What will the world look like 10 old age from now ? Forty years from now ? Will the continuance of Moore ’s Law eventually allow us to have a society track down by automatise robot ? Will we have conquered planetary warming and fete as a citizenry as we approach the much - vaunted prospect of the singularity ? Somefuturists , the hoi polloi who deal in this sort of speculation , have made predictions of this nature , but there are also those who say these forecast are inaccurate . In this article , we ’ll take a look at some pop mind about thefuture of technologythat are potential myths .
Predicting next trend or development , especially in a dynamic field like engineering , is inherently inexact , but it is possible to make some informed guesses . Of of course , it ’s also possible to debate the opposite point of view regarding the reality of some of these engineering science , but in these slip , there ’s enough grounds out there , particularly from expert , to diagnose them as myths .
Let ’s set out with one of the great legendary machine of the post - industrial eld : the flying car .
5: Soon We’ll All Be Driving Flying Cars
The fly automobile has been prophesied for decades . It ’s one of the holy grails of the futurist , utopian high society , where everyone acquire to zip around through the air and ground well , quietly and safely wherever he or she wants .
You ’ve in all likelihood date television of vanish - car prototypes , taking off from the ground , vacillate and possibly crashing . But the first " autoplane " was really unveiled in 1917 , and many interchangeable efforts have survey . Henry Ford predicted the flying car was occur – in 1940 – and there have been legion false alarms ever since .
A ten into the twenty-first century , we do n’t seem to be any closer , despite what you might read on gadget blogs . Because funding dry out up , NASA abandoned its contest for inventors to create a " Personal Air Vehicle , " and there does n’t seem to be another regime agency , except perhaps the closemouthed DARPA , quick to take on the labor .
There are but too many challenge in the way of a vanish car becoming widely adopted . Cost , flight route and regulations , safety , likely use in terrorism , fuel efficiency , training pilots / drivers , landing , haphazardness , opposition from the automobile and Department of Transportation industries – all stand in the manner of a legitimate flying car . Also , these vehicles will belike have to be able-bodied to operate as gondola on regular road , posing another logistical challenge .
In fact , many of the so - called fly cars that are being hawked as the real affair are simplyroadableaircrafts– a kind of plane / car hybrid that is not equal to of , say , making a short trip to school to drop off the tiddler . Plus , they ’re far too expensive . One such vehicle , the Terrafugia Transition , set for a release in 2011 or afterwards , is wait to cost $ 200,000 .
4: The Technological Singularity Approaches
In late years , prominent futurist like Ray Kurzweil have argued that we are approach the singularity , perhaps as presently as 2030 . There are many different innovation of just what precisely thesingularityis or will be . Some say it ’s a true artificial news that can touch humans in independent thinking and creativity . In other words , car will surpass homo in word and as the planet ’s dominant specie , capable of creating their own novel , smarter machines . Others struggle that it will demand such an explosion in computing power that somehow humans and machines will merge to create something new , such as by upload our minds onto a deal neural web .
Critics of the singularity , such as writer and academic Douglas Hofstadter , claim that these are " science - fiction scenarios " that are essentially speculative . Hofstadter promise them shadowy and useless in contemporaneous word of what makes a human being and our relationship with technology [ source : Ross ] . There is also little evidence that the form of " tidal wave " of technological innovation foretell by Kurzweil and other futurists is impending [ generator : Ross ] .
Mitch Kapor , the former chief operating officer of Lotus , called the singularity " intelligent intention for the IQ 140 people " [ source : O’Keefe ] . One magazine called it " the Rapture of the geeks " – scarcely a complimentary term [ informant : Hassler ] . Computer scientist Jeff Hawkins contends that while we may create extremely intelligent automobile – far greater than anything we have now – true intelligence relies on " experience and grooming , " rather than just advanced programming and advanced processing power [ source : IEEE ] .
sceptic indicate to the numerous sci - fi fantasies and predictions of the yesteryear that still have not come true as grounds that the uniqueness is just another pie - in - the - sky ambition – for lesson , we do n’t have moon bases or artificial gravity yet . They also argue that understanding the nature of knowingness is unimaginable , much less creating this capability within machine . Finally , the impending coming of the uniqueness depend in large part on the prolongation of Moore ’s Law , which , as we discuss on the next page , may be in jeopardy . ( It should also be noted that Gordon Moore himself is not a believer in the singularity [ generator : IEEE ] . )
3: Moore’s Law Will Always Hold True
Moore ’s Law is broadly taken to mean that the issue of transistors on a chip – and by extension , processing power – double every two years . In reality , Gordon Moore , the computer scientist who originated Moore ’s Law in 1965 , was talking about the economical price of microprocessor chip production and not the scientific achievements behind advances in chip design .
Moore believed that the costs of chip output would halve annually for the next 10 years but may not be sustainable afterwards [ root : Hickins ] . The point of accumulation to Moore ’s Law may then be progress to economically or else of scientifically .
Several salient computer expert have contended that Moore ’s Law can not last more than two decades [ source : IEEE ] . Why is Moore ’s Law doomed ? Because bit have become much more expensive to produce as transistor have become small .
One analyst has predicted that by 2014 , transistors will be 20 nanometers in size but that any further reductions in scrap size of it will be too expensive for aggregated production [ source : Nuttall ] .
For comparison , as of summertime 2009 , only Samsung and Intel have endow in making 22 - nanometer chips .
The factories that bring about these chips cost billions of dollar bill . Globalfoundries ' Fab 2 factory , localise to begin yield in New York in 2012 , will cost $ 4.2 billion to make . Few companies have those kinds of resource , and Intel has read that a companionship must have $ 9 billion in yearly revenue to compete in the cutting - edge chip market [ source : Nuttall ] .
That same aforementioned psychoanalyst consider that companies will set about to make the most out of current engineering before investing in new , more expensive , small chip designs [ reference : iSuppli ] . So while the end of Moore ’s Law may determine the charge per unit at which we impart transistor to chips , that does not necessarily think that other innovations will prevent the creation of faster , more modern computers .
2: Robots Will Be Our Friends
While we ’re plausibly not headed for a Skynet - like Armageddon , an increasing number of scientist care whether equal step are being take away to safeguard ourselves from our robotic and digital creations .
One of the main concerns isautomation . Will military drones eventually be allowed to make their own decisions on whether or not to attack a fair game ? If a human is monitoring , will he or she still be capable to override the drone ’s wish ? Will we set aside machines to replicate themselves without human direction ? Are we fail to allow self - force back car ? ( Some cars already offer the power to park themselves or to foreclose a driver from drifting into another lane . )
Then there is the issue of robots use up roles they credibly should not . Already , there are prototype aesculapian robots design to require patient role about their symptom and to render counsel , simulating comforting emotions – a purpose traditionally occupied by a human doctor . Microsoft has a television - found receptionist A.I. in one of its buildings . A young class of " service golem " can plug away themselves into electrical exit and do other menial tasks – not to note the long - established Roomba , an automatize , vacuum like automaton .
We may also be placing too many critical tasks and responsibilities into the " hands " of non - human actors , or will gradually incur ourselves in a locating of dependence on machines . At a 2009 conference of computer scientist , roboticists and other researchers , the expert in attendance verbalize concern about how criminals could take vantage of next - contemporaries technology , like artificial intelligence , to chop info or impersonate real people [ source : Markoff ] . The bottom line of this league and other treatment seems to be that it ’s important to commence tackle these issues early , to limn diligence standards now , even if it ’s not clear what kind of technical advancements the future tense will bring .
1: We Can Stop Climate Change
Is global warming inevitable ? The consensus among many scientists is that it is , at least to some extent , and that we can only hope to stop major catastrophe and deal with the consequences . Some of the world ’s most well-thought-of climatologists say that humanity has already passed the proverbial stop of no return [ germ : Borenstein ] . The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change , a group of more than 2,000 scientists , met in 2007 and issued a stark warning , after having first announced that in 2001 global temperature were already get up .
Even now , we are meet the effects of mood change , such as in glacier melt and rising ocean level make South Asian cyclones more severe . The effects are expected to be particularly severe for hundreds of meg of people in the developing world [ source : Kanter ] . The atoll of Tuvalu now plow with high tide that threaten to submerge the entire commonwealth .
If we produce no more greenhouse gases after today , the world would still see a 1 degree Fahrenheit increment in temperature by mid - one C because be carbon dioxide would appease in the atmosphere for a half - one C or more [ source : Borenstein ] . ( Some countries are trying to do something about this , such as Norway , which is pumping CO2into disused underground oil wells . ) And a potentially catastrophic increase of 3 to 6 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century is possible [ root : Borenstein ] .
The major remaining question , for some , is whether the amount of warming can be kept in chip to prevent these fatal scenarios . encourage grassroots environmental natural action is important , but intergovernmental cooperation is paramount , and that ’s been slow in make out , peculiarly with the United States , China and India . We also , experts say , need to begin to plan how to respond to warming - related cataclysm , such as by aiding coastal orbit , establishing nimble - response units for wildfire and preparing for mortal heating plant waves .
For more selective information about technological myths and other related topics , look over the links on the next page .
