While the world’s most important thinkers on human consciousness state that the next human agenda is happiness, longevity and augmentation — witness meditation that has gone mainstream; increasing awareness on the impact of stress and anxiety; and the growth of technology designed to enhance human mental capacity — Nichol Bradford has been central in defining and organizing the growing movement around this long before it became a hot topic.
As Executive Director and co-founder of the Transformative Technology Lab, Bradford believes that the world has only 15 years to head in the right direction — which would be to access the contribution of every human being and unlock the world’s potential so that humans can collaborate with each other to solve humanity’s most pressing problems. A tall order, to say the least.
“We need to successfully navigate ‘the crunch,’ a combination of changes in economics, technology, and environment,” she said. Software and automation are estimated to replace 800 million jobs by 2030. Environmental issues such as climate change, clean food production, waste disposal energy generation are paramount. Wealth inequality is rising, as the wealthiest 1 percent of the world’s population now more than half of the world’s wealth.
In short, Bradford says the urgency is profound. “We are at a critical point between two futures – abundance or permanent massive inequality, Star Fleet or Hunger Games – and I believe the tipping factor towards abundance will be the psychological health of humanity.”
Her goal is to support the growth of technologies that can expand mental health, emotional well-being, and human psychological capacity, and therefore, truly elevate the human race. Sounds ambitious if not almost impossible, but supporters say her mission is the culmination of a lifetime of experiences that led her here. Her work is informed by a lot of real-world exposure: high-level executive positions (she held a senior role an $18 billion acquisition), an MBA from top-rated Wharton, and most importantly, a deep passion and commitment to the future of humanity. UCSF’s Dr. Adam Gazzeley, one of the top neuroscientists in the world, said that: “Nichol is a superstar. She was a major contributor to the consumer technology world — operating World of Warcraft in China — and has now applied her skills to using technology to create experiences that improve our minds. We need more tech leaders like her.”
Tim Chang, Partner with Mayfield Fund and a leading investor in emerging tech had this to say, “As a VC that has backed many startups using gamification, growth hacking and mobile technologies to maximize engagement and profits, I feel a strong karmic debt to now focus on technologies that can help make us *more* connected with ourselves and others, and to raise our level of consciousness as a species. What began as an exploration into quantified self and biohacking has evolved into a movement that now also blends cutting-edge biofeedback sensors, analytics, machine learning and human-computer interfaces with traditional spiritual and contemplative practices – Old meets New, East meets West, Data meets Wisdom, Math meets Intuition. Nichol Bradford and the TransTech Lab is at the forefront of this movement, and her work in uniting and bridging all these worlds is crucial in helping modern society wield our increasingly powerful technologies with the proper level of awareness and intentionality. Without efforts like TransTech, our level of consciousness will continue to severely lag the pace of our technical innovation, inevitably leading to species-wide extinction-level outcomes in my mind.”
Bradford discussed what drives her work, the tremendous responsibility that she feels and how transformative technology can help solve these problems.
Q. What is driving the work you do?
A. I have a profound sense of urgency. Our technologies are on exponential curves, but human development is not. The gap is dangerous to our ability to fully thrive as well as navigate the changes that are coming. Closing the gap will include technology because of its ability to create scalable, affordable products that are accessible to all. Even though by many objective measures like decreases in infant mortality, access to electricity and clean water, or girls in school, human life is better off than ever, and while the last few years have witnessed great advancements in human technical capacity, if you are tracking the global psychological data, you will see a worldwide surge in stress, anxiety, loneliness, depression, and suicide. Those numbers, while sobering, don’t include those feeling a general lack of engagement, happiness, meaning, or connection. Going further, the rise in automation will replace “ ” jobs, with “ ” jobs to even be employable, people will need skills where their level of self-awareness and the ability to connect with others will be central to their success. TransTech is about helping to address these problems, not only to support those who are suffering but to make exponential wellbeing possible.
Q: How do you define Transformative Technology?
A: Transformative Tech is medically and scientifically validated technologies that support mental health, emotional well-being and human thriving. that ranges across a psychological spectrum, from support for stress, anxiety depression, to self-awareness and connection, to even expanding the mental and emotional capacity of humans. We track 11 categories of technology from AI emotion and pattern recognition, to neuro and bio-stimulation, to consumer EEG and more. TransTech is one of the next mega-sectors because the brain, the mind, and human consciousness is a universal condition, and also central to the next chapter of human evolution and society. It’s an incredibly exciting time because we need some scalable method to help reduce stress and bring peace to the minds of mankind. Given the challenges I mentioned before, plus the opportunity from unlocking human potential, you can expect to see the recent flood of investment into brain research and rising interest in TransTech to continue. As part of my research lab, I talk to companies, researchers, and scientists that are working on technologies across the entire spectrum. What is thrilling is the number of real products that I see in the market — technologies that can truly impact human well-being. We just published a list of hundreds of companies and products that are available today. Many of these technologies work across the spectrum – so products initially used to optimize athletic performance having applications for PTSD. A rising tide lifts all boats. These technologies can be scaled to the millions — or the billions. Because the problems are so urgent, we need to have scalable products and platforms at prices consumers can afford.
Q: You’ve said that the biggest problems facing mankind aren’t technical, they are human. Can you explain more about that?
I think the greatest challenges facing mankind aren’t technical but human. I believe we actually have all the resourcefulness that we need to save the human race but it begins with helping people answer the basic question mankind has asked throughout the ages – Who am I? Essentially addressing and prioritizing the psychological needs and inner development of people, and if we don’t get busy addressing that, we will not be able to have an abundant future – because no matter how amazing our tech is, technology remains just a tool. A tool that people use. So, the minds of the people developing and using the tech just as important as the tech itself in determining the future. You’ll make what you are. I believe that accelerators and investors serious about creating a brighter future should institutionalize a culture of personal development for founders alongside company development.
Q. What can be done about this doomsday scenario?
I don’t feel that we are doomed – but we do have a lot of work to do. I believe that as humans, we need to look at how we learn the soft skills that will ultimately be the most important. Today, we rely on culture, one-to-one, to teach the things that matter most: self-awareness, collaboration, creativity, communication. There are over 7BN people on the planet, we cannot rely on culture and one-to-one to get these skills out to a critical mass of people. This is where TransTech and exponential technology can help. Not as a replacement, but as a compliment and amplifier of humans. We need human-centered design, use cases structured around enhancing and supporting human inner development, and value-based metrics to build technologies that complement us. We design it and we can determine what we want it to do for us. Are we just meeting needs at the bottom of Maslow’s hierarchy or are we supporting people all the way from the base to the apex of self-transcendence? This is a design intention. I’m very optimistic because humans are incredibly resourceful.
Q. What has influenced your work?
Meditation and contemplative traditions deeply influence my work. Around the world, humans have been pushing on the known boundaries of human mental and emotional capacity for several millennia. They documented what they experienced and today neuroscience and massive data-driven psychological are coming to similar understandings. So, we have a glimpse of what has been possible for a few, and technology which often makes what is scarce abundant suggests that mental and human thriving can be available to all.
Q. What are some of the most interesting new technologies within TransTech?
I’m very interested in technologies that amplify our higher natures, our greatest teachers, or our trained mental health practitioners. I believe that designers of TransTech products could help us amplify our collaborative and altruistic side.
I think intelligent assistance is evolving and chatbots will soon recognize emotion via facial expressions, text audio. This is the beginning of the use of chatbots that will be able to give support and comfort to humans. I don’t think this should replace human contact by any means, but I don’t have a binary point of view. I see a world where people have a variety of tools available for different times and needs. Sometimes that will be a human, and sometime that will be a bot.
I track products that allow us to sense, measure, and stimulate human physical and emotional states. The main tools are HRV, EEG, and GSR, but there’s been very interesting progress in combinations of these as well as RF signals that analyze reflections off a person’s heart rate and breath. The speed at which the product development in this sector is moving is nothing short of spectacular.
I’m very interested in enhancement. I’m interested in expanding the mental and emotional capacity of humans. I know that we have not gotten anywhere near the capacity we are capable of with our bodies and our minds.
I’m in love with the products that pick-up biodata unobtrusively in the background or in an all in one device like Interaxon’s Safilo glasses with EEG so that people can track data without thinking about it.
I’m really interested in the gut biome. Researchers are starting to sequence the microbiome — and we are beginning to understand how important gut health is to wellbeing. Turns out that people who are depressed often have a level of disturbance in their gut biome. The research is nowhere near causation yet – but it’s interesting. We are at the beginning of understanding the role it plays in psychological well-being.
Q. What are some of the specific products that you are looking at?
I love the Oura ring because it’s a great sleep tracker with some of the best data accuracy in the market. The app helps you figure out what is wrecking your sleep. There is no well-being if you can’t sleep no matter how smart or talented you are, so sleep is a major TransTech category.
There’s a company called Joyable, which focuses on social anxiety. They have a mobile app — you get a human therapist, plus exercises, plus text support. Through the app you can also reach out to a therapist at the exact moment you are having social anxiety versus a week later in an office. Those therapists amplified by technology can support 200 people each and the efficacy data for meeting the clients’ needs is outstanding,
I love things that stimulate the Vagus Nerve which is now being recognized as a major player in . I didn’t know this before I started working with TransTech, but the female orgasm runs on the Vegas nerve. It does not run up the spine. It’s fascinating. One of the reasons why we love music in our earbuds is that there’s a little tip of the Vegas nerve within the ears. And so, when you’re playing music, it’s stimulating it, especially if the music has a little bit of base.
I am really interested in smart scent. For example, say you’ve had a stressful day at work. You can have a smart scent distributor that would know you had a bad day — and when you walk in the house your house would smell like lavender, which is calming. There is low hanging fruit right there for enhancing the well-being of humans, and those products exist today.
There are products focusing on people who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD or baby monitors that record that heartbeat of the mother. The monitor plays the through a speaker in the baby’s when he or she starts to cry. The baby just spent nine months in the mother’s womb, so knows that more than anybody else. It will bring comfort to the child. many more examples like these.
Q: Any last thoughts?
Our inner landscape is one of the next great frontiers for technology — though not one without traps. In order to use tech, to heal and shape our minds, we will on that journey develop the ability to directly affect our psychology and capacity. When we can turn the knobs and levers of our mind at-will, if we still have a gaping “hole” that we seek to fill from outside ourselves, then we face a danger of losing authority to the very algorithms that will help us engineer our pleasure. So, we must actually “wake-up.” The good news is — humans have created maps and described what it feels like to be there. We can modernize the process — accelerated by technology, minus religiosity, and informed by data. Welcome to the next great revolution in technology — human mastery of the mind.