Acceptance Speech by Dr. Takeshi Utsumi
Note: this was given by Dr. Tak Utsumi on the acceptance of the
prestigious Lord Perry Award for Excellence in Distance Education from
the University of the World in San Antonio, Texas on November 1, 1994.
The Lord Perry Award is the highest honor conveyed upon those who are
stretching the limits of technology to support the fast growing field of
distance education.
Edited Transcript
Philosophy and Realization
of
Global (electronic) University (GU) System
PART I: ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
Distinguished Members of the Board, Ladies and Gentlemen:
It is my great honor to receive a Lord Perry Award for the Excellence in
Distance Education, and to join the distinguished group of prior
recipients, Professor Yash Pal, Dr. Arthur C. Clarke, and Ambassador Jose
Chaves.
I would like to wholeheartedly congratulate Dr. Jim Miller, Lord Perry,
and the members of the University of the World for this outstanding award
system.
This award gives credibility to the fledgling academic field of global
electronic distance education. It also encourages our colleagues who are
now striving for its spread to every corner of the world with the use of
various telecom media for betterment of mankind and world peace keeping in
the 21st century.
At this memorable occasion, I would also like to express my sincere
gratitude to our electronic colleagues around the world for their
continuing mutual encouragement, extraordinary help and cooperation, and
generous "in- kind" service support to my long-standing dreams of
establishing a Global (electronic) University (GU) system and a conduct of
Globally Collaborative Environmental Peace Gaming through Global Neural
Computer Network of the Global Brain. Therefore, this honor should be
shared with all of them.
I am very happy to have this opportunity to briefly describe our Global
(electronic) University system project and its underling philosophy.
I. GLOBAL (ELECTRONIC) UNIVERSITY (GU)
Global (electronic) University (GU) (TM) consortium seeks to improve the
quality and availability of international educational exchange through the
use of telecommunication and information technologies. Its main activity
is to achieve global electronic education across national boundaries by
developing a cooperative infrastructure and by bringing the powers and
resources of telecommunications to ordinary citizens around the world.
Another goal of Global University is to empower under-served people of the
Third World by giving them access to the educational excellence available
at the institutions of the more developed. Students could access some of
the world's finest resources with a far greater variety of educational
philosophies, courses and instructional styles than they could ever
encounter on a single campus.
This is "the 21st century version of Fulbright exchange program."
This system is a corollary to many U.S. distance education organizations
which now extend their educational services across state boundaries. An
outstanding example among them is the National Technological University
(NTU), which President, Dr. Lionel Baldwin, is the key person for its
success and who is one of the distinguished board members of the
University of the World.
How did I come up this idea of establishing a Global (electronic)
University?
II. GLOBALLY COOPERATIVE ENVIRONMENTAL PEACE GAMING
I had an honor and privilege to establish the Summer Computer Simulation
Conference (SCSC) of the Society of Computer Simulation International,
both of which I named. I served as Program and General Chairmen in 1970
and 1971, respectively. At the 1971 SCSC, I got my idea of a Globally
Cooperative Peace Gaming on Energy, Resources and Environmental system
which I presented at the First International Conference on Computer
Communications in Washington, D.C., in 1972. At this conference, I saw
demonstrations of ARPANET (the predecessor of Internet) and EMISARY
computer mediated conferencing system (which later became Electronic
Information Exchange System of New Jersey Institute of Technology).
SLIDE 1:
The ultimate goal of the Global Systems Analysis and Simulation
Association in the U.S.A. (GLOSAS/USA) is to establish a Globally
Distributed Decision Support System with distributed interactive computer
gaming simulation system, for problem analysis, policy formulation and
assessment, to be used for training of would-be decision makers in
conflict resolution, crisis management, and negotiation with win-win
cooperation.
This is to be done with integrated use of distributed computer
conferencing, databases and simulation systems among various countries.
Several system will be interconnected to form a global neural computer
network [a term coined by me in 1981]. The total system will act as a
single system with parallel processing of those subsystems in individual
countries. Here each game player with his submodel and database
corresponds to a neuron, TCP/IP oriented node to a synapsis, and
packet-switching Internet the nerves of a global brain.
Vice President Al Gore's speech on January 11, 1994 to communications
industry leaders said; "The Department of Defense is investing well over
$1 billion in the development and implementation of networked distributed
interactive simulation. This technology, which allows dispersed learners
to engage in collaborative problem solving activities in real time, is now
ready for transfer to schools and workplaces outside of the defense
sector."
How should I realize this daunting scheme?
III. "GLOBAL LECTURE HALL (GLH)"
1. Extension of U.S. Data Communication Networks and Deregulation of
Japanese Telecommunication Policies
In the first decade since early 1970s, I helped extend the U.S. data
communication networks to various overseas countries, particularly to
Japan, and also helped de-regulate Japanese telecommunication policies on
the use of email which has been emulated in many countries. I had a
privilege of having a help from the Late Commerce Secretary Malcom
Baldrige for my efforts. This message exchange system is depicted by lines
connecting players in the center of SLIDE 1.
Internet now covers 75 countries, and email has been proliferated in more
than 150 countries.
2. Global Lecture Hall (GLH) (TM) Videoconference
In the second decade, since email is only text-oriented without graphic
and video capabilities, we developed "Global Lecture Hall" multipoint-to-
multipoint multimedia interactive videoconferencing technology. We have
conducted a number of GLHs, ranging from Korea, Japan, Australia, New
Zealand, North and South America, entire Europe, Scandinavia, and Russia,
with tremendous cooperation and help from educational, industrial,
domestic and international governmental organizations. The GLH employed
inexpensive media accessible to the less developed countries.
We greatly appreciated "in-kind" services from various parties, such as
NTU, INTELSAT, Hughes Communications, US Sprint, to name but a few. We
shared free Sprint account privilege with many colleagues in Third World
countries.
These GLH demonstrations aroused awareness on technical and economic
feasibility of global electronic distance education, thus, helped build a
network of leaders in the global electronic distance education movement.
They are becoming core group to form GLOSAS and GU in their countries.
IV. GLOBAL (ELECTRONIC) UNIVERSITY (GU)
In the third decade, along with our U.S.-Russia Electronic Distance
Education System (EDES) project, we helped establish the Association of
International Education in Moscow with the Ministry of Science, Higher
Education and Technology Policy of the Russian Federation. This is to
later become a Russian Electronic University as a part of our Global
University system. Others are Global University in Ukraine (GU/UKR),
Global University in Costa Rica (GU/CR), and similar activities in Japan,
Canada, Italy, Colombia, Poland, Latvia, Kyrgyzstan, etc.
GU/USA has already gained wide support of prominent educational
institutions, information technology specialists and industry in many
countries, making this an international project to help Russia, Ukraine,
other ex-communist, and the Third World countries.
The students, faculties and researchers of our Global University system
will be the "would-be" or "pseudo" decision-makers of our planned Global
Environmental Peace Gaming exercises mentioned before.
V. PHILOSOPHY OF GLOBAL UNIVERSITY
The underling philosophy of our Global University is condensed in the logo
of GLOSAS/USA. Let me explain it.
SLIDE 2:
About a half century ago, Arthur C. Clarke, a recipient of Lord Perry
Award two years ago, conceived the idea of global satellite communication
system. Three satellites can cover the entire globe.
SLIDE 3:
This slide views the globe from north to south direction. The center
circle is the globe. Three representative analog satellites are at the
corners of an equilateral triangle which is positioned vertically in this
diagram. The outer circle is the geosynchronous orbit where there are many
stationary satellites nowadays.
SLIDE 4:
We advocate a Space Station Library System which will consist of three
space stations on the geosynchronous orbit. Not only books and archived
information in the U.S. Library of Congress or at any of similar libraries
in any countries, but also educational courses available at any schools on
earth can be uplinked to the nearby space station library to be stored in
compact disks which can be retrieved with a juke-box type system. Those
space libraries and ordinary communication and broadcasting satellites
will be connected via laser communication beams which technology is now a
hot pursuit in Japan, the U.S. and European countries. One can obtain
information or educational course from the other side of globe through
those routes. We call this system a Strategic Peace Initiative (SPI). In
this slide diagram, three representative space station libraries are
positioned at the corners of an equilateral triangle which is positioned
as an inverse-pyramid.
SLIDE 5:
This slide shows only the equilateral triangle of the original analog
satellite system. This vertical pyramid can be a symbol of conventional,
feudalistic, militaristic, command and control hierarchy.
SLIDE 6:
However, many of vertically structured, functional pyramid organizations
are currently being restructured to become more process-oriented,
horizontally structured organizations, as shown on this slide [FORTUNE,
1992]. This fundamental movement is largely due to proliferated use of new
communication media (such as fax, e-mail, etc.) that change an
organization s structure and culture [BUSINESS WEEK, 1994 and Nippon
Keizai Shimbun, 1989].
SLIDE 7:
When Mr. Donald T. Regan (former chairman of Merrill Lynch & Company) was
fired from the position of the Chief of Staff of the Reagan
Administration, an essay appeared in The New York Times, March 8, 1987. It
was written by Mr. James M. Kouzes, Director of the Executive Development
Center, Leavery School of Management of Santa Clara University, and titled
"Behind Donald Regan's Downfall: Why Businessmen Fail in Government." A
few of excerpts from the article are [The New York Times, 1987];
"the dominant principle of large corporations is in direct conflict with
the dynamics of democratic governance.
Businesses are characterized by their focus on management as the
rationalizing force, asserting influence and control over the company by
using its hierarchical organization. Authority relationships must be clear
and explicit, and power flows from top to bottom. Cost efficiency and
effectiveness are the measures of success.
[on the other hand,] The cardinal rule in our society holds that the
government derives its legitimacy from the consent of the governed. (...)
Elected officials and their staffs are not masters of the people; they are
servants. (...)
Above all, secrecy, disinformation and autocratic rule have no place in
the functioning of a representative democracy.
But a democratic government, whose success is measured in terms of just
and equitable policies, needs give-and-take bargaining to work.
Negotiating is a way of life. Those with opposing points of view are not
the competition, a group to be defeated. Rather they must be seen as
potential collaborators working toward a common goal. Furthermore,
successful negotiators know that the process depends on listening to the
other side's position rather than on reiterating one's own views.
In this regard, Mr. Regan again failed to make the switch from the world
of business to the world of government.
(...) running a government office requires a different view of
organization and a unique set of skills.
Those who make a successful transition from private sector to public
sector learn to view our Government not as a corporation, but as a
political institution, driven by democratic principles. They accept the
legitimacy of competing view. They learn how to build consensus and
negotiate with those opposing them. They let go of the role of master and
cherish the role of civil servant."
SLIDE 8:
This slide is taken from the article. A chief executive officer of a
business organization is at the top of a vertical pyramid. The President
of a democratic government is at the bottom of an inverse pyramid, as
holding the burden of its weight up. This reminds me a famous word by
President Harry S. Truman, who said, "I would be promoted from the chief
executive of civil servants to the master of government," when he was
retiring from his presidency. The first Tokugawa Shogun in Japan also said
that life was like climbing a mountain with a heavy burden on shoulders.
Christ washed a foot of a poor woman.
Global University is an educational SERVICE organization, fostering
creativity of and global citizenship among youngsters to work together
harmoniously for global problems.
SLIDE 9:
This slide is an inverse pyramid, and the one for the space station
library system we advocate.
SLIDE 10:
When we combine one triangle over the other, it becomes as shown on this
slide. As you are very familiar, it is same as the Star of David, which is
the symbol of Judeo-Christianity and Western culture based on justice,
equality, and liberty.
SLIDE 11:
As the 21st Century is approaching closely, some people start advocating
the modes of thought to be changed from the vertical pyramid in the 20th
Century to a global (round) circle in the 21st Century -- refer to Rene
Dubos' famous dictum "Think Globally." This diagram was taken from a flyer
of COUNTDOWN 2001 in Alexander, VA. As we advocate a global neural
computer network of global brain [Utsumi & Garzon, 1991], people and
his/her knowledge database and their simulation model (which correspond to
a neuron) will be webbed and symbiotically related each other via
telecommunication media (which correspond to synapsis and nerves) for
globally cooperative decision making in participatory democracy.
SLIDE 12:
This slide shows the circles of the globe and the geosynchronous orbit. As
you may know, the circle is a symbol of Buddhism and Oriental culture,
which are holistic and compassion.
SLIDE 13:
When all of those two triangles and two circles are combined together, as
shown in this slide, it becomes a logo of our GLObal Systems Analysis and
Simulation Association in the U.S.A. (GLOSAS/USA).
Here,
(a) The inner circle, globe and earth, is in light green, like the color
of
sprouting flora, signifying the source of oxygen -- without which no fauna
can live. It also signifies the creativity of youngsters -- which is the
driving force for betterment of human life. As we must protect flora in
our environment, we must foster and cherish the creativity of youngsters.
(b) The vertical pyramid, conventional (analog) satellite system, is in
scarlet, like the color of blood -- without which no living creature have
life. It also signifies passion and feeling -- without which human life
will not have beautiful poem, literature, painting, music, etc., and will
be very dry society.
(c) The inverse pyramid, our advocating space station library system, is
in
royal purple which was used only by dynasty in ancient China. Our human's
destiny must be royal and aristocratic, in a sense that it will give more
than take.
(d) The outer circle, total of conventional satellite and space station
library systems, is in deep blue of open sky, signifying intelligence and
rationality.
The logo therefore represents space-age high technology and inter-
cultural philosophy and moral principle.
SLIDE 14:
The last slide was taken from FORTUNE, January 25, 1993, Page 69. It says
"The great leaders of tomorrow will be the ones who understand how to get
everyone to participate" -- in solving our pressing global problems
together with the use of information and telecommunication technologies,
for the betterment of our human society and for the sake of our future
generations.
Our Global University is to bring youngsters forth for this leadership to
serve the world with the spirit of inverse pyramid.
VI. WHAT AHEAD
1. "Multimedia of America (MMOA)" (TM) Project
GLOSAS is now forging ahead to develop a one-to-many receive-only
multimedia system to broadcast American educational courses to rural and
remote areas around the world. Video of an instructor, handwriting in
color on an electronic white board, image/graphic with annotation, dynamic
graphic presentation by real-time execution of an application
program/simulation model, etc., can be seen in windows on computer screen.
On the other hand, teachers and professors (active or retired) can also
transmit their courses from their offices or homes through ordinary
telephone lines for worldwide broadcasting.
2. Large Scale GLH
In cooperation with the Fulbright Association Task Force on East Central
Europe and the Former Soviet Union, GLOSAS will assist Hungarian Fulbright
Commission to organize a large scale GLH at the occasions of the 50th
anniversary of Fulbright exchange program and of the 1100th anniversary of
the nation of Hungary. This GLH will be centered in Budapest, and will
focus on medical information, telemedicine, nurse training with electronic
distance education, etc. Proposed panelists are former President Jimmy
Carter, former Surgeon General Dr. Everett Koop, etc. This GLH will range
from Japan, Australia, New Zealand, North and South America, entire Europe
and Former Soviet Union (FSU).
VII. CONCLUSION
We all know that technological advances have made global communication an
everyday fact of life: but the lives of so many millions of people,
particularly in disadvantaged countries, are still untouched by the great
educational possibilities that have already been opened up for relatively
few [De Blasi, 1990]. We are at the threshold of a new age in education
and communication but the use of the new tools is so far reserved mainly
for the privileged few and is scarcely discussed as a matter of public
policy. The emerging Global University (GU) attempts to provide
cooperative, experiential
learning opportunities on the widest possible scale and for the purpose of
fostering peace and sustainable development [Ljutic and Utsumi, 1991].
Global University will distribute education from all the world's finest
sources to all students who crave knowledge, wherever they are, so as to
enlarge and expand the present exchange of courses into a worldwide
educational system that can provide a specially tailored educational
program for each individual, bringing to his or her home an array of
resources that can empower individuals and bring new wealth to the Third
World also.
Global (electronic) University is an evolutionary concept with no global
precedent. The time is ripe for global electronic distance education. Let
s work together.
Thank you very much for your listening.
REFERENCES
BUSINESS WEEK, January 17, 1994, Page 12 [BUSINESS WEEK, 1994]
De Blasi, M., Support letter for GLOSAS/USA's effort to de-regulate
Japanese telecommunication policy, August 10, 1990. [De Blasi, 1990]
FORTUNE, May 18, 1992, Page 94 [FORTUNE, 1992]
Kouzes, James M., Behind Donald Regan's Downfall: Why Businessmen Fail in
Government," The New York Times, March 8, 1987 [The New York Times, 1987]
Ljutic, A. and T. Utsumi, "Glasnost In The Global Village: A Glosas
Project." Paper presented at the "GLASNOST AND THE GLOBAL VILLAGE"
conference, York University, Toronto, Canada, February 19-22, 1991.
[Ljutic and Utsumi, 1991]
Nippon Keizai Shimbun (Japan Economic Journal), August 2, 1989, in
Japanese [Nippon Keizai Shimbun, 1989]
Utsumi, T., and A. Garzon, "Global (electronic) University for Global
Peace Gaming," in Crookall, D., and Arai K. (eds) GLOBAL INTERDEPENDENCE:
Simulation and Gaming Perspectives, Proceedings of the Conference of the
22nd Annual International Conference of the International Simulation and
Gaming Association (ISAGA), Kyoto, Japan, Springer-Verlag, July 1991.
[Utsumi & Garzon, 1991]
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* Takeshi Utsumi, Ph.D. *
* Laureate of Lord Perry Award for Excellence in Distance Education *
* President, Global University in the U.S.A. (GU/USA) *
* A Divisional Activity of GLOSAS/USA *
* (GLObal Systems Analysis and Simulation Association in the U.S.A.) *
* 43-23 Colden Street, Flushing, NY 11355-3998, U.S.A. *
* Tel: 718-939-0928; Fax: 718-939-0656 (day time only--prefer email) *
* INTERNET: utsumi@columbia.edu; Tax Exempt ID: 11-2999676 *
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