In this reflective monologue recorded in Cairo, the speaker recounts attending the Conscious Tech Summit and examines the paradox of humanitarian innovation being filtered through capitalist investment mechanisms. He highlights a 3D‑printed prosthetic hand venture that could theoretically provide affordable hands to the 30 million people worldwide lacking them, noting the $1,000 per hand price point and the $30 billion total cost. Instead of rallying collective resources, the audience interrogates the presenter about projections, roadmaps, and profit, exposing a systemic bottleneck where funding criteria impede rapid, large‑scale impact. The talk also mentions other circular‑economy projects showcased at the summit—organic‑waste food production, cooking‑oil recycling, and shrimp‑shell upcycling—illustrating a broader spectrum of humanitarian tech. The speaker reflects on his own alignment, the absurdity of competitive funding for essential needs, and reaffirms his commitment to co‑creation, cooperation, and a Rumi‑inspired vision that transcends traditional business metrics.
Chapters
All right, so I felt like sharing something today. I was reflecting last night on the past couple weeks of my travels to Egypt for the Conscious Tech Summit, and now here I am in Cairo. So something struck me last night that I wanted to share with, with the world. So I was at this Conscious Tech Summit, and I want to be clear that I'm not specifically talking about the event itself or the people there or who organized it or any individuals. I'm more talking about the talk on the social commentary level. Thank you so much. One second. Thank you. So, I'm more talking at the level of social commentary or society, a little bit of dark comedy. Because sometimes the only thing you can do is laugh, really. So I'm at this summit where there's something called the Shark Zone, right? So it's for entrepreneurs and people are pitching their apps and their inventions and their innovations and looking for people to invest in them. Is it healthier to drink out of the glass? I would be curious. Okay, so I'm at this summit where people are pitching their business ideas, looking for investors, and there's this guy up here, right? He's got this amazing innovation. He basically puts a slide up on the wall that says there's 30 million people on the planet who don't have a hand. Literally missing a hand for one reason or another, whether accident or birth defect or circumstances or whatnot. 30 million people. And then he puts these slides up and he's starting a company that is 3D printing. So he's 3D printing hands that, you know, work with the muscles. And then you use VR to get people to learn how to use their, their electricity, electrical system, and to move the fingers. And the people can custom design their hands and things like that. So he starts doing his normal pitch, sharing, you know, most people can't afford to get prosthetics or new hands like this, and the cost would be normally, you know, $100,000 when all is said and done. And because of his model and his 3D printing and the technology, etc., he's gotten this down to $1,000 per hand at a retail cost. I'm looking at this slide and I'm thinking 30 million hands needed, $1,000 per hand to print them. I think that's $30 billion in total. So technically speaking, $30 billion would give a hand to everybody on the planet right now who doesn't have a hand. I don't think we need to discuss how amazing that is and how beautiful and wonderful that is and how we really would want to see that happen under any conditions. So here I am at this event and he's talking about this and I'm thinking, what's the response to this amazing innovation? What's the response to this guy's drive to give people hands? And rather than everybody in this place coming together and thinking, wow, how do we find $30 billion so we can just create 30 million hands and solve this problem that's on the planet right now. That's all it is, $30 billion. Now, there's plenty of money on the planet. That's actually a drop in the bucket for the planet, for the planet itself, speaking as a planet. So I'm sitting there thinking, okay, let's rally around this guy. What is the solution? What can everybody at this amazing event do? to help 30 million people get a new hand. And what happens is people start competing for funding and get— and this guy's getting asked questions like, what's your projection? You know, what's your roadmap? How many clients do you have? How are you going to do this? How are you going to do that? And literally 30 million people could have hands. If we check cash out first. For $30 billion. And we have people asking questions about business plans, roadmaps, and projections, and profit. How much money are they going to make if they help this guy help people get hands? How ludicrous is that? So this is the world. I find myself in the last few weeks. And the event I was at was really amazing. I mean, there was— it was a conscious tech summit, and honestly, I had made some assumptions thinking a lot of the tech was going to be sort of blockchain-related or similar to the space that I'm in with socio-technologies. And it turned out that there was a whole range of humanitarian-type of innovations and people there. So you have this guy helping people with 3D printing hands. There was people that were turning organic waste into new food for stock. There was people who recycle cooking oil here in Cairo because there's a lot of cooking oil. There were people who do a circular economy type of innovation with the shells on shrimp. And turn that into a new substance which is organic and can be used in 100 different ways. So this event was actually quite amazing, um, of the spirit of people there and what they were working on and trying to create, and everyone who was networking. And then you have what I call the bottleneck of capitalism. What? The very fact that we were sitting there asking someone who has an innovation that can provide hands for the handless about his business model, hoping he might win a competition to get some funding to provide the world with hands. And that's where I find myself. I don't know if it's creating bridges. I don't know if I'm not yet 100% in my own alignment. I don't know if I should make anything of it. I just know that it was ludicrous looking back a week later thinking about this guy's presentation and all these people. And I know there's a lot of people around the world that need different things and have different diseases or hardships, so not discounting any of that. I'm just thinking about my experience. And this is in Africa. And the somewhat absurdity of our, of our current planet. And really, What excites me, which is going way, way, way beyond triple bottom lines and businesses and investment like that. And just reaffirming why I do what I do and why I live the way I live and why I have the aspirations that I do. It's quite profound, actually. Being in that space, watching us all, watching people compete for money and funding to do things that we all need really being done. And I'm sure I'm gonna be learning some more lessons around that for quite a while, but totally inspired to like keep on going with what I'm interested in doing and, and really Going to another whole next level when it comes to innovation on this planet and co-creation and cooperation and really living in a different reality. As Rumi said, out beyond the field of right and wrong, out beyond the field of business plans and investments, that's where I'll be, and I'll meet you all there. Much love. Thanks for listening and have a great day. Thank you.
