Introduction of Nameraka (Smooth) Society

OVERVIEW

"Nameraka (Smooth) Society" is a concept proposed by Ken Suzuki since around 2004, which became known to the Japanese Internet though leaders through his lecture at ISED in 2006, and was systematically summarized in 2013 with the publication of "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies". The book is currently not available in English, as it is written in Japanese.

This page introduces an idea of Nameraka (Smooth) Society and references by Suzuki and other authors in English.

Nameraka (Smooth) Society

Nameraka (Smooth) Society is a concept for an ideal future society proposed in the early 2000s by Ken Suzuki. Later, Suzuki published "Nameraka Society and Its Enemies" in 2013 (in Japanese), systematically presenting his vision to realize a new social system 300 years in the future using computer technology, along with specific systems, such as the Propagational Investment Currency System and dividual democracy.

This book, while academic in nature, attracted many readers in Japan, including general readers. CyberLang and the constructive social contract theory it proposed preceded implementation of smart contracts, proposed by Ethereum in 2014, and as such, Suzuki’s book is viewed by young Japanese readers as prophetic.

Here, Nameraka Society connotes a society that has diversity, more complex than a dichotomy. Nameraka Society can be explained by contrasting it with two other types of society, a "Flat Society" and a "Step Society", using a sigmoid function. By changing the λ parameter of the sigmoid function, transitions can occur among the three types.

A "Flat Society" is a uniform society devoid of diversity, where everything is the same. Such a society does not automatically develop, but requires strong intervention by the state or authority to unify people's values.

A "Step Society" has diversity, but these diverse elements do not mix. Instead, they separate and oppose each other . When people with different values are left alone, they may voluntarily separate and oppose one another, or there may be forces that intentionally create oppositional structures.

[Figure of Smooth, Flat, and Step]

A Nameraka society is a society in which it is possible to transit to another state by passing through intermediate states, or to remain permanently in a mixed state. Because there are many intermediate states, a Nameraka Society can also be conceived as a society in which "everyone is a minority."

In "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies", Suzuki argues that no matter how much computer technology develops, if we do not improve society's tendency to divide into friend and foe, any social progress will become a castle built on sand, collapsing into either a Step Society or a Flat Society. For this reason, he argues that it is necessary to fundamentally update core systems of society, the monetary system, voting system, legal system, and military system, with technology.

Structure of "Nameraka Society and Its Enemies"

How would it be possible to live this complex world as is, retaining its complexity? This book addresses this question. To do so, it is necessary to update social systems, a process requiring about 300 years.

Part 1: From Life to Society

"Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies" begins its discussion of social systems from the origin of life. This is because to understand why society has the property of dividing into private ownership or friend and foe, we must look at the fact that its origin lies in cells. Based on theories such as autopoiesis, even though the world is a complex network, the emergence of nuclei and membranes repeats. Also, for humans with cognitive limitations to achieve such a society, it is necessary to harness the power of technology.

Part 2: PICSY (Propagational Investment Currency SYstem)

The Propagational Investment Currency SYstem is a monetary system in which value propagates, and all transactions become investments. If people's daily transactions can be considered as a kind of in-kind contribution, all goods, including labor, are treated as investments, resulting in property in which value propagates by tracing back through the transaction network. In practice, transactions are represented as a matrix, and by calculating its eigenvector, the degree of contribution to society as a whole is calculated and treated as a stock price, which can be used as currency. The technical method is close to Google's PageRank algorithm, but Suzuki developed the method independently. For more detailed specifics of PICSY, refer to "Ken Suzuki — PICSY : Proposing a New Currency System Using Social Computing, Introducing “Plural Money” from Japanese Complex System Researcher."

Part 3: Divisual Democracy: Divicracy

Elections are at the core of democratic decision-making, but the current system does not directly reflect people's true intentions and feelings. Because each individual may have multiple divided personalities, identities and thoughts inside, it is hard to be consistent as an (in)dividual. Suzuki uses Deleuze's concept of "dividual" to express this quality, and Divicracy is a voting system that can express this dividual nature. One vote can be divided and cast, and individuals can vote for both policies and people. Additionally, delegated votes can be re-delegated, and cast votes can be changed at any time. This system, like PICSY, is realized using matrix calculations.

Part 4: Natural Intelligence

Natural intelligence refers to the realization of intelligence using the computational capacity inherent in nature itself. According to this view, the world is not a dualistic mix of artificial and natural, but rather artificial and non-artificial exist within nature, meaning that all intelligence is natural. Intelligence produced by artificial systems, such as artificial intelligence, is in this sense a natural phenomenon. Society, too, can be imagined as a kind of collective intelligence.

Suzuki argues that with the advance of technology, people in future societies will increasingly live in parallel worlds. The parallel world implied here is a state in which while sharing the same physical world, people subjectively live in different worlds, avoiding conflict. To maintain a society while allowing for the complexity of the world, a parallel world-like situation is necessary.

Part 5: Law and Military

CyberLang, which automatically executes contracts, is proposed as a common language of understanding between machines and humans to enhance the legal system with technology. The idea is similar to smart contracts. The proposal to actually implement social contracts using this idea is discussed in the book.

However, even in such a society, it is not possible to solve the problem of dividing into friend and foe, as in Schmitt's friend-enemy theory, and a method to smoothly manage the military and violence is necessary to solve this problem. The specific method for this is not described in this book and remains an unsolved problem.

Background to "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies"

This section describes the background of Suzuki's conceptualization of "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies" preceding its publication. Although this book was published in January 2013, the concept was developed in the 2000s and presented sequentially.

GETS

Around 2000, Suzuki developed a system called GETS, which made the local currency LETS usable on the internet. Kōjin Karatani, a philosopher who later won the Berggruen Philosophy & Culture Prize, proposed using the system in the social movement NAM (New Association Movement), and Suzuki became involved in developing NAM's monetary system. When Karatani originally invited Suzuki to NAM, Suzuki initially refused, but ultimately he became involved. This process is described in a dialogue between Kōjin Karatani and Akira Asada in "NAM Generation."

PICSY

Suzuki, who had been researching recurrent neural networks in the context of complex systems up to his master's degree, was inspired by the backpropagation method of artificial neural networks and devised a monetary system using Markov processes (later PICSY) around 2000. He presented this in an essay "The Treasure Box of Net Community Currencies" in NAM Generation. In 2001, development of this monetary system was adopted by Mitou, a programmer support project by the Japanese government's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, and Suzuki was recognized as a genius programmer/super creator by the government in 2003. These contents were summarized as a paper in SAINT 2004, and Suzuki obtained his Ph.D. with this research on the monetary system in 2009.

From Life to Society: Autopoiesis

Around 2004, Suzuki held a book reading group on Francisco Varela's "Principles of Biological Autonomy" with Hiroyuki Iizuka, and Keisuke Suzuki at the University of Tokyo's Takashi Ikegami Laboratory, a complex systems and artificial life research lab, which has yielded deep insights into the theory of life. This discussion led to the writing of Part 1, "From Life to Society", in "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies."

ISED and "Nameraka Society"

Having been involved in Kojin Karatani's NAM and recognized as a brilliant programmer in the 2002 Mitou Software Creation Project, Suzuki became known in Japan's technology thought circles. In 2004-2005, he began talking about the "Nameraka Society" as a member of ISED (Interdisciplinary Studies on Ethics and Design of Information Society), a research group on information society led by philosopher, Hiroki Azuma. Prompted by this research group, he received a request from an editor at Keiso Shobo to publish a book, resulting in the publication of "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies" (2013).

Constructive Social Contract Theory

In 2005, Suzuki presented "The Grammar of XML and a New Social Contract Theory" in InterCommunication, in which he announced the concept of CyberLang, a legal language readable by both machines and humans, and the constructive social contract theory using it. Blockchain technology had not yet been announced at the time, and this was about 10 years before the concept of Ethereum.

VCASI

From 2007, Suzuki was involved in operation of the Tokyo Foundation's Virtual Center for Advanced Studies in Institution(VCASI), led by Masahiko Aoki, Professor Emeritus at Stanford University and an economist, as a member of the steering committee. Through activities of the Virtual Institute, ideas from economics and institutional research were incorporated. The 2013 volume, "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies", featured a favorable review from Masahiko Aoki.

Divisual Democracy: Divicracy

In 2009, at the Web Society conference, held at the University of Tokyo's Yasuda Auditorium, Suzuki proposed Divicracy, the divisual democracy. This research was introduced in Japanese in "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies", but there is still no English version. It is currently being prepared as an academic paper.

Hardcover edition 2013

In addition to compiling these research results, newly written content was added, and "Nameraka (Smooth) Society and Its Enemies" was published by Keiso Shobo in January 2013 in Japanese. Despite being an academic book with equations, it achieved exceptional sales and attracted many readers from the general public.

Paperback Edition 2022

After publication of the hardcover version, Suzuki focused on his work as the CEO and founder of SmartNews, pausing his research activities related to the "Nameraka Society." However, with publication of the paperback edition from Chikuma Gakugei Bunko, he wrote an addendum summarizing developments in the 10 years since 2013. This addendum discusses insights into the division in America, accumulated through SmartNews, and developments in theories of artificial intelligence and consciousness research. Additionally, the book cover features "Seascapes" (1980) by artist and photographer, Hiroshi Sugimoto.

Reference Articles

Shunsuke Takagi, 2023, Ken Suzuki — PICSY : Proposing a New Currency System Using Social Computing, Introducing “Plural Money” from Japanese Complex System Researcher [link]

Ken Suzuki, 2009, Propagational Investment Currency SYstem(PICSY) : Proposing a New Currency System Using Social Computing, doctoral dissertation from University of Tokyo [link]

Ken Suzuki, 2004, January. How does propagational investment currency system change the world?. In 2004 International Symposium on Applications and the Internet Workshops. 2004 Workshops. (pp. 9-15). IEEE. [link]

Editorial Cooperation by Heat Satoh

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Editorial Cooperation by Heat Sato