Let's Put Our Heads Together, While We Can

Shawn Murphy -

Problem: We are screwed if we don't fix thinking

We race toward authoritarianism, AI superintelligence, nuclear war, killer drones and biosphere collapse but can't end despised Daylight Savings. Individual minds trapped in private mental models struggle with problems needing 700 concepts when our brains hold just 7. We're overwhelmed by modern pace, complexity, noise, and lies. The meta-problem: we can't even discuss our problems without triggering tribal warfare.

Vision: deliberately design Humanity's next thinking technology

Imagine humanity thinking as one, through shared semantic infrastructure—a Merged Mental Model (MMM) where diverse perspectives combine rather than clash. Unlike social platforms needing millions to matter, this "motorcycle for the mind" empowers even single users to juggle 70 concepts, manage nuanced evidence chains, and fluidly perceive multiple worldviews. When we connect our ideas directly (with the right algorithms), we get species-scale cognition, not social media noise. Using an extended 'knowledge graph' platform, human and machine voices are brought together harmoniously — providing superintelligence without sacrificing the humane. Unlike tools that force consensus (Google Docs, Wikipedia, GIT), the MMM maintains a superposition of perspectives - no rush to belief, no collapse to false unity, while maintaining source provenance. This is a knowledge ecosystem for what we know, how we know, what we value, and why we believe it.


Status

We are a four person multinational team overlapping in cogsci, tech, design, humans and business — pioneers with multiple web 'firsts' in e-comm, edu, law, academia. Shawn (https://smurp.com) has been unpuzzling the power-v-wisdom hazard since '77; spearheaded an existential risk think-tank in 1989 and was pitching distributed hypertext for civil society in 1987, before the web. We've been bearing the vision, the research, the engineering and the cost of developing this technology for over 40 years, multiple startups, and a score of prototypes.

ThinkerToys is to the MMM what Netscape (née Mosaic) was to the WWW — the first browser for humanity's next cognitive infrastructure — by revealing the Merged Mental Model where we can think and act together at scale. It overturns the WWW's old apps, sites and docs paradigm — where ideas go to die in silos, walled gardens and incompatible file formats (bugs for people, features for rent takers.) On the MMM the new first-class entities are assertions, models, experiences, presentations, worldviews and, all around them, us people — asserting, comparing, designing, choosing, deciding, inventing, and all those other thinky things us fancy monkeys do.

So now, when AI timelines are collapsing, international civility tanking and tribalism skyrocketing — the MMM is needed YESTERDAY — and our little team should no longer, foolishly, try to carry this ourselves. We need to finish off the latest version of multi-user infrastructure for the MMM. We've got to thank our patient angels, call in our outside collaborators, explain the science and document the technology — so this private moonshot can become a global movement. To do this, we need the help of our community to fund and perform the final push and get this revolution out the door.

Cracking the Chicken and Egg Problem

When the toughest problems demand superposition-of-perspectives, and the thought leaders solving them adopt these tools, keeping up means joining in. Especially when the alternative is feeding more money to untamed AI. Meanwhile the MMM has tame ways for AI to participate. So, by partnering with workers in AI risk, democracy resuscitation and the salvation of peer-review -- the roll-out plan puts this tool where the future is going.

Potencies, not apps! (these emerge from the no-code features of ThinkerToys on the MMM)

  • HyperVideo - Collaborative hypermedia, from realtime multi-stakeholder meetings to refined, multi-perspectival productions
  • Map of the Future - How else to find safe passage to futures worth living in?
  • Encyclopedia of the Future - Updated by events, responds to your knobs — view the future with our best understanding
  • LegislationForge - Legislatures are too porky, citizens might draft laws in post-partisan public fora which support convergence
  • Mind2Mind - Extensible enterprise suite powered by our ManyVoices tech
  • SciForge - Citizen science and cross-disciplinary research are evidence-based mind-melding at scale
  • FundForge - Drives impact funds powered by evidence and multi-stakeholder insight
  • Alum2Alum - Boosts the latent trust, alignment and wealth of alumni networks to new cognitive and performance levels

Structure

We are establishing the Noospheric Software Foundation, a non-profit to steward all technical and collaboration efforts related to our collective cognition mission. Civilization infrastructure presents unique funding challenges—while VCs excel at scaling proprietary platforms and academia advances disciplinary knowledge, we need hybrid models for open technologies serving collective wisdom.

The Foundation's structure is designed to prevent the principle erosion we've witnessed elsewhere—from Google's abandoned "don't be evil" to OpenAI's shift from open research to proprietary development. By remaining transparent and mission-driven rather than profit-driven, we protect against the institutional drift that occurs when profit overrides values.

As the software proves itself, the Foundation will pioneer sustainable funding through its own technology—allowing organizations and communities who benefit from enhanced collective cognition to support its continued development. This creates alignment between the platform's success and humanity's improved capacity for wisdom, rather than traditional extraction models. The Foundation will follow Wikipedia's proven model of open infrastructure and open content, with appropriate licenses for each layer. One of the early collaborations on the platform will validate this plan, in the context of its novel combination of semantic code in content.

Roadmap

  • 6 months: Launch the multi-user network with essential initial collaborators, including YOU; explain the science; document the tech; and finalize foundation and governance
  • 9 months: Engage 10+ critical institutions which need this the most
  • 12 months: Harden for massive scale with an expanded team

Initial, invited collaborators, chosen to facilitate bridges to engagements with critical institutions, will help unlock funds for subsequent phases.

A Note on Proof

Fermat famously promised a proof there were no solutions for aⁿ + bⁿ = cⁿ (where n>2) but it was "too large to fit in the margin". Only 358 years later Andrew Wiles published a 129 page proof that had taken him seven years in an attic. We cannot prove to you that this mad thing will transform society, we ask only that you give us a chance to try. By the way, Andrew Wiles doesn't believe Fermat had a valid proof. The only possible proof is for us to try! It is absurdly ambitious. We won't be disappointed if this doesn't start an avalanche. At the very least it will be a dramatically superior collaboration technology. We'll be devastated if we can't give it a proper try.

Ask: any amount, as soon as possible

This project needs $400K (USD) for

  • $350K - 12-month runway for our 4-person team with room for a hire
  • $50K - Launch the Noospheric Software Foundation plus essential buffer

This $400K jumpstart supports the team while proving multi-user viability and establishing initial collaborations and the Foundation. Success unlocks subsequent growth phases. We know projects of this scale have non-trivial costs - we're just asking for help to launch it with the right partners.

How to Support

  • Join the movement: $5/mo or $50/year at https://noosphere.org/blog/fund/#/portal/signup
  • Initial support until the Foundation is operating: Any amount via https://wise.com/pay/me/shawnm48 or EUR to "Shawn Murphy" at IBAN: BE87967063344194
  • Volunteer: Coder? Designer? Lawyer? Accountant? Writer? Artist? Film-maker?
  • Major donors ($1K+): Membership in the Foundation Council
  • Impact Investors (>$10K): Structured investment vehicle available
  • Founding supporters ($100K+): Seat on the Foundation Advisory Board

Questions? Advice? Volunteer? Meet: https://smurp.com/meet or email: wiseup@smurp.com

Our power explodes while wisdom wavers. Experts warn their red lights are flashing. Let's jolt humanity awake with tech to put our heads together, so we can steer our future. You pay for internet... what would you pay to make the future more livable?