Cela, BSC-CNS,Spain

Chair :    

• Albert Soret , BSC-CNS, Spain

Keynote speech:

• Nicolaus Hanowski , Head of Mission Management & Ground Segments Department. European Space Agency (ESA).

Roundtable discussion :

• Discussant 1: Alvaro Giménez Cañete, Member of the Board, Spanish Space  Agency, and former Director of Science, European Space Agency.
• Discussant 2: Asun Lera St. Clair,  DNV, Oslo, Norway.
• Discussant 3: Víctor Homar , University of the Balearic Islands, Spain.

Open Debate.

Concluding Remarks:

• Albert Soret. BSC-CNS, Spain                        

Chair :

• Josep Tabernero , Director of the Vall d'Hebron Instituto de Oncologia (VHIO), Barcelona, Spain.

Keynote speeches:

• Speaker 1 : Ignacio Blanquer , Professor of the Computer System Department at UPV .  Coordinator of the Spanish Network of e-Science Board composed of Directors of the EOSC association .

• Speaker 2 : Johanna McEntyre , European Bioinformatics Institute. Associate Director of EMBL-EBI Services .UK.

Roundtable discussion:

• Discussant 1: Liesbet Geris , Universities of Liège and KUL, Leuven, Belgium, Executive director of the  Virtual Physiological Human Institute
• Discussant 2 : P aula Petrone, Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal). Leader of the Biomedical Data Science Team.
• Discussant 3: Xavier Prats-Monné , President of the Board of Governors of Sant Pau Hospital, Barcelona, Spain.
• Discussant 4: Pedro Russo , Leiden University, The Netherlands; Board of Directors of Ciência Viva, Portugal.

Open Debate.

Concluding Remarks:

• Alfonso Valencia, BSC-CNS, Spain.

Chair:

• Fabrizio Gagliardi, Senior Strategy Advisor of the BSC-CNS.

• Introductory Speech:  Sergi Girona, BSC Operations Director.

Roundtable discussion:

• Discussant 1: Sanzio Bassini. Director of Supercomputing Applications and Innovation Department (SCAI), CINECA, Bologna, Italy.
• Discussant 2 : Satoshi Matsuoka, Director of Riken CCS, Japan.  
• Discussant 3: Per Öster , Director Advanced Computing Facility, CSC- IT Center for Science, Kajaani, Finland.
• Discussant 4 : Mateo Valero, Director, Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC-CNS), Spain.

Open Debate

Concluding Remarks:

• Fabrizio Gagliardi. BSC-CNS, Spain

Brief final interventions:

• Pep Martorell , Associate Director of the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre (BSC).
• Àlvar Vinacua , Vicerector d’Estratègia Digital, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya.
• Jordi Valls , Deputy Mayor of Economy, Finance and Economic promotion of the Barcelona City Council, Spain.
• Joaquim Nadal , Conseller of Research and Universities, Government of Catalonia.
• Representative of the Government of Spain.
• Elvira Fortunato , Minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education, Portugal.
• Raquel Yotti, Secretaria de Estado de Investigación, Spain.