CHED Faculty Training for the New General Education Curriculum

Purposive Communication-Second Generation Training

Prof. Jocelyn Perida-Castro

May 12, 2017

REACTION PAPER ON GORDON BROWN’S WIRING A WEB FOR GLOBAL

GOOD

Submitted by:

Hizon, Carolyne L.

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Gordon Brown: Wiring a Web for Global Good

The rapid development in modern technology has revolutionized our world that has

tremendously contributed to the progress toward an actual global community. Our digital

world increases in speed and accuracy enabling people from various nations and cultures to

have the opportunity to share common experiences almost instantaneously.

Technology has transformed the one big and far world into a tiny global village. With modern

technology, we have the power to communicate with anybody on the sides of the world. With

modern technology, we can work for the common good contributing to a sustainable world.

This is exactly what Gordon Brown addresses in his Tedtalk: Wiring a Web for Global Good.

For his advocacy on poverty and climate change to name a few , he has promoted technology

as vehicles for economic and environmental recovery. He has used communication tools like

Twitter and YouTube as a means to communicate global issues. He has emphasized human

interconnectedness to develop our shared global ethics.

One of the points he raised in his video is what modern technology is capable of: the power

of our moral sense allied to the powers of communication and our ability to organize

internationally.

This he believes gives us the opportunity to fundamentally change the world like in the case

of Nelson Mandela. This man believed that the change we want to see in the world must be

the change we want to see in ourselves. How did people know about Mandela’s life? Well, it

is through modern communication tools. The social media, the interest, the youtube and all.

Another one, noteworthy to be looked into is how St. Teresa of Calcutta’s love for the

unloved spread.Her life mirrored to the world, it has overwhelmingly contributed to the

global challenge of contributing to the creation of a truly global society.

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Brown said that with modern technology, it has the great power of increasing a global ethic

with the power of our ability to communicate and organize together, a truly global society,

built on that ethic but with institution that can save that global society. And what is this

global ethic all about? This is embodied in the Declaration Toward a Global Ethic drafted

individually by Hans Kung, President of the Foundation for a Global Ethic. Drawn on many

of the world’s religions, spiritual and cultural traditions, the declaration identifies the global

rule: “What you wish done to yourself, do to others” as unconditional norm for all areas of

life and the four principles which can be affirmed by all persons with ethical conviction,

whether religiously grounded or not. These principles pronounce the commitment to culture

of non-violence and respect for life, a culture of solidarity and a just economic order, a

culture of tolerance and a life of truthfulness and a culture of equal rights and partnership

between men and women.

Indeed,this global ethic is very important to achieve fairness and responsibility across the

generations.

On the whole, the video on Wiring a Web for Global Good by Gordon Brown undoubtedly is

a call to everyone to make use of modern technology to promote a human cause for a global

good.

At the end of the day, it would be good to ask ourselves what have we contributed to the

betterment of the world with all the modern technology available to us. To quote Steve Job’s

line, “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me. Going to bed at night,

saying we have done something wonderful, that what matters to me.”

REFERENCES:

1. www.techi.com/blog2013/global-impact-4-ways-tech

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2. study.com/academy//how-technology-affects-global

3. https://www.google.com.ph

4. https://www.ted.com

5. www.huffingtonpost.com//tedtalks/gordon-brown-wiring

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