00:00:29.843 --> 00:00:34.114
I actually was at home because
it was marathon Monday.

00:00:34.200 --> 00:00:39.071
The Temple Israel, my synagogue,
was closed on that day.

00:00:39.880 --> 00:00:42.160
There's an opportunity to think about

00:00:42.240 --> 00:00:45.040
going out to watch some of the
runners come in or whatever.

00:00:45.129 --> 00:00:48.500
I watched some of the marathon

00:00:48.800 --> 00:00:53.880
on television and was half
tuned into the marathon.

00:00:53.963 --> 00:00:55.600
The first runners had come in.

00:00:55.900 --> 00:00:58.514
The 117th Boston Marathon,

00:00:58.600 --> 00:01:00.600
one of the world's
great sporting events.

00:01:03.486 --> 00:01:04.471
For the first time,

00:01:04.560 --> 00:01:08.520
jurists saw images yesterday that led
the FBI to the Tsarnaev brothers.

00:01:08.600 --> 00:01:10.440
Chilling new video shows Tamerlan

00:01:10.460 --> 00:01:13.760
and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev weaving
through the crowd on Boylston street.

00:01:13.843 --> 00:01:15.086
The second blast.

00:01:17.086 --> 00:01:21.214
If there's any lingering doubt,
I did do it along with my brother.

00:02:02.880 --> 00:02:08.440
The day of the marathon, of the bombing,
I was in the church, I was up in the tower

00:02:08.520 --> 00:02:13.480
overlooking the marathon finish line,
about 246ft above ground,

00:02:13.563 --> 00:02:22.329
just looking down, and I think at the same
moment heard and saw an explosion.

00:02:22.886 --> 00:02:26.200
And we are looking down and we
are on our phones and we're

00:02:27.243 --> 00:02:31.457
beginning to get a picture of the horror
that has transpired on the streets.

00:02:35.720 --> 00:02:38.440
I mean, this is a cherished
event in our history.

00:02:38.529 --> 00:02:41.643
This is arguably the most special
day of the year in Boston.

00:02:42.080 --> 00:02:43.680
This was happened in our city.

00:02:43.760 --> 00:02:44.760
These are our people.

00:02:44.840 --> 00:02:48.040
This is our event that we've
been covering for decades, right?

00:02:48.129 --> 00:02:52.471
This is, the Boston Marathon has
been happening on our streets

00:02:52.557 --> 00:02:54.671
since before World War I.

00:02:54.760 --> 00:02:55.920
This was a huge story,

00:02:56.003 --> 00:02:59.800
not just for Boston, but for the country
and for certain parts of the world anyway.

00:03:00.243 --> 00:03:01.237
Who did this?

00:03:01.320 --> 00:03:03.214
Who's behind this, right?

00:03:03.300 --> 00:03:05.071
How could this have happened?

00:03:05.160 --> 00:03:07.640
How could this have been?
Right?

00:03:07.729 --> 00:03:09.871
And who would target the marathon?

00:03:11.086 --> 00:03:12.329
Good morning, everybody.

00:03:13.040 --> 00:03:17.400
I've just been briefed by my national
security team on the attacks in Boston.

00:03:17.486 --> 00:03:19.986
This was a heinous and cowardly act.

00:03:20.560 --> 00:03:23.320
And given what we now know about what took

00:03:23.400 --> 00:03:26.640
place, the FBI is investigating
it as an act of terrorism.

00:03:26.720 --> 00:03:31.160
Affirming his Muslim faith, he added,
I prayed for Allah to bestow his mercy

00:03:31.240 --> 00:03:35.400
upon the deceased, those affected
in the bombing and their families.

00:03:35.480 --> 00:03:38.040
I pray for your relief, for your healing.

00:03:38.080 --> 00:03:39.200
How religion played a role

00:03:39.280 --> 00:03:42.640
in the Boston Marathon bombing is
a large and complicated question.

00:03:42.800 --> 00:03:46.757
Tamerlan had been an unusual character.

00:03:46.840 --> 00:03:49.360
He had had some struggle psychiatrically.

00:03:49.400 --> 00:03:52.800
I think he had told his mother at one
point that he, quite rather young,

00:03:52.880 --> 00:03:58.080
I think, as a teenager, that he had heard
voices in his head and he latched onto

00:03:58.163 --> 00:04:02.671
Islam as one way to keep
himself from drowning, I think.

00:04:03.186 --> 00:04:04.637
Clearly Dzhokhar and Tamerlan were

00:04:04.720 --> 00:04:07.114
learning about Islam
on the computer screen.

00:04:07.880 --> 00:04:11.840
The things they were reading, Inspire
magazine alone, which was at the time

00:04:11.920 --> 00:04:16.080
the place to go to learn about this.
You know, it's a click of a button,

00:04:16.120 --> 00:04:19.200
and there you can read all the theology
and justification of violence.

00:04:19.240 --> 00:04:22.520
And by the way, here's how you make
a bomb in the kitchen of your mom.

00:04:22.603 --> 00:04:24.157
And that's exactly what they did.

00:04:24.600 --> 00:04:25.929
It wasn't very hard.

00:04:28.280 --> 00:04:31.560
I think their disenfranchisement
is a big part of the story.

00:04:31.640 --> 00:04:34.240
That has absolutely nothing
to do with religion.

00:04:34.320 --> 00:04:38.200
It has to do with them feeling like
outcasts, them not being respected,

00:04:38.280 --> 00:04:41.760
them coming from broken families
and not having good examples.

00:04:41.840 --> 00:04:44.480
Personally, I do not believe that it's

00:04:44.560 --> 00:04:47.320
religion that drives
people to commit violence.

00:04:47.400 --> 00:04:53.040
It's really their social, economical
situation that really drives them.

00:04:53.120 --> 00:05:01.240
It still is very painful for our community
not able to forget what happened and not

00:05:01.329 --> 00:05:04.371
being able to explain why it
happened the way it happened.

00:05:04.957 --> 00:05:08.943
There isn't an answer that could satisfy

00:05:10.760 --> 00:05:15.400
or that could answer, or even justify,
come even close to justifying that.

00:05:15.486 --> 00:05:17.614
I don't think that.
I know there isn't any.

00:05:18.560 --> 00:05:21.440
Welcome to the Cathedral of the Holy Cross

00:05:21.520 --> 00:05:26.840
in Boston South End for a special
presentation and interfaith service

00:05:26.929 --> 00:05:28.271
healing our city.

00:05:28.920 --> 00:05:30.504
Boston prays together.

00:05:30.704 --> 00:05:31.800
After the bombing,

00:05:31.840 --> 00:05:35.080
there was this sort of tremendous
effort to really bring people together.

00:05:35.163 --> 00:05:38.029
And I think the religious leaders
were really at the center of that.

00:05:46.314 --> 00:05:49.171
And we stand together, and
nobody's going to divide us.

00:05:49.514 --> 00:05:55.743
And so we come together to pray
and mourn and measure our loss.

00:05:57.800 --> 00:06:05.160
But we also come together today
to reaffirm that the spirit of this city

00:06:05.243 --> 00:06:11.271
is undaunted and the spirit of this
country shall remain undimmed.

00:06:12.080 --> 00:06:14.120
What does this have to do with religion?

00:06:14.200 --> 00:06:16.080
I think what has to do with religion is

00:06:16.160 --> 00:06:19.960
the response, is the aftermath,
is the healing, is the pulling people

00:06:20.043 --> 00:06:26.029
together, is the overcoming hate,
refusing to slide into Islamophobia.

00:06:26.480 --> 00:06:28.000
I think that's what,

00:06:28.086 --> 00:06:31.186
I think that's the religion story
in the Boston Marathon bombing.

00:06:33.840 --> 00:06:35.920
Why does religious violence happen?

00:06:36.000 --> 00:06:37.920
There's no simple answer.

00:06:38.000 --> 00:06:40.480
After every attack, many questions arise.

00:06:40.563 --> 00:06:43.029
Lots of people try
to explain why it happened.

00:06:43.686 --> 00:06:45.971
We think that if we can
understand religious violence

00:06:46.057 --> 00:06:47.914
we might be able to prevent it.

00:06:48.480 --> 00:06:51.280
In universities and think tanks worldwide,

00:06:51.363 --> 00:06:55.486
researchers and academics are studying
and trying to explain religious terrorism.

00:06:55.840 --> 00:07:01.920
ISIS is a little bit like
the United States was in the 19th century.

00:07:02.000 --> 00:07:04.400
You know the motto
on the Statue of Liberty?

00:07:04.480 --> 00:07:07.360
Give me your poor, your needy,
your huddled masses?

00:07:07.440 --> 00:07:09.280
Well, ISIS says, come to us.

00:07:09.360 --> 00:07:11.920
Anybody, come to us. You have problems?

00:07:12.000 --> 00:07:16.720
It appeals to a fairly wide range of young
people frustrated by the fact that their

00:07:16.800 --> 00:07:20.240
aspirations, they believe,
can't ever be met.

00:07:20.329 --> 00:07:24.800
And ISIS has been pretty successful
recruiting in 110 countries.

00:07:28.286 --> 00:07:32.043
So then I decided to go to the field
and hang around with jihadis

00:07:33.886 --> 00:07:35.571
to figure out what really moves them.

00:07:37.714 --> 00:07:41.329
What I found was they believe
in what they're doing.

00:07:42.360 --> 00:07:44.280
They find a sense of purpose
in community,

00:07:44.360 --> 00:07:48.360
which are the most important things,
that none of them are really crazy.

00:07:48.440 --> 00:07:53.840
So people join and are willing to die
for their friends who also have ideas,

00:07:53.920 --> 00:07:59.120
so they can have sort of eternal glory
in the eyes of people who they care about.

00:07:59.200 --> 00:08:03.880
So the best predictor of who joins these
groups is if their friends join them.

00:08:03.960 --> 00:08:08.160
And that's why we introduced
identity fusion into the equation.

00:08:08.243 --> 00:08:13.457
And identity fusion is
a sense of visceral oneness.

00:08:13.840 --> 00:08:18.400
So when we did our work with ISIS,
we found that these two factors were

00:08:18.480 --> 00:08:23.000
extremely important, and that is the ideas
and the group dynamics,

00:08:23.080 --> 00:08:26.800
the fusion of the groups, and that made
them the most effective fighters by far.

00:08:26.886 --> 00:08:31.514
The only thing that's important to me now
is how ideas can be used to change policy.

00:08:32.280 --> 00:08:36.800
At my stage in life, writing academic
papers, it doesn't do it for me.

00:08:36.886 --> 00:08:38.771
I have no place to go in a career.

00:08:39.400 --> 00:08:42.880
Basically, I'm in a good
place in terms of that.

00:08:42.960 --> 00:08:48.600
The only thing for me to do
intellectually is to try to change policy

00:08:48.680 --> 00:08:52.640
based on what we know about the world
in terms of the evidence we have at hand.

00:08:52.720 --> 00:08:58.080
But I still think that providing
a clear notion of what's going

00:08:58.163 --> 00:09:03.086
on and the evidence at hand
in the long run, can be very helpful.

00:09:18.160 --> 00:09:19.680
My name is Leron.

00:09:19.763 --> 00:09:24.143
I'm a philosopher of religion
and a professor at a university in Norway.

00:09:25.840 --> 00:09:28.160
As a philosopher, I spend most of my time

00:09:28.240 --> 00:09:31.640
thinking about theories, but I
often get frustrated with the gap

00:09:31.729 --> 00:09:34.814
between theory and application
to these social problems.

00:09:35.200 --> 00:09:36.843
I want to figure out how to take

00:09:36.929 --> 00:09:40.071
scholarly work out of the ivory
tower into the real world.

00:09:41.600 --> 00:09:44.443
I want to know what it would
take to make a difference.

00:09:46.440 --> 00:09:48.200
This is my friend Wesley.

00:09:48.286 --> 00:09:51.343
He's a philosopher of religion
who's also a computer programmer.

00:09:51.920 --> 00:09:54.640
Wesley and I designed a project to build

00:09:54.729 --> 00:09:58.000
computer simulations of religion
in order to understand it better.

00:09:59.160 --> 00:10:00.640
Wesley thinks computer modeling

00:10:00.720 --> 00:10:04.600
and simulation is the ideal tool
for studying the complexity of religion

00:10:04.686 --> 00:10:08.514
and getting a bird's eye view of society
to see how things really work.

00:10:09.400 --> 00:10:12.320
The modeling religion project is
headquartered in Boston,

00:10:12.403 --> 00:10:15.700
just a mile away from the
finish line of the Boston Marathon.

00:10:18.280 --> 00:10:19.600
This is Saikou.

00:10:19.680 --> 00:10:24.000
Saikou is originally from Guinea,
and now he's a computer simulation expert

00:10:24.086 --> 00:10:26.843
from the Virginia Modeling,
Analysis, and Simulation Center.

00:10:27.643 --> 00:10:32.214
He spent years computer modeling war
games, simulation of traffic patterns,

00:10:32.300 --> 00:10:35.457
emergency evacuation schemes,
and flight simulators.

00:10:39.880 --> 00:10:41.080
This is Ross.

00:10:41.160 --> 00:10:43.480
He's a hardcore computer scientist.

00:10:43.563 --> 00:10:46.157
He specializes in handling big data or

00:10:46.243 --> 00:10:49.743
massive amounts of information
that can be mined for useful knowledge.

00:10:51.880 --> 00:10:53.840
Here's Justin.

00:10:53.920 --> 00:10:57.440
He's a religious studies scholar
and a computer modeling expert who is

00:10:57.529 --> 00:11:00.086
programming a way to predict
religious violence.

00:11:01.286 --> 00:11:03.000
Together, we religion scholars

00:11:03.086 --> 00:11:07.214
and computer scientists plan to apply
cutting edge technology and world class

00:11:07.300 --> 00:11:11.814
expert knowledge to real world problems
in order to try to make meaningful

00:11:11.900 --> 00:11:16.071
suggestions to policymakers about how
to improve conditions and cooperation

00:11:16.157 --> 00:11:19.257
across human societies over
the next hundred years.

00:11:20.640 --> 00:11:24.160
Modeling in simulation is used
all the time for everything.

00:11:24.243 --> 00:11:31.900
It's used to create new cars,
it's used to handle flight simulators,

00:11:31.986 --> 00:11:37.400
it's used to build distribution routes,
it's used to manage the economy,

00:11:37.486 --> 00:11:41.286
it's used for everything
that affects you in your daily life.

00:11:41.714 --> 00:11:43.686
One example of a model of human social

00:11:43.771 --> 00:11:47.571
behavior that led to change in the
real world was a traffic model built

00:11:47.657 --> 00:11:50.571
at the Virginia Modeling,
Analysis, and Simulation Center.

00:11:51.114 --> 00:11:55.000
Computer scientists there were able
to show when traffic would be particularly

00:11:55.086 --> 00:11:58.557
bad, and to make recommendations
for a different pattern of traffic light

00:11:58.643 --> 00:12:01.829
rotation and the construction
of frontage roads.

00:12:02.714 --> 00:12:06.414
These plans were sent to the city
council and the changes were made.

00:12:06.757 --> 00:12:08.671
So there's a history of modeling human

00:12:08.757 --> 00:12:12.197
social behavior to find
optimal ways of being together.

00:12:12.280 --> 00:12:14.160
And we wondered if we could apply the same

00:12:14.243 --> 00:12:17.600
principles to modeling religious
radicalization and terrorism.

00:12:18.486 --> 00:12:22.157
It's a very active, energetic
process with thousands of ideas

00:12:22.243 --> 00:12:27.643
flying around and people figuring out
over time which ideas are most important.

00:12:27.960 --> 00:12:29.680
So they figure out exactly what needs

00:12:29.763 --> 00:12:33.786
to be implemented and what doesn't need to
be implemented in the model architecture.

00:12:34.200 --> 00:12:36.800
Who will be America's next top modeler?

00:12:37.329 --> 00:12:41.571
We have before us nine contestants,
but only eight spots.

00:12:45.514 --> 00:12:47.671
We build our models using
social scientific and

00:12:47.757 --> 00:12:50.486
research data
that describes the real world.

00:12:50.960 --> 00:12:52.600
There's a lot of information out there

00:12:52.680 --> 00:12:56.800
about how the world works that can be
collected from a vast amount of scientific

00:12:56.886 --> 00:13:00.557
publications, also from census
data or public databases.

00:13:01.600 --> 00:13:03.320
Our teams have harnessed that data,

00:13:03.403 --> 00:13:07.314
formalized it into computer code,
and then used it to program our models.

00:13:07.757 --> 00:13:11.786
The agents are simulated people that populate the model

00:13:11.986 --> 00:13:15.543
reflect the data about human cognition and social psychology

00:13:16.971 --> 00:13:19.514
So the models are calibrated using data about people

00:13:19.600 --> 00:13:21.671
in the world we live in

00:13:22.086 --> 00:13:26.043
Once we validate that,
the model mirrors a given society in some

00:13:26.129 --> 00:13:29.614
key ways, and we can start to play
with different variables and parameters

00:13:29.800 --> 00:13:33.729
to better understand the complex
relationships between social factors

00:13:34.071 --> 00:13:40.557
such as religious identity, diversity,
geography, education, integration, health,

00:13:40.643 --> 00:13:43.657
gender, and vulnerability
to radicalization.

00:13:59.720 --> 00:14:02.440
You feel like MODRN is
gonna take off this morning?

00:14:02.520 --> 00:14:05.080
I do.
Well, it's gonna at least mini takeoff.

00:14:05.163 --> 00:14:08.071
Cause the big maxi takeoff is in June.

00:14:09.480 --> 00:14:12.200
This one's supported
by the university directly.

00:14:12.280 --> 00:14:15.760
So it's a chance to sort
of get an early start.

00:14:15.843 --> 00:14:20.243
Introduce colleagues here at the
university to folk, to people on the team.

00:14:20.443 --> 00:14:22.129
Why religion?

00:14:22.557 --> 00:14:27.114
For most people on the planet, religion is a
deeply important part of their life.

00:14:27.586 --> 00:14:32.143
And yet, often is left out of the scientific study,
of the academy

00:14:32.329 --> 00:14:35.057
It doesn't have--it's not the center of
the university, as it should be

00:14:35.829 --> 00:14:40.429
Religion can cultivate virtue, it can help give people

00:14:40.914 --> 00:14:46.729
the motivation for their norms, for the
way in which they behave morally in the world.

00:14:46.929 --> 00:14:50.243
But it can also, under certain conditions, lead
to conflict between groups

00:14:50.443 --> 00:14:53.743
So we believe it is a very important
phenomenon to study.

00:14:56.571 --> 00:14:58.486
One of our goals is to develop computer

00:14:58.571 --> 00:15:02.371
simulations that can help us
compare competing policy proposals.

00:15:02.671 --> 00:15:04.657
Take for example, debates about the best

00:15:04.743 --> 00:15:08.257
way to integrate refugees
into the society of a host country.

00:15:08.640 --> 00:15:12.560
A government, an NGO,
the Red Cross, United Nations.

00:15:12.643 --> 00:15:14.257
Any kind of organization will be

00:15:14.343 --> 00:15:18.214
interested in implementing policies
to facilitate a healthy society.

00:15:18.486 --> 00:15:20.714
But they'll have limited
funds and resources.

00:15:21.360 --> 00:15:26.000
Say one has 100 million
euro to promote integration.

00:15:26.080 --> 00:15:30.480
Should we spend that money on cultural
education, teaching arriving refugees

00:15:30.563 --> 00:15:33.271
about social values
such as gender equality?

00:15:33.680 --> 00:15:35.440
Should we spend the money on opportunities

00:15:35.529 --> 00:15:38.329
to integrate or interact
with local host culture?

00:15:39.000 --> 00:15:41.040
Or on providing economic support,

00:15:41.129 --> 00:15:44.086
or language instruction,
or defense and security?

00:15:44.786 --> 00:15:46.943
What our models can help one do is see how

00:15:47.029 --> 00:15:49.900
each of these policies is likely
to play out in the future.

00:15:50.243 --> 00:15:51.514
Compare different outcomes.

00:15:52.160 --> 00:15:53.960
That way, one can make more informed

00:15:54.043 --> 00:15:57.886
decisions about the best policies
to adopt in order to meet one's goals.

00:15:59.280 --> 00:16:00.600
You have an interest in modeling

00:16:00.680 --> 00:16:07.600
and simulation because you want
experts to get those simulations right.

00:16:07.680 --> 00:16:09.720
But the deeper meaning of modeling is

00:16:09.803 --> 00:16:14.843
to help public policy people, and that's
the part that's really challenging.

00:16:14.929 --> 00:16:20.271
We could fail to actually develop models
that can be calibrated to the data.

00:16:20.360 --> 00:16:22.120
The failure would consist especially

00:16:22.203 --> 00:16:29.171
in not delivering
a public policy projection machine

00:16:29.643 --> 00:16:32.871
that would actually be useful
to people in public policy circles.

00:16:39.000 --> 00:16:42.843
I actually was living in Oxford
at the time and I was having a dinner

00:16:42.929 --> 00:16:46.571
party that night and had a bunch
of my friends over for the evening.

00:16:46.657 --> 00:16:48.114
I kept hearing my phone go off.

00:16:48.200 --> 00:16:50.557
It was ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.
It was so annoying.

00:16:50.643 --> 00:16:54.057
And I didn't really want to bother myself
as to why my phone was going crazy.

00:16:54.320 --> 00:16:59.680
I went and checked my phone to see
what all the sounds were about.

00:16:59.760 --> 00:17:02.800
There had been a bombing in Boston during

00:17:02.886 --> 00:17:05.929
the marathon and it gave me
sort of a sense of helplessness.

00:17:07.400 --> 00:17:11.280
I felt the day after the Boston bombing
that I needed to be doing more.

00:17:11.360 --> 00:17:13.720
I should be doing something about this.

00:17:13.800 --> 00:17:15.000
This is what I do.

00:17:15.086 --> 00:17:18.771
My contribution to the academic literature
should not just be for the sake of

00:17:18.857 --> 00:17:19.843
pure knowledge.

00:17:20.600 --> 00:17:25.514
We can understand
why people will bomb

00:17:25.600 --> 00:17:30.840
a marathon, or bring down the buildings
of the two towers, or shoot up a nightclub

00:17:30.920 --> 00:17:36.080
in Paris, or drive a truck
into a Christmas market in Germany.

00:17:36.163 --> 00:17:39.671
And as someone who does modeling
of religion, I can help to answer these

00:17:39.757 --> 00:17:43.600
questions so that we can better prevent
these things from happening in the future.

00:17:52.586 --> 00:17:54.571
At Oxford, I developed questions

00:17:54.657 --> 00:17:58.597
for online survey research about religious
violence, specifically the troubles

00:17:58.686 --> 00:18:01.543
between Catholics and Protestants
in Northern Ireland.

00:18:01.629 --> 00:18:04.300
It happens that these set of questions
actually were very relevant

00:18:04.386 --> 00:18:05.237
to the Boston bombing.

00:18:05.320 --> 00:18:06.560
And we did have a hypothesis.

00:18:06.560 --> 00:18:07.760
We had a hypothesis that the people

00:18:07.840 --> 00:18:11.680
who were going to be more emotionally
affected by the Boston bombing,

00:18:11.763 --> 00:18:16.171
were going to be more fused with
their identity of Boston because

00:18:16.257 --> 00:18:18.943
it's such a visceral feeling
of oneness with your group.

00:18:19.043 --> 00:18:21.271
You internalize your
group as part of yourself.

00:18:21.357 --> 00:18:25.157
So to distance yourself from your group is
to distance yourself from yourself.

00:18:25.360 --> 00:18:30.640
The people who are more fused are more
likely to endorse extreme behaviors.

00:18:30.720 --> 00:18:33.000
They're more likely to take up arms.

00:18:33.086 --> 00:18:37.043
They're more likely to sacrifice, even
donating blood after the Boston bombing.

00:18:38.320 --> 00:18:40.360
This effect of fusion of personal

00:18:40.443 --> 00:18:45.871
and social identities,
that proposes a very specific cognitive

00:18:46.400 --> 00:18:52.920
architecture that I program into an agent
based model in order to try and understand

00:18:53.003 --> 00:18:56.886
how intergroup relations can
result in negative effects.

00:18:57.920 --> 00:19:02.680
So this is the model of mutually
escalating religious violence.

00:19:02.763 --> 00:19:07.043
The way that we started this was
by building up all of the different

00:19:07.129 --> 00:19:14.643
components that go into a human's mind
almost in a lego-like fashion.

00:19:14.800 --> 00:19:17.240
We took these different tendencies that we

00:19:17.320 --> 00:19:21.720
have, like the tendencies to be afraid or
the tendencies to believe,

00:19:21.803 --> 00:19:26.457
the tendencies to do things as a group,
the tendencies to have ritual,

00:19:27.000 --> 00:19:30.240
the tendencies to transmit
emotion and information.

00:19:30.320 --> 00:19:32.120
And so there's just thousands

00:19:32.203 --> 00:19:36.471
and thousands of lines of code
that go in the background here.

00:19:37.240 --> 00:19:38.760
We built these

00:19:38.843 --> 00:19:43.471
different algorithms for each one of these
tendencies and tried to use that to build

00:19:43.557 --> 00:19:49.197
our brain, and build a brain in such a way
that we could not just create one of them,

00:19:49.286 --> 00:19:53.729
like a single artificial intelligence,
but copy and paste it hundreds or

00:19:53.814 --> 00:19:55.957
thousands or millions
of times if we needed to.

00:19:56.040 --> 00:19:58.520
To create multi agent
artificial intelligence.

00:19:58.600 --> 00:20:00.600
We can simulate tens of thousands

00:20:00.680 --> 00:20:04.320
of incidences of violence,
tens of thousands of different conflicts,

00:20:04.403 --> 00:20:08.243
and study what is it about our
minds that are creating conflict?

00:20:23.957 --> 00:20:28.514
People look for religion as a cause,
and religion is really never the cause.

00:20:28.600 --> 00:20:30.240
They're looking for the easy explanation.

00:20:30.329 --> 00:20:35.700
And what we offer is a more complex,
but still computationally controllable

00:20:36.403 --> 00:20:39.229
perspective on what's going
on when it comes to religion.

00:20:40.440 --> 00:20:43.600
This model has potentially predictive

00:20:43.686 --> 00:20:47.757
capacities to understand the future
of conflicts, because what we're looking

00:20:47.843 --> 00:20:53.397
at are the causal mechanisms behind
religious and ethnic conflict.

00:20:53.486 --> 00:20:57.243
If you can isolate causal mechanisms
and the appropriate conditions under

00:20:57.329 --> 00:21:02.314
which religious and ethnic violence will
occur, you can, in principle, predict it.

00:21:05.400 --> 00:21:07.880
This approach, though, is, it's very new.

00:21:07.963 --> 00:21:10.371
I mean, we are the group
that's pioneering this.

00:21:10.680 --> 00:21:17.120
So this has repercussions for policy,
has repercussions for a military strategy.

00:21:17.200 --> 00:21:18.920
Maybe we need to rethink the fact that we

00:21:19.000 --> 00:21:22.720
just, you know, we're raining
bombs down from the sky on people.

00:21:22.800 --> 00:21:26.680
The people who are left over,
the brothers and the sisters of the family

00:21:26.760 --> 00:21:30.320
members who are killed through things like
drone strikes and other military actions

00:21:30.403 --> 00:21:33.271
are highly likely to become
terrorist individuals.

00:21:37.920 --> 00:21:39.760
When I look at these conditions,

00:21:39.843 --> 00:21:43.555
how frequently do they produce
periods of mutual escalation?

00:21:44.200 --> 00:21:46.320
Right. So it's almost
like a correlation.

00:21:46.403 --> 00:21:49.971
I was worried that somebody might say,
okay, well, you know, in the next week,

00:21:50.057 --> 00:21:53.186
how much mutually escalating religious
violence do you predict in the world?

00:21:53.800 --> 00:21:54.720
I have no idea.

00:21:54.760 --> 00:21:57.200
You know, they think of a weather
prediction, and they should.

00:21:57.280 --> 00:21:59.520
That's a real way to think of prediction.

00:21:59.600 --> 00:22:01.200
But the model doesn't do that.

00:22:01.286 --> 00:22:05.386
It just highlights conditions that create
mutually escalating religious violence.

00:22:06.371 --> 00:22:12.357
When I talk about predicting religious
extremism and using computer simulations,

00:22:12.443 --> 00:22:17.143
a lot of people think of the movie
minority report as if I'm saying that this

00:22:17.229 --> 00:22:20.237
individual at this location,
at this date and time,

00:22:20.320 --> 00:22:24.400
is going to commit an act of violence
and therefore, let's go arrest them.

00:22:24.486 --> 00:22:26.200
I don't think that that's possible.

00:22:26.640 --> 00:22:29.640
I think that when we're predicting
religious extremism,

00:22:29.729 --> 00:22:33.529
what we're doing is saying that given
a certain context and a certain set

00:22:33.614 --> 00:22:38.957
of people, the actions
that we see in this area are

00:22:39.040 --> 00:22:43.080
likely to give rise to higher levels
of radicalization and terrorism.

00:22:43.160 --> 00:22:44.960
You have to actually have eyes

00:22:45.040 --> 00:22:49.920
on the ground in order to see
and prevent the actual act of terrorism.

00:22:50.000 --> 00:22:51.920
The more realistic the virtual society

00:22:52.003 --> 00:22:56.414
that you build, the more realistic
the implementation of the policy is.

00:22:56.760 --> 00:22:58.760
Now, why would you do that?

00:22:58.800 --> 00:23:01.480
Why wouldn't you just try
a policy out in the real world?

00:23:01.560 --> 00:23:03.920
Because it's expensive and time consuming,

00:23:04.000 --> 00:23:08.200
and you have to use a lot of credibility
to even get a policy back to the point

00:23:08.286 --> 00:23:11.186
that it can be implemented
in legislation and in law.

00:23:11.720 --> 00:23:13.200
It's very expensive.

00:23:13.280 --> 00:23:14.560
It's very risky.

00:23:14.643 --> 00:23:19.814
It's better to try that out in a virtual
society first, whenever possible.

00:23:20.200 --> 00:23:21.760
So it's not that we've created

00:23:21.840 --> 00:23:25.400
a prediction machine,
but what we have created is a tool

00:23:25.480 --> 00:23:29.880
that can root policy decisions
in facts, data, and theory.

00:23:29.960 --> 00:23:32.040
And that that in itself is valuable

00:23:32.129 --> 00:23:36.929
because it can offer a near term
abstract predictive capability.

00:23:38.720 --> 00:23:44.640
Trying to take my scholarly work out
of the ivory tower and into the real world

00:23:44.720 --> 00:23:49.800
has always been important to me,
but important to me only in a certain way.

00:23:49.880 --> 00:23:56.400
Up until recently, until the recent years,
mostly the way I used to think of it was I

00:23:56.440 --> 00:23:59.760
would come up with a really good
theory by sitting in my ivory tower.

00:23:59.840 --> 00:24:04.400
I would try to write an article
which clarified how to think about moral

00:24:04.486 --> 00:24:07.986
issues, and then someone else would
take that and apply it to a moral issue.

00:24:08.800 --> 00:24:10.640
So not very practical at all, really.

00:24:10.720 --> 00:24:13.440
It was just more of a kind
of self justifying.

00:24:13.529 --> 00:24:17.057
Wouldn't it be nice if someone applied my
theory so I can stay in the ivory tower?

00:24:17.414 --> 00:24:22.157
The thing about trying to take
intellectual work and make it useful

00:24:22.240 --> 00:24:25.640
in the world is really
difficult for humanities people.

00:24:25.720 --> 00:24:27.760
You can spend your entire life studying

00:24:27.840 --> 00:24:32.040
this deposit of key literature
from the far past,

00:24:32.120 --> 00:24:36.320
and it may never have any impact
on anyone, practically speaking,

00:24:36.360 --> 00:24:39.400
in terms of the sharp social
problems that we try to deal with.

00:24:39.480 --> 00:24:41.560
You have to be smart about
how you choose your topics.

00:24:41.643 --> 00:24:45.271
But if you are smart,
you can actually find things that

00:24:46.520 --> 00:24:48.760
fundamental research can
make a difference on.

00:24:48.840 --> 00:24:51.360
And a classic example
is religious extremism.

00:24:51.440 --> 00:24:53.440
I want someone who was going to blow

00:24:53.520 --> 00:24:57.720
themselves up to decide not to blow
themselves up because they've got some

00:24:57.760 --> 00:25:00.680
other vision of the way life can be,
or because they read an article

00:25:00.763 --> 00:25:05.386
that convinced them that there are other
ways of protesting unjust situations.

00:25:07.080 --> 00:25:10.480
I have a greek colleague
from my university, Apostolos.

00:25:10.560 --> 00:25:12.280
He came to one of our public seminars

00:25:12.320 --> 00:25:16.040
about the modeling religion project
and heard us describing the way we apply

00:25:16.129 --> 00:25:19.143
simulation technology
to humanitarian problems.

00:25:19.600 --> 00:25:21.760
So Apostolos was planning a conference

00:25:21.840 --> 00:25:26.440
in Lesbos, Greece, an island that has been
hit especially hard by the refugee crisis.

00:25:26.520 --> 00:25:30.600
So Apostolos suggested that our team come
a couple of days early and actually visit

00:25:30.686 --> 00:25:35.157
the camps where the refugees stay
after crossing from Turkey into Greece.

00:25:35.829 --> 00:25:37.514
It worked out particularly well because

00:25:37.603 --> 00:25:40.943
some of our modelers had already
started working on a refugee model.

00:25:42.243 --> 00:25:46.914
So we decided to focus on refugees,
radicalization, and integration.

00:26:21.386 --> 00:26:24.057
How many people does this kind of boat hold?

00:26:24.143 --> 00:26:28.143
100 people.
100? But it's so small.

00:26:28.229 --> 00:26:31.400
No, it's not so small.
Where do they go? Do they go underneath?

00:26:31.500 --> 00:26:32.500
Inside

00:26:32.700 --> 00:26:35.971
They are all...stuffed against each other?

00:26:36.486 --> 00:26:37.600
Yes

00:27:10.714 --> 00:27:13.143
Summer of 2015.

00:27:13.555 --> 00:27:16.060
From about April to November,

00:27:16.960 --> 00:27:21.800
the number of refugees that were coming
across in these rubber rafts and some

00:27:21.880 --> 00:27:26.360
boats, rows and rows and rows,
and to peak it was about 10,000 a day.

00:27:26.445 --> 00:27:30.740
Basically one rubber raft with about
50 people every twelve minutes.

00:27:31.120 --> 00:27:32.600
The distance is only about 5 miles.

00:27:32.680 --> 00:27:35.520
You could see them coming
in one after the other.

00:27:35.560 --> 00:27:37.440
This little village has only about 800 or

00:27:37.525 --> 00:27:43.890
900 people, and so to try to take care
of that many people per day is staggering.

00:27:44.680 --> 00:27:46.160
And the woman who

00:27:46.240 --> 00:27:48.080
with whom we spoke yesterday, who

00:27:48.165 --> 00:27:50.105
well, she used the word tsunami.

00:27:51.200 --> 00:27:56.040
It's a kind of event that, you know,
is unimaginable, and nobody can,

00:27:56.125 --> 00:27:57.875
you almost,
they can't prepare for it.

00:27:58.160 --> 00:28:00.755
You just do what you
have to when it happens.

00:28:50.720 --> 00:28:53.080
Many people associate the recent refugee

00:28:53.165 --> 00:28:56.855
and immigration crises with the threat
of religious radicalization.

00:28:57.400 --> 00:29:01.355
But what role, if any, does
religion play in intergroup violence?

00:29:01.960 --> 00:29:03.560
And what policies, if any,

00:29:03.640 --> 00:29:07.640
can help facilitate the peaceful
settlement of peoples of different faiths

00:29:07.725 --> 00:29:10.275
into contexts that are
often quite secular?

00:29:17.429 --> 00:29:21.600
There's a complex but clear connection between
forced migration and religious violence

00:29:22.600 --> 00:29:25.040
Not only are refugees and asylum seekers

00:29:25.120 --> 00:29:29.360
often fleeing from violent religious
extremism, but a small percentage of their

00:29:29.445 --> 00:29:33.530
children grow up to perpetuate
religiously inspired terror attacks.

00:29:33.800 --> 00:29:35.760
Research shows that individuals affected

00:29:35.845 --> 00:29:40.770
by religious extremism and violence are
more likely to turn to radical ideologies.

00:29:41.400 --> 00:29:43.680
So we went to Greece to learn more about

00:29:43.760 --> 00:29:47.640
how refugees and their children are
impacted by religious extremism

00:29:47.725 --> 00:29:51.450
and whether this might increase their
vulnerability to being radicalized.

00:29:52.080 --> 00:29:57.315
The Syrian refugee crisis was really
predicated on a very specific

00:29:58.680 --> 00:30:01.080
set of circumstances
in the Middle East at the time.

00:30:01.165 --> 00:30:01.875
You know,

00:30:01.960 --> 00:30:06.400
they really created a situation
where ISIS was allowed to

00:30:06.480 --> 00:30:10.520
flourish in the power vacuums
that existed in the region,

00:30:10.605 --> 00:30:16.015
and it created a new group in the region
that made life unbearable for many people.

00:30:16.360 --> 00:30:20.920
They could no longer tolerate
life in that area.

00:30:21.000 --> 00:30:24.880
So understanding why it was that they

00:30:24.960 --> 00:30:28.840
wanted to move from Syria in
through Turkey to Greece, really,

00:30:28.920 --> 00:30:32.720
you have to understand
the nature of the religious landscapes

00:30:32.805 --> 00:30:35.395
and religious identities that are
interplaying in the region.

00:30:35.960 --> 00:30:40.200
What happens after the refugees
and asylum seekers land is complicated.

00:30:40.800 --> 00:30:43.080
Unfortunately, life in Europe and America

00:30:43.165 --> 00:30:46.880
isn't always easy, not for immigrants,
and even less so for their children.

00:30:54.640 --> 00:30:58.180
Second or third generation
immigrants who grew up in the EU.

00:30:58.640 --> 00:31:01.000
These are not the same
refugees we see on the news.

00:31:01.080 --> 00:31:05.040
Hundreds of people walking across
fields to try to get to safe territory.

00:31:05.125 --> 00:31:07.745
Rather, it is their
children and grandchildren.

00:31:08.440 --> 00:31:10.520
Many young Muslims of migrant origin,

00:31:10.600 --> 00:31:15.160
whether newly arrived or born in Europe,
develop a widespread feeling that they are

00:31:15.240 --> 00:31:17.760
not fully accepted as fellow citizens.

00:31:17.840 --> 00:31:20.000
They feel caught between two cultures,

00:31:20.085 --> 00:31:24.435
disenfranchised and alienated in a society
that does not fully accept them.

00:31:24.920 --> 00:31:26.800
The same goes for America.

00:31:26.880 --> 00:31:30.880
In fact, every jihadist who conducted
a lethal attack inside the United States

00:31:30.965 --> 00:31:34.410
since 9/11 was a citizen or legal resident.

00:31:34.800 --> 00:31:37.280
Many have been second
generation immigrants.

00:31:38.640 --> 00:31:42.880
The cell phone leads police to Rahami,
a naturalized US citizen

00:31:42.960 --> 00:31:48.640
born in Afghanistan, Rahami graduated from
Edison High School in New Jersey in 2007.

00:31:48.720 --> 00:31:51.360
Saipov, an immigrant from Uzbekistan,

00:31:51.440 --> 00:31:56.400
moved to the US in 2010 and held a green
card and a Florida driver's license.

00:31:56.480 --> 00:31:59.080
There's definitely a link between what

00:31:59.160 --> 00:32:02.720
we're doing with the artificial
intelligence to study religious violence

00:32:02.800 --> 00:32:06.480
and what we're doing to study
the refugee crisis in Lesbos.

00:32:06.560 --> 00:32:10.240
And the key to that connection is human

00:32:10.325 --> 00:32:13.040
identity and how we
identify as individuals.

00:32:13.360 --> 00:32:14.600
We're dealing with an artificial

00:32:14.680 --> 00:32:17.920
intelligence system that is
modeling our identity.

00:32:18.005 --> 00:32:21.880
We're applying the models of our
identity to understand the identities

00:32:21.965 --> 00:32:23.865
of refugees in Lesbos.

00:32:23.950 --> 00:32:27.990
A refugee is, by nature, someone who holds a

00:32:28.190 --> 00:32:30.985
specific identity, the identity
of their home culture

00:32:31.070 --> 00:32:33.560
of their home country, and
they're trying to get to a place

00:32:33.865 --> 00:32:39.040
where they are going to be, almost
surely a minority amongst people

00:32:39.125 --> 00:32:42.520
who hold different ideas, different
beliefs, and different identities.

00:32:42.920 --> 00:32:45.600
How are they interacting
with the local communities there?

00:32:45.680 --> 00:32:47.840
How are they assimilating or integrating

00:32:47.920 --> 00:32:51.840
into European culture or wherever
they decide to make their new homes?

00:32:51.920 --> 00:32:55.520
These are going to be questions
that are going to need to be answered.

00:32:55.600 --> 00:32:57.520
Politicians in America and Europe have

00:32:57.605 --> 00:33:01.055
capitalized on the easy association
between refugees and terrorism,

00:33:01.480 --> 00:33:04.505
successfully polarizing
populations over the issue.

00:33:04.943 --> 00:33:07.771
But the research tells a more complicated story

00:33:07.971 --> 00:33:13.371
about how the refugee crisis is the result of and
the precursor to religious extremist violence

00:33:14.080 --> 00:33:16.240
The more we can understand the complex web

00:33:16.320 --> 00:33:20.240
of factors involved, the more effective we
can be in promoting inclusion,

00:33:20.325 --> 00:33:24.450
social cohesion, education,
and integration among diverse peoples.

00:33:26.960 --> 00:33:28.520
And so when we're understanding what's

00:33:28.600 --> 00:33:32.520
going on in Lesbos, we have to not just be
thinking about the people who are

00:33:32.600 --> 00:33:35.320
currently on those boats, the people
who are currently on the island

00:33:35.400 --> 00:33:38.480
or in the refugee camps,
but that in years to come,

00:33:38.560 --> 00:33:42.400
they're going to be settled throughout
Europe and they're going to have homes

00:33:42.440 --> 00:33:43.880
there and they're going
to be raising kids there.

00:33:43.960 --> 00:33:47.960
And how is it that we can help to better

00:33:48.045 --> 00:33:54.335
integrate them so that they can maintain
their identity as Syrians or as Muslims

00:33:54.970 --> 00:34:00.195
or as Middle Eastern Christians,
and also help their children to feel

00:34:00.280 --> 00:34:04.240
at home so that they can also have
an identity that is Norwegian,

00:34:04.320 --> 00:34:09.120
that is British, so that when they grow
up, they're not going to have an animosity

00:34:09.205 --> 00:34:14.450
towards the country and towards the people
that they want to feel at home with.

00:34:15.800 --> 00:34:21.210
The refugee crisis in Lesbos is
quite developed and it's quite acute.

00:34:21.640 --> 00:34:25.570
Some of the refugees from here
wind up going to Norway, so we can

00:34:26.120 --> 00:34:30.640
be here and learn something about refugees
in general, and at the same time build

00:34:30.725 --> 00:34:34.600
models that are specific to particular
countries, such as Norway.

00:34:35.600 --> 00:34:40.040
I look around, I'm not sure that we're
there yet, because I see some buildings,

00:34:40.125 --> 00:34:44.190
some tents, and I'm looking around,
and I'm not sure we're there.

00:34:44.329 --> 00:34:46.750
Is this the camp or not?
It has to be.

00:34:47.136 --> 00:34:50.211
It doesn't look like this doesn't
look like what I expected.

00:34:53.357 --> 00:34:58.614
We're walking up. Apostolos
our host is introducing us

00:34:58.800 --> 00:35:01.314
to the woman who runs the camp.

00:35:02.960 --> 00:35:04.480
She's telling us,

00:35:04.563 --> 00:35:09.286
she's pointing to different buildings
and showing us the volunteers.

00:35:09.486 --> 00:35:12.614
I can just give you an introduction about the place.

00:35:13.643 --> 00:35:15.971
Pikpa started in 2012.

00:35:16.700 --> 00:35:18.857
It was an abandoned summer camp for children.

00:35:19.057 --> 00:35:23.757
Because of the crisis, they couldn't work here.

00:35:23.957 --> 00:35:27.314
So the place was empty for some years.

00:35:27.800 --> 00:35:31.543
The main problem for us is that there is no strategy,

00:35:31.700 --> 00:35:34.829
and everything is changing from one day to the other.

00:35:34.914 --> 00:35:40.829
It is very difficult for the people that get
psychologically affected by this insecurity.

00:35:41.029 --> 00:35:43.614
We have thousands of people arriving.

00:35:43.814 --> 00:35:47.014
From May on, we have an increase
of 500 people per day,

00:35:47.371 --> 00:35:51.771
and then we go to 3,000
and even 8 to 10,000 per day.

00:35:53.200 --> 00:35:55.480
The volunteers have come from different

00:35:55.560 --> 00:36:00.000
places all over the world,
some from Greece, from the islands.

00:36:00.086 --> 00:36:02.014
Some of them are themselves refugees.

00:36:02.657 --> 00:36:06.643
We had people that stayed only,
in 2015, only two or three days.

00:36:07.057 --> 00:36:09.400
Now it is some months, the minimum.

00:36:09.680 --> 00:36:12.800
She's leading us into this building,

00:36:12.886 --> 00:36:21.014
and to the right are rows and rows
of children's clothes, piled boxes,

00:36:22.280 --> 00:36:29.360
shoes, hats, boxes that list children's,
girls dresses, age six, and so forth.

00:36:29.443 --> 00:36:30.700
As far as you can see.

00:36:56.840 --> 00:37:00.320
What I've seen recently has affected

00:37:00.403 --> 00:37:07.143
the way I think about the situation
and how to frame the problem.

00:37:08.200 --> 00:37:09.640
I know there's something for me to do.

00:37:09.720 --> 00:37:12.600
I just don't know what it is,
and I can't figure it out.

00:37:12.686 --> 00:37:18.343
And I don't even know if I have
enough distance or enough

00:37:19.000 --> 00:37:22.520
understanding and maturity
to really process what I'm saying.

00:37:22.600 --> 00:37:29.480
So I try to be careful not to
make huge leaps and claims about the way

00:37:29.560 --> 00:37:31.800
it changed, the way I
would approach things.

00:37:31.886 --> 00:37:34.114
That's why we have the experts after all.

00:37:35.754 --> 00:37:38.960
With the original culture, with alpha.

00:37:39.000 --> 00:37:41.040
Yeah.
Host is here again.

00:37:41.120 --> 00:37:41.520
Okay.

00:37:41.600 --> 00:37:44.320
We're working primarily
on four different models.

00:37:44.400 --> 00:37:47.960
Each one deals with a particular
phase of the migration of peoples.

00:37:48.040 --> 00:37:50.520
The first model is the refugee process.

00:37:50.603 --> 00:37:54.300
We have more scholars here working
on that model with two different teams.

00:38:01.560 --> 00:38:05.800
We heard from some crisis volunteers
that the influx of refugee arrivals was so

00:38:05.886 --> 00:38:09.700
overwhelming that many locals became
stressed and conflicted among themselves.

00:38:10.114 --> 00:38:12.329
Ethnic stereotypes and even xenophobia

00:38:12.414 --> 00:38:16.197
came into play with some of the local
hotel owners and municipalities.

00:38:16.280 --> 00:38:18.720
That's one of the central
challenges of integration,

00:38:18.800 --> 00:38:21.360
diffusing racial and ethnic stereotypes.

00:38:21.560 --> 00:38:23.600
When they go into a new population,

00:38:23.680 --> 00:38:26.200
if there are these prejudices already

00:38:26.280 --> 00:38:29.400
built in to the local communities
that they live in,

00:38:29.440 --> 00:38:32.000
then they're going to have a hard
time living in those communities.

00:38:32.086 --> 00:38:34.443
The model that my group is working on

00:38:34.671 --> 00:38:37.914
concerns the last stage
of the integration process.

00:38:38.000 --> 00:38:43.760
What we're interested in is the mechanism
by which people who are born

00:38:43.843 --> 00:38:49.086
from a different culture, a minority
culture, integrate into a country.

00:38:49.640 --> 00:38:51.800
It's important to realize that we're not

00:38:51.880 --> 00:38:56.320
dealing with issues that will be settled
within a matter of years,

00:38:56.403 --> 00:39:00.614
but rather decades, and,
dare I say it, even centuries.

00:39:00.960 --> 00:39:03.280
So these are very long term problems.

00:39:03.360 --> 00:39:05.520
And that's one of the things that makes

00:39:05.600 --> 00:39:10.360
simulation of interest, because
we can experiment with artificial

00:39:10.440 --> 00:39:16.440
societies and look at them over a period
of decades, or indeed centuries.

00:39:16.529 --> 00:39:20.400
And we can do so with computer runs
that may last less than a minute.

00:39:46.557 --> 00:39:48.957
Can you imagine?
They can get 100 people in there.

00:39:50.920 --> 00:39:52.040
Impossible.

00:39:52.120 --> 00:39:54.000
There must be people underneath, too.

00:39:54.080 --> 00:39:55.720
Oh, yeah, yeah.

00:39:55.803 --> 00:40:02.014
They're jammed in skin to skin.

00:40:04.240 --> 00:40:06.360
I mean, not only is there a gigantic,

00:40:06.440 --> 00:40:13.480
immense mound of life jackets, torn,
ripped, some, okay, a lot of them torn up.

00:40:13.520 --> 00:40:17.040
Some of them were faked life jackets,
like they put grass in them to make them

00:40:17.080 --> 00:40:19.640
look as if they were life jackets,
but they really weren't.

00:40:19.729 --> 00:40:21.743
I mean, the scale of it is hard to grasp.

00:40:22.800 --> 00:40:25.720
So I'm like, I'm six foot two

00:40:25.800 --> 00:40:28.280
and I'm looking like,
dead in the middle of that pile.

00:40:28.360 --> 00:40:30.480
So, I mean, they have to be piled at least

00:40:30.563 --> 00:40:34.471
12, 13ft high here,
and that's a smaller pile.

00:40:52.000 --> 00:40:55.014
We've got people praying and
singing praise songs over here...

00:41:06.080 --> 00:41:08.080
My place and my safety.

00:41:08.160 --> 00:41:10.080
He is my God and I trust him.

00:41:10.163 --> 00:41:12.371
You know, in Portugal, you have a saying

00:41:13.557 --> 00:41:16.571
which is "Olhos não
vêem, coração que não sente"

00:41:17.143 --> 00:41:22.214
meaning what the eye doesn't see,
the heart doesn't feel.

00:41:22.886 --> 00:41:32.600
I have, in fact, just one single feeling,
which is, I want what I do to be useful,

00:41:33.800 --> 00:41:39.314
if not for policies, at least
for understanding or for something else.

00:41:40.400 --> 00:41:43.760
The Lord says, I will
rescue those who love me.

00:41:43.840 --> 00:41:46.480
I will protect those who trust in my name.

00:41:46.563 --> 00:41:49.586
When they call on me, I will answer.

00:41:50.043 --> 00:41:52.443
I will be with them in their trouble.

00:41:52.800 --> 00:41:54.920
I will rescue and honor them.

00:41:55.003 --> 00:42:01.114
I will renew them with a long
life and give them my salvation.

00:42:02.086 --> 00:42:06.857
Keep in mind that there is a distance

00:42:07.800 --> 00:42:12.700
between us and these people
that will never be shortened.

00:42:22.760 --> 00:42:25.000
I've seen a lot,

00:42:25.080 --> 00:42:29.040
enough pain and suffering, not in myself,
in other people around,

00:42:29.120 --> 00:42:34.000
that you just have to do something. Come
in looking, okay, taking pictures,

00:42:34.086 --> 00:42:41.014
and it felt a little bit touristy,
and it's like tourism of misery and pain.

00:42:42.280 --> 00:42:43.880
Not interesting to me.

00:42:43.960 --> 00:42:46.560
So if you want to do something,
let's do something.

00:42:46.640 --> 00:42:48.760
And if we're going to do something now,

00:42:48.843 --> 00:42:55.129
as a human, let's do something meaningful,
let's do something that means something.

00:42:55.640 --> 00:43:03.240
It's never entirely clear how realistic
these models are,

00:43:03.320 --> 00:43:07.480
but if it's oversimplified,
then it doesn't seem realistic.

00:43:07.560 --> 00:43:14.960
And people, either lay people or policy
people, can quite rightly object that it

00:43:15.043 --> 00:43:19.243
doesn't correspond to the complex
reality of the situation.

00:43:21.440 --> 00:43:24.120
It's hard for an academic to come to terms

00:43:24.200 --> 00:43:28.480
with how little influence we
actually have as researchers.

00:43:28.560 --> 00:43:30.000
You know, we get these big grants,

00:43:30.086 --> 00:43:34.229
we do this cool research, we get the big
publications, and nothing ever happens.

00:43:34.640 --> 00:43:36.960
Actually having even the smallest amount

00:43:37.040 --> 00:43:40.880
of personal experience of, you know,
actually being in Lesbos or holding one

00:43:40.880 --> 00:43:44.600
of the life jackets of a child that was
not going to work when that boat capsized.

00:43:44.686 --> 00:43:47.143
That life jacket did not
save that child's life.

00:43:47.680 --> 00:43:51.000
And knowing that you're actually holding
the one key that could have helped save

00:43:51.080 --> 00:43:54.400
that life, you kind of realize
that actually you have a skill set

00:43:54.480 --> 00:43:58.480
and you've been trained to think about
things and to come up with solutions

00:43:58.563 --> 00:44:00.957
that actually could
save a child's life.

00:44:01.920 --> 00:44:03.640
It's much more important, really,

00:44:03.680 --> 00:44:06.600
to kind of, you know, get out
of that ivory tower and actually

00:44:06.640 --> 00:44:10.600
deal with real problems and real issues
and just sitting around and debating them

00:44:10.680 --> 00:44:15.320
and talking about them because,
you know, you did a PhD in Foucault is.

00:44:15.403 --> 00:44:16.571
It's a bit.

00:44:19.643 --> 00:44:20.814
It's arrogant.

00:44:43.640 --> 00:44:45.360
So now it's the end of the summer.

00:44:45.440 --> 00:44:48.320
It's August, and we're
in Kristiansand, Norway.

00:44:48.400 --> 00:44:50.120
It's been three months since we were all

00:44:50.203 --> 00:44:54.586
together at Lesbos, and every one
of the teams has made terrific progress.

00:44:55.080 --> 00:44:56.560
They'll be arriving soon,

00:44:56.643 --> 00:45:00.857
and we have space set up for them
here in Sørlandet kunnskapsperk.

00:45:01.286 --> 00:45:03.300
Here in Kristiansand at
the University of Agder,

00:45:03.386 --> 00:45:06.237
we've got the time to be
working together for two days.

00:45:06.320 --> 00:45:09.071
We are doing another workshop where all

00:45:09.157 --> 00:45:12.437
of the different teams are getting
together to try and keep working on their

00:45:12.520 --> 00:45:17.586
models of radicalization,
refugee integration, immigration,

00:45:18.686 --> 00:45:22.557
and hopefully we're going to try and
finish some of them off while we're here.

00:45:24.486 --> 00:45:28.457
Here in an academic bubble,
you're sheltered from that,

00:45:28.543 --> 00:45:30.957
you've developed a common
language of understanding.

00:45:31.040 --> 00:45:33.640
You're starting to see results that

00:45:33.720 --> 00:45:36.600
match what you expected
to see or start to match data.

00:45:36.680 --> 00:45:39.640
And so you believe in the
validity of your model.

00:45:39.729 --> 00:45:43.400
And then you probably think it can answer
even more questions than it probably can.

00:45:48.840 --> 00:45:50.960
We're here today trying to make sure

00:45:51.000 --> 00:45:53.120
that the room is ready
for our presentation tomorrow.

00:45:53.203 --> 00:45:55.671
We have a lot of people from the
university that are gonna come.

00:45:55.760 --> 00:45:57.720
We have policymakers
that are supposed to come.

00:45:57.800 --> 00:46:02.160
We've invited people from different
government agencies in Oslo to come down.

00:46:02.200 --> 00:46:05.800
So this is the first time that we're gonna
be presenting as a team to not just local,

00:46:05.840 --> 00:46:07.640
but also national
government officials, too.

00:46:07.729 --> 00:46:08.829
So that'll be cool.

00:46:08.914 --> 00:46:10.071
Can you hear me okay?

00:46:10.157 --> 00:46:12.237
Not too loud.
Okay.

00:46:12.320 --> 00:46:16.157
Welcome to the Refugees, Religion,
and Radicalization conference.

00:46:16.480 --> 00:46:19.040
Actually, we have a really great agenda,

00:46:19.120 --> 00:46:23.440
I think, and a panel with six of our
experts on the experience of using

00:46:23.520 --> 00:46:26.440
computer models for scientific
study of religion.

00:46:26.520 --> 00:46:28.240
I'm going to try to present to them what

00:46:28.320 --> 00:46:32.200
models can do, why we're
enthusiastic about the methodology.

00:46:32.280 --> 00:46:34.000
The goal from the beginning for this

00:46:34.080 --> 00:46:39.040
particular public event, this colloquium,
was to try to show to the university

00:46:39.120 --> 00:46:43.840
community here in my local university
in Kristiansand and policymakers

00:46:43.920 --> 00:46:47.720
and collaborators we have here
in the region, and a few colleagues

00:46:47.800 --> 00:46:51.096
who came from other places
in Oslo and Europe

00:46:51.186 --> 00:46:53.643
to show them what modeling could do.

00:46:53.729 --> 00:46:58.437
The way in which this particular
methodology can link together theories

00:46:58.520 --> 00:47:03.760
and show possible causal connections
and lead to policy implications in a way

00:47:03.843 --> 00:47:06.814
that no other particular
methodology can do.

00:47:07.957 --> 00:47:09.329
Questions?

00:47:12.686 --> 00:47:17.386
Can we predict and prevent religious radicalization?

00:47:17.586 --> 00:47:21.200
Of course, the answer to that question
depends on the meaning of every word

00:47:21.286 --> 00:47:22.400
in the question, right?

00:47:22.600 --> 00:47:26.014
What do we mean by predict, prevent,
and religion, and radicalization...

00:47:26.214 --> 00:47:27.371
and "we,"

00:47:27.471 --> 00:47:28.514
and "can."

00:47:28.714 --> 00:47:33.829
Policymakers ask, "What social policies, if any,
can reduce violent extremism?"

00:47:34.029 --> 00:47:36.729
Sometimes, there's a sense of giving up.

00:47:36.929 --> 00:47:39.386
Is there any way to stop
the violence that continues?

00:47:39.471 --> 00:47:40.914
Charlottesville, Barcelona,

00:47:41.114 --> 00:47:43.100
right, it just continues,
over and over and over.

00:47:43.300 --> 00:47:45.514
What policies could possibly help?

00:47:45.714 --> 00:47:50.200
But to come up with plausible arguments that
we've identified at least some of the mechanisms

00:47:50.929 --> 00:47:56.214
under which, in particular conditions,
we do have a high probability of radicalization.

00:47:56.714 --> 00:47:59.929
But I do think that it can
help us get a clearer view

00:48:00.129 --> 00:48:03.114
of the conditions under which
radicalization is likely to occur.

00:48:03.314 --> 00:48:09.029
And, ideally, inform the policy discussions
about these important issues.

00:48:16.160 --> 00:48:17.760
We worked on the model of mutually

00:48:17.840 --> 00:48:20.760
escalating religious
anxiety for a few years.

00:48:20.843 --> 00:48:22.614
It told us that social groups are more

00:48:22.700 --> 00:48:27.114
likely to get into intergroup conflict
when they feel threatened by contagion,

00:48:27.200 --> 00:48:31.771
such as in a pandemic, or by the presence
of social groups different from their own.

00:48:32.280 --> 00:48:36.520
They're much less affected in terms
of intergroup conflict in relation

00:48:36.603 --> 00:48:40.457
to their anxieties connected
to natural hazards or violent crime.

00:48:42.240 --> 00:48:45.080
We found that actually, in this

00:48:45.160 --> 00:48:51.640
particular bit of research that, oh, well,
once you start to get like 60/40 splits

00:48:51.720 --> 00:48:54.480
in populations, things
start to get more violent.

00:48:54.560 --> 00:48:57.120
Populations in which there's a about 60/40

00:48:57.200 --> 00:49:02.000
or 70/30 division between majority
and minority groups are the most

00:49:02.086 --> 00:49:05.414
susceptible to mutually
escalating intergroup conflict.

00:49:06.120 --> 00:49:08.640
This can be useful to policy professionals

00:49:08.720 --> 00:49:13.320
because they can then especially pay
attention to populations in which there is

00:49:13.403 --> 00:49:16.657
that level of division between
majority and minority groups.

00:49:18.443 --> 00:49:21.443
We've completely fulfilled
all of our promises.

00:49:21.529 --> 00:49:24.514
In fact, we've over delivered
on all of the fronts.

00:49:24.600 --> 00:49:30.000
We produced more than we promised,
but we've given tons of papers and tons

00:49:30.080 --> 00:49:33.800
of panel presentations,
and we've been really warmly received

00:49:33.880 --> 00:49:36.040
by people in the scientific
study of religion.

00:49:36.120 --> 00:49:37.840
I'm one of the people.
I wanted the influence.

00:49:37.929 --> 00:49:39.986
I wanted my life to be more satisfying.

00:49:40.560 --> 00:49:41.800
So now I can.

00:49:41.886 --> 00:49:44.186
I can take on an issue like

00:49:45.486 --> 00:49:50.743
radicalization and extremist religious
violence, build computer models,

00:49:51.350 --> 00:49:55.100
use what I know from religious studies
and philosophy of religion to talk about

00:49:55.183 --> 00:49:58.917
the theories and try and come up
with a deeper understanding of them.

00:49:59.000 --> 00:50:00.758
That's what I call fundamental research.

00:50:01.800 --> 00:50:03.560
But I can also make a difference

00:50:03.640 --> 00:50:10.680
in the world practically by working
on problems that are immediately.

00:50:10.767 --> 00:50:12.700
The solutions are
immediately applicable to

00:50:12.783 --> 00:50:13.725
people in the world.

00:50:26.720 --> 00:50:29.520
The Boston Marathon bombing in 2013 is

00:50:29.603 --> 00:50:32.867
an example of how complicated
religious violence can be.

00:50:33.358 --> 00:50:36.817
It showed how you can't blame
it on any one simple cause.

00:50:37.600 --> 00:50:39.960
A young male, second generation immigrant

00:50:40.040 --> 00:50:43.440
with mental illness,
feeling disenfranchised from the host

00:50:43.520 --> 00:50:47.840
culture, radicalized online,
further radicalized on a trip to his home

00:50:47.925 --> 00:50:51.658
country, abandoned by his parents,
recruited his little brother.

00:50:52.242 --> 00:50:56.592
This was a complex interplay of factors
culminating in religious violence.

00:50:59.400 --> 00:51:02.640
So it's not just in England or Norway

00:51:02.720 --> 00:51:07.480
where you start to see this pattern
of second generation immigrants going

00:51:07.520 --> 00:51:09.680
through this radicalization
and identity crisis.

00:51:09.760 --> 00:51:12.120
You see this in Germany,
you see this in Belgium,

00:51:12.203 --> 00:51:14.567
you see this in France,
you've seen this in the United States.

00:51:16.150 --> 00:51:18.475
I'm establishing new vetting to keep

00:51:18.558 --> 00:51:23.275
radical Islamic terrorists out
of the United States of America.

00:51:23.358 --> 00:51:24.442
We don't want them here.

00:51:25.000 --> 00:51:28.880
I think it's the case that unless
the United States and other nations

00:51:28.971 --> 00:51:34.086
throughout Europe and North America
address how it is that they integrate

00:51:34.960 --> 00:51:40.440
immigrants in the coming years, this is
likely to be a pattern that will increase.

00:51:40.520 --> 00:51:44.680
And that's something that is backed up
by our models, and it's backed up by a lot

00:51:44.767 --> 00:51:47.608
of other experts that aren't using
computer modeling and simulation.

00:51:50.517 --> 00:51:52.533
Yeah, the only point is
to make a difference,

00:51:52.617 --> 00:51:53.742
is to solve problems.

00:51:55.067 --> 00:51:57.933
That's me though, I know
I'm a bit weird that way.

00:51:58.242 --> 00:52:00.092
Other people really love
the togetherness stuff.

00:52:00.175 --> 00:52:03.833
You know, let's hold hands and watch
the Titanic go down, you know.

00:52:04.150 --> 00:52:07.197
I'd rather stop the bloody
Titanic from going down.

00:52:07.283 --> 00:52:09.675
And if they'd simulated
it hitting an iceberg,

00:52:10.240 --> 00:52:13.960
what you would see is water filling up
and the whole thing sinking and they never

00:52:14.043 --> 00:52:15.925
would have let it go
out of that Irish port.

00:52:17.000 --> 00:52:17.825
Nuts.

00:52:22.960 --> 00:52:28.200
There is a risk that this project won't
have the outputs that we desire,

00:52:28.283 --> 00:52:30.908
that it won't have the impact
that we're looking for.

00:52:31.720 --> 00:52:35.200
But if factors that still make bad dudes

00:52:35.280 --> 00:52:39.240
in the world persist, we
can't really solve those factors.

00:52:39.280 --> 00:52:40.760
We can just identify where they are

00:52:40.840 --> 00:52:44.080
and tell people they should put resources
towards attempting to reduce them.

00:52:44.160 --> 00:52:48.880
But even then you can't
eradicate poverty in the world.

00:52:48.960 --> 00:52:49.680
It's not going to happen.

00:52:49.740 --> 00:52:53.240
You can't take away hunger and you can't,
you can't take away violence.

00:52:53.280 --> 00:52:54.920
You can try and create conditions where

00:52:55.000 --> 00:53:00.480
it's minimized to some extent,
but if you tie yourself to those outcomes

00:53:00.567 --> 00:53:02.917
you're gonna be an
emotional wreck and sad.

00:53:04.200 --> 00:53:05.960
We have to over promise to get more money

00:53:06.040 --> 00:53:11.240
but we can't over promise
and have people pissed that we didn't

00:53:11.320 --> 00:53:14.480
solve problems and we
can't solve all the problems.

00:53:14.567 --> 00:53:16.742
But we're doing a better job than,

00:53:17.240 --> 00:53:20.040
I mean, we're doing a better job
than somebody's not working on it.

00:53:20.125 --> 00:53:21.233
I mean, that's for sure.

00:53:26.717 --> 00:53:30.642
When I'm with friends who, like me,
are humanities scholars

00:53:31.917 --> 00:53:38.567
we'll sit down over drinks and I'll ask
them, what does our life really add up to?

00:53:38.960 --> 00:53:40.400
What are we really doing?

00:53:40.480 --> 00:53:42.200
Because the world's in trouble.

00:53:42.280 --> 00:53:46.520
The world in some ways is better than it's
ever been, but there are such terrible

00:53:46.603 --> 00:53:51.142
dangers and we've also got the capacity
to make change that we're not making.

00:53:51.560 --> 00:53:54.480
So what do the humanities people sitting

00:53:54.567 --> 00:53:58.500
in their humanities caves like me,
what do we do about that?

00:53:59.200 --> 00:54:03.517
How can we actually make a difference
in real people's lives right now?

00:54:03.600 --> 00:54:05.783
Not just by teaching them
in the classroom,

00:54:05.925 --> 00:54:07.917
but by solving practical problems?

00:54:08.000 --> 00:54:09.050
Can we or not?

00:54:09.680 --> 00:54:14.560
And I think the answer there is that we
can't make a real difference by ourselves.

00:54:14.640 --> 00:54:16.640
We need to team up with people.

00:54:16.720 --> 00:54:18.960
We need to be smart about
the way we build teams.

00:54:19.000 --> 00:54:22.200
So we need to work with engineers and we
need to work with change agents and we

00:54:22.283 --> 00:54:25.125
need to work with NGO's and we
need to work with policy makers.

00:54:25.600 --> 00:54:29.800
All of these people are not us
and we can't do what they can do.

00:54:29.880 --> 00:54:31.720
And we can't have change.

00:54:31.800 --> 00:54:33.640
We can't be involved in making change

00:54:33.720 --> 00:54:36.080
unless we're making it
with those partnerships.

00:54:36.167 --> 00:54:37.150
In those partnerships.

00:54:38.240 --> 00:54:40.560
I really tried my heart out.

00:54:40.640 --> 00:54:42.800
I really tried to make a difference.

00:54:42.883 --> 00:54:44.117
I did my best.

00:54:44.680 --> 00:54:48.120
And so I'm going to be able to look
at myself in the mirror and think

00:54:48.200 --> 00:54:51.560
something other than you could
have, but you didn't try.

00:54:51.643 --> 00:54:53.233
I'm not going to have that thought.

00:59:36.000 --> 00:59:37.483
Good boy.

00:59:38.083 --> 00:59:39.250
Yes.

00:59:40.442 --> 00:59:41.108
Hey!

00:59:43.840 --> 00:59:45.040
Yeah.

00:59:45.120 --> 00:59:46.160
Oh, heavens.