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As scientific advances promise extended healthy lifespans, we face unprecedented rates of social transformation within a single generation. In this era of exponential growth in both information and choices and dramatic societal acceleration, we will experience changes with overwhelming intensity and amplitude throughout our extended lives. These transformative shifts pose significant challenges to our health and well-being.

How can we cultivate a healthy and well-being-focused future in such an era? Through our research in 2023-2024, we have identified 'slowness' as crucial concepts for navigating this future.

This session explores new social paradigms and human-technology relationships for 2050, taking these concepts as guiding principles to navigate this transformative age.

【Reflection】
Although it was only a two-hour session, we believe that the most essential aspects of what we wanted to convey through the Shape New World Initiative "Health and Well-being" research report were successfully communicated to participants.

Using the four-dimensional correlation framework, we visualized the structural problem of extreme expansion in the economic domain (Dimension I) and shrinkage in other domains in contemporary society, developing multifaceted discussions about the significance of "slowness" in an accelerating society. We do not wish to halt progress. Rather, we welcome desirable changes and evolution. However, we aspire to build a future optimized not for maximizing economic growth, but for a society where people are respected as human beings—in other words, a future optimized for individual and societal well-being.

To achieve this, at the societal level, we need to establish comprehensive frameworks that include ethical verification and social dialogue to ensure that evolving technologies are introduced in ways that contribute to well-being. At the individual level, we need to secure space for people to engage in other dimensions of activity commensurate with productivity gains from science and technology. Such constraints and mechanisms that promote "slowness" become essential.

Each panelist presented diverse approaches from their specialized perspectives that contribute to the required "slowness." Toya explained what "smart" means and its dangers from the perspective of technology theory in contemporary thought, proposing "carefulness." Koshio presented possibilities of slow technology through AI with memory capabilities. Hasegawa offered questions about the future through speculative design using artificial wombs. Yoshida presented visions of a healthy longevity society from the perspective of in-body device technology and the current reality where increased productivity leads to more tasks rather than creating space.

Building on the framework outlined in our report, it was also a significant achievement of this session to present participants with perspectives that allow them to maintain a certain distance from assumptions such as "we must keep up with accelerating technological evolution (there are no other options)" and fixed ideas that "smartification and optimization should always be pursued and are inherently good."


【Post EXPO Initiatives】
After the session, we received an insightful email from one of the participants who had also cooperated with us through interviews during the report writing process.

The email included statements such as "One of the real pleasures of the Expo lies in panelists and participants coming together to deeply consider the future" and "The act of designing future society should not be left to a few specialists, but it is important for diverse people living in society to maintain awareness of issues and actively engage." These words made us realize that the direction we aimed for in this session had certainly reached the participants.

There was also the observation that "in the current world of technology, there are aspects where some tech libertarians pursue their ideal society and push forward unilaterally." This recognition perfectly aligns with the structural problems of acceleration through capitalism and informatization discussed in our report, and we renewed our awareness of the importance of forming networks with people who can share such problem consciousness.

As for future initiatives, we would like to gradually expand our network while upholding the concept of "slowness" and continuously engage in discussions to connect this to more sophisticated theoretical construction and practical proposals.

Based on such dialogues and the insights gained from this session, we will advance the writing of academic papers and general-audience books to more broadly disseminate the vision of a well-being future opened up by "slowness" to society. In particular, we will likely accumulate further research and practice regarding current situation analysis using the four-dimensional correlation framework and specific measures for social implementation of balancing-type structures.

Additionally, from the perspective of "future ethics" that we could not sufficiently introduce during this session, we hope to utilize speculative design as a balancing-type structure embedded in society and work toward making dialogue opportunities based on such virtual future visions a part of everyday life.