Democratizing Science: Camilo Rodriguez-Beltran at TEDxBeloHorizonte

According to Camilo Rodriguez-Beltran, a new definition of scientific and social progress is needed: one created by the people, based on their actual needs, cultures and traditions. He believes science must be demystified and made accessible to everyone, for only then can we move forward into a brighter future. Camilo founded the Taleo Initiative as an idealized system where ideas on global challenges can be conceptualized through observation and alternative thinking.

(Portuguese): The lovely and hospitable capital

of the state of Minas Gerais.

Good afternoon,

I won't speak in Portuguese because

I don't speak Portuguese.

And I don't want to invent
the first talk in Portuñol.

So I'm going to speak English.

I come from Mexico.

So, thirty years ago,
I was born in Mexico City

and as you may know,
Mexico is the country where corn,

maize, was born centuries ago.

We call it the land of corn.

And actually, corn is very important
in our culture,

but not just in our culture,

but mainly in our gastronomy.

And maybe some of you have been going to

Mexican restaurants, eating tacos, maybe.

Maybe burritos, although burritos

are not really Mexican, sorry.

But they mostly use what we have here,

which are tortillas.

These tortillas are made out of corn,
and in Mexico,

corn consumption is quite big.

As you can see there,
from the statistics from the FAO,

per person, per year, a Mexican

eats around 120 kg of corn.

So, it's not just important
in terms of the culture,

but is very important
in terms of nutrition.

So, by knowing that,
when I was 15 years old

I started having dreams,
and my dream at that stage was

to help creating an enhancement,

a nutritious enhancement in corn.

So, my fellow citizens,
Mexicans that eat a lot of tortillas

every day, like bread,
will have a better nutrition, ok?

That was my dream when I was 15.

And I suppose people like me
when I was 15

and you have a dream like that,
the first thing you start to do

is to decide to study science,
engineering,

so that's what I did.

So step by step I started
studying biochemical engineering,

graduated, and quite fast,
at the age of 23,

I was already working
as a research associate

at the University of Canterbury

in the Biological Science Department.

I quickly started to participate in projects

related to research
on biotechnology, which made sense,

if I come back to my previous dream.

So, I don't know, if you think
a lot about inflexions in life,

those moments that suddenly
change the direction,

the current trend of your life,
and transforming

all deviating into a new one.

To me, this happened in 2005.

In 2005 I had the opportunity
to go to the Solomon Islands.

I don’t know if many of you
know the Solomon Islands.

Well, the Solomon Islands
is actually a country,

that is situated in the Pacific.

It is part of the Pacific Islands.

So, this is a picture
that I took from the plane,

this is what it looks like.

It is a very interesting place
with the highest concentration

of ethnicities and languages in the world.

And despite of all of that
we don’t know it too much.

We actually know more
about the Solomon Islands

because this was the place
where lots of the navel battles

during the Second World War happened

and lots of divers go, for example,

but not many other people.

So, I was actually invited there
by a conservation biologist

from the Solomon’s
called Patrick Pikatcha.

He brought me to an island
that is called Choiseul Island,

which it is in the Solomon Islands
but it is next to the border

with Papua New Guinea,
and this is how it looks.

Very beautiful
and it will probably look like

some other places here also in Brazil.

So, we went there
because Patrick was doing some work,

trying to monitor a native species,

in particular he likes to study frogs.

So, I don’t know why,
but scientists like him,

biologists, like to work
at night, maybe because frogs

usually go out at night

like some people here
also in Brazil, and Latin America.

Well, just like frogs, we had to go
outside at night,

with Patrick, and we were looking
for these frogs

and just after 30 seconds
of getting out of the field station,

I realized that this was
not my environment, completely.

I was completely blind.
Imagine this dark to me,

I was completely like a blind man.

I already wear glasses.
Imagine me in here.

Because I am very used to cities,
for example,

but not really this kind of environment.

It was even more interesting,
my experience,

when I started to see that Patrick
was using his lantern on the river,

starting to spot some
of the different frogs.

For me, it was completely invisible.

But the most interesting thing here,
is that the boy,

the teenager that was leading
the expedition,

he was actually spotting
the place where organisms

were going to appear,
even before the expert,

even before Patrick.

And at that moment I started to realize

that something interesting was happening,

and I started to look on
how this non-expert, this teenager,

had a different sight, definitely,
compared to mine,

but also different from
the real expert, from Patrick.

But the Solomon Islands
do not only have a forest,

they also have cities.

And in the city of Honiara,
which is the capital,

we and some colleagues
from the University of Canterbury,

like professor Jack Hyneman,
my friend and colleague

from the Solomon Islands Paul Roughan,

started to organize some

capacity building initiatives
to discuss biotechnology

in the Solomon Islands
and discuss biology in general.

The person you see here is Naneth Tutua.

She is a business woman
from the Solomon Islands.

What she is [holding] there
is a DNA extraction

from a papaya.

She was able to visualize DNA.

So how did this happen?

Because Solomon Islands is considered

one of the least developed places
in the world.

So, there are no real laboratories
for molecular biology there.

But what we had to do is to improvise.

To do a different kind
of experiment in order to extract DNA

and so, Ms. Naneth
could see what DNA looks like,

and by looking at this,
she was able to demystify DNA.

And DNA was just not something

that is abstract
and she cannot understand,

this time she was able to see it,
understand it,

and when someone wants
to talk about biotechnology,

she has somehow,
some confidence to talk about this.

She seems quite proud
of doing her extraction.

And naturally, DNA extractions,
I don’t know if you know,

but are quite easy to do.

You just need salt,
detergent and alcohol.

So I started to use
these three ingredients,

put it in my bag
and started to travel around,

doing exactly what we did
in the Solomon’s,

repeating the experience, bringing

the demystification of DNA.

This happens in different places
of the world

but definitely my
most important experience

was when last November,
a DNA extraction was featured

in a Chilean soap opera
called Decibel 110.

A low cost kitchen DNA extraction

was part of this meet-up
between Francisco

and his prohibited love, Cindy.

We didn’t stop at the DNA extraction,
we suddenly started to play also

with instruments of molecular biology.

Here you have some pictures of workshops

that we’ve performed
in Philippines, where we actually

started to develop basic
molecular lab equipment,

as you can see there,
it looks quite basic,

but it's actually
some of the equipment

that is mostly used in laboratories.

So, once I started to build up
this kind of motion

and instrument and trying to work out

with these local's technology,
and the demystification

and with all those travels,

I suddenly found myself in West Africa.

And West Africa was also
an inflexion point for me.

The reason for that,
is that in West Africa

I found for the first time
a hub of people

that were thinking a bit like me.

That were asking questions
about the experts,

that were asking questions
about technology.

What kind of technology?
For whom?

They were asking questions about

what Africa can bring to the world.

The interesting thing here,
is that they were

mainly social scientists,
but also farmers,

and artists, talking about this.

So we decided to stay more,
and I’ve been going

to West Africa every year since 2007.

And the basic question of it,
is based on this picture.

As you can see we have a plane.

A plane represents technology, I think,

and as we can agree,
planes have changed

the way we move,
the way we communicate,

but also the way diseases are transmitted

and also passed.

But what is important here
is not just to look at the technology,

but to look at the context surrounding it.

And maybe for some of you
this will look quite nice.

For me, it allows me to make
the questions about

what is the context about.

What this technology
can offer to the context?

Does this technology fit into the context?

And those were the questions used

as a base for our documentary:

(Music)

(Video) Man (French): If science say so,
it counts as "the gospel".

Science is made by man.

Science must be made by man

for man.

Woman: Why do we do research?

Who does the research?

For what purpose?

Man: And the specialists hide

in their offices, in their sects,

to decide for everybody.

Man: To create an agricultural policy,

without the farmers

it means that we are not discussing
agriculture.

Man: The farmer needs to consider himself
as a researcher

as someone who works in a laboratory.

Woman: It is not enough to research
inside a laboratory.

Man: Today, we will extract DNA
from plants.

Woman: Is not enough to do research
inside an institution.

Man: We will use some salt,

some detergent,

we have alcohol and test tubes.

We are able to extract DNA.
We saw it.

I saw the DNA,
our friends saw the DNA.

Without any electron
or optical microscope.

Woman: We have to deinstitutionalize
the research!

Camilo Rodriguez-Beltran: So,
this is just a fragment of the documentary

“Autrement” (“Differently”),
that we did in West Africa,

and, as you can see,
it just raises questions

about technology, science,
but based on the context in West Africa.

And as you can see there is
an empowerment of it.

There is a message that Africans
want to say

about what they can offer.

So, after building kind of a boat,

with instruments and methods,
we started to use them

in different parts of the globe,

then I decided also to observe.

And this comes from
a so called expert that is known

now to talk about the non-experts.

Usually the non-experts
are kind of invisible

in this generation of knowledge.

Mostly, non experts are consumers or users

of knowledge, of technology, of science.

We have had several
technological revolutions

starting with Information Technology,

starting also in agriculture,
lots of technical revolutions.

But most of the people in the world,
and I'm talking here also of countries,

have been mostly consumers and users.

This is a list of the technologies

that Peter Diamandis,
from Singularity University,

proposed at the last TED.

This list, which is quite interesting,

he proposes are the technologies
that will change

and that are already changing the future.

And among these technologies,

he also talks about the crowd,
and the power of the crowd.

He actually introduced the term
cyber citizens,

which are normal citizens,
people like us,

that participate via online,
and in his example,

it was in a game of folding proteins.

Not only for the pleasure
of playing a game

but actually to solve medical problems.

And this is where we are now,
in a world where

the non experts are not just
consumers and users,

but they are transforming
themselves into contributors.

We heard today,
this morning, a very good example of it

happening here, in the Amazon.

But some of these are also
what we call the Crowd-X,

or crowdsourcing, or crowdfunding.

A very good example is Wikipedia.

Wikipedia is a contribution
of the non-experts.

And we have lots of examples like that.

The citizen science, the bio-hackers,

this is happening right now.

The Who is changing.

The non-experts are contributing right now.

However, I am here to propose

something more radical,
than just being contributors.

I want also to raise questions
regarding the What.

What kind of technology?

Is that the only list of technologies
that will shape the future?

I don’t think so.

I don’t think there is only
one way to see

how we're going to develop
ourselves into the future.

I actually think that we need more
and we have more.

We need knowledge that starts to develop

from the context, context-based.

We heard some examples from West Africa

and the Solomon's.

Those are different contexts
and they can develop

new ways to see generation of knowledge.

We probably need to unable,

not to say: science is just this,

and if you start to bring some
art into this,

then it's not science,
you can't talk about that.

Maybe we have to start unlabeling things.

For example, in our documentary,

we talk about science and development

but we use contemporary African dance
to talk about that, why?

Because if you talk
about contemporary dance in Africa,

things make sense.

If you don’t use the culture,
things do not make sense.

It is important to work out
in the demystification,

in the democratization, decentralization.

I think we can have very good examples
for research

coming from these places.

Solomon Islands,
this tiny archipelago, could become,

for example, the best observatory,

monitoring of global changes in the world.

And these could be
the new research centers

happening around the world,

maybe these are the new contributors.

I actually believe that we have passed

from the technological revolution to,
right now,

in a crowd revolution,
but we need something else.

We need a humble revolution.
We need humbleness.

We need to reduce our ego.

Those who consider themselves specialists,
or experts,

we need to reduce the ego.

Once we reduce the ego,
we are able to identify

the potential among our peers,

among those that we call the non-experts.

And, by doing that,
we will be able to start new directions.

New directions for science, for technology,

you can call it the way you want.

I will just finish with this slide,

which to me represents empowerment,

because I am here,
standing in front of you,

and that dream that I had
when I was 15 years old,

I want you to remember,
that dream has changed.

That dream has actually expanded.

I don’t want to build,
with a bunch of experts,

a technological tool to help
the population of my country.

I want to create something new.

I want to expand my horizon,
and this is all.

Thank you very much.

(Applause)