The future as predicted 107 years ago...

[Thorn]

Re: The future as predicted 107 years ago...

I would like to make one prediction though, the world will not end by any natural means, nor by war or strife. the world shall end because some too-smart for his own good scientist develops something that simply wipes mankind from existence.

<shrug> Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley predicted that science would destroy it's creator long before Verne was born, and it still hasn't happened. Frankly, I'd rather be living longer and enjoying the benefits from technology than being short-lived, disease-ridden, cold and hungry as in Shelley's day.

[TheCotMan]

Re: The future as predicted 107 years ago...

There are many problems with the concept of growing organs, and there is a great deal we will likely need to accomplish before that is possible. If grown from the patient, then there is risk in having the original failure in the organ exist in the replacement-- especially in cases where the cause was genetic. We'll have to better understand how to induce cellular specialization, and how to inhibit expression of certain genes to aid with proper organ development. Additionally, we will have to better understand hormones, when and how much should be released during development. All of this is compounded with the legal limitations imposed on human experimentation.

Perhaps, with overpopulation, and greater limits from lack of water than lack of land with food production, a new class of human will come to exist which will legally be designated as "expendable" thus making human experimentation with medicine acceptable to the masses. Something will have to change in order to see quick development in medicine that can be used on humans.

A flying car makes little sense for the future of the common man. Flying on Earth, fighting against gravity uses a great deal of energy compared to rolling on roads. Vehicles using wheels are actually quite efficient at short distance travel on roads, when compared to flying. I think we will see more mass transit, and maybe a return to using trains, trams, trolleys, or buses. If flying cars to come to exist, the percent of the population using them will be much smaller than the percent of population presently piloting their own vehicles. (If you think drunk driving is a problem, consider drunk flying. Similar considerations for falling asleep while driving/flying, and risks for when parts on the flying car fail vs. what happens when parts fail on an automobile.

Without some sort of war, pandemic, or new product like "soylent green" to interfere with the global population growth, and cheap alternatives to our energy, "needs," I predict a reversal of the population shift from inner cities to suburbs, as people instead move closer to work, and/or mass-transit stations. Living 30 or 50 or more miles from work, and driving your own car that full distance will be too expensive for the common person. The price for water to our homes will increase faster than the rate of inflation. (More on this later.)

Industrialized agriculture will become the only way to produce food for the masses, and as GM foods, cause non-GM foods to be the first crops hit by pests, creating a feedback loop to encourage farming to pay for GM foods and as nature catches up to adapt new pests that like our GM foods, new rounds of R&D will be funded with increasing prices on foods, where new monopolies will ultimately be created. This will happen slowly, as people buy the cheaper, better looking foods at stores.

Humans using water for drinking, elimination of waste, growing of crops for eating, growing crops to feed animals, cleaning, growing crops that will be converted to alternative fuels (corn, soybeans, sugar beets, more), industrialization, and for the protection of endangered species are all competing against each other. I will guess that endangered species will be the first losers in the battle over water and survival.

Desalinization plants, water reclamation system, and processing plants to convert sewage water to drinking water (or water for farms) will be costly, and cause further drains on energy resources, many of which demand water to function, creating a 2-stage cycle with both stages demanding the limited resource being "created" by the other.

The masses won't conserve resources until there is a financial incentive to do so. A financial incentive will be created as supply decreases, or does not increase as quickly as demand. The invisible hand of economics will pull double duty as it also encourages people to conserve or pay. A greater demand for products that conserve expensive resources.

Another item that comes into play when resources are pinched, and become more limited, is war-- especially when the resources in limited supply are in any area of the 3 basic needs for human survival. War becomes another way to slow demand for resources, as eliminating population decreases demand, just as people choosing to buy less because of costs also decreases demands.

Going back to the lack of water issue: attempts to reclaim sewage waste water, and gray water for processing back to water for farming and human crops, or direct to drinking water, there is much greater risk for spreading diseases over large populations geographically, as there are more opportunities for mistakes to be made-- mistakes that will be stated as never to happen due to fail-safes that will be planned. There is also risk for "water standards" to be rewritten such that water previously not considered acceptable for drinking will become acceptable by regulation.

Limiting water and power further pinch the food processing industry which use water and power to clean systems, and encourage farmers and ranchers to re-use (treated) waste water from livestock for livestock increase risk for mass infection that may not be caught until after the food is processed and introduced for consumption by humans, pets or other animals.

Many opportunities will be created in the form of new problems to solve. Many of these problems will need urgent consideration and be critical in nature.

Now for the good news...
Necessity is a HUGE part of revolutionary invention.

We will likely make great advances in the realm of industrialized agriculture, especially where minimizing water-loss and maximizing production exist.

Cheap, low-energy systems to convert large volumes of water from various sources into safe drinking water will be invented. Nanotechnology may be the tool.

Space travel, and colonization of other places will never mirror travel an expansion on Earth like re-settling of "the West" unless there is a financial incentive to do so. Once something sufficiently profitable to justify the costs of transporting people to and from other planets, we may see sustained colonization of other planets. Additionally, people will need to own tools necessary for personal interplanetary travel, for the kind of colonization where people chose to move to a new location on their own. First "waves" of colonization would more likely be government, or corporate depending on which has more incentive.

The next "big" tool that might actually be a killer application if developed quickly enough, will be a personal information aggregator, and will be included in computers and whatever we call PDA. These systems will be able to take, snarf, steal, information that actually matters to a person, and will learn what that person needs, wants, or likes. This will ultimately replace newspaper, TV-style news, and radio news. It will be applied to everything from movies to watch, to news around the world, comic strips, humor, and more. Such systems will also be able to alert you to other people that choose to advertise their interests in such devices. With GPS integration, users will be able to find where other peopel that share their interests, and choose to announce this information, seem to spend time. Once use exceeds 60% by population, its use will eventually be co-opted to allow Law Enforcement, DHS, or ??? to find or search for people of interest and profile them, bypassing the user-selected choice to broadcast interests. It wil probably eventually be integrated into a phone, audio player, tv, video player, and more, as a single device which can be "docked" with cars, office-spaces, homes, and more. This will become more and more useful as we are flooded with information overload, and wish to have information filtered to the content we want. Google is in a good position to provide this.

The US will continue to decline as a world power, and as the "rich" export their liquid assets and convert to the Euro, or some other currency. We will see uncontrolled inflation, possibly at the same time as recession. As a result, the US will once again become a relatively cheap place for industrialization and human labor. Natural resources and national parks will be harvested and sold to postpone or soften the changing economy. The US may once again start to export goods to other countries. This may lead to a shor-term, second industrial revolution.

Las Vegas will become a modern ghost town. Costs of electricity, transportation of goods, access to water, and more will cause it to become too expensive to keep it running while other gambling locations like tribal gaming, Lake Tahoe, or Reno are available and closer to access people from LA and Orange County.

Every problem listed above will be attacked by humans, and I think some of the biggest inventions will be directly related to our needs, or side-effects of this research.

The new high-paying job in the tech sector will not be the programmer, but a new position like a Systems Engineer. They will excel at integrating existing technology to build totally new systems very quickly. Blue-collar, "grunt," work will be relegated to programmers. A skilled "New Systems Engineer" will be able to cut months off of normal development cycles by relying on existing technology to make it possible to get to market first. This will increase the initial build cost, but allow a company to be first to a ground of contention. Future generations of products will require more programming, but be funded by profits from the first round of first generation systems.

[SlackJaw]

Re: The future as predicted 107 years ago...

I wouldn't mind the "free university education" come to pass, but the implications could be precarious. I believe the value of a traditional, formal education is inherently connected to the cost.

Having said that, my future prediction is based on education: one will need specialized skills and abilities to earn and achieve. I know that's the case today, but I mean it will be mandated as unskilled labor becomes obsolete and unnecessary.

I also believe they'll find a way to actually add length and girth to those needing help in that department.

[Thorn]

Re: The future as predicted 107 years ago...

I also believe they'll find a way to actually add length and girth to those needing help in that department.

You mean they don't already? Are you saying those emails I keep getting are lies?!?!

[HighWiz]

Re: The future as predicted 107 years ago...

I'm still waiting for Sky-net...

I'm surprised Bascule hasn't jumped in on this conversation with his thoughts on the singularity.