The Future is Now
April 10, 2012 in Daily Bulletin
In an expansive article that looks at society’s relationship with technology Markus Dettmer, Hilmar Schmundt, and Janko Tietz highlight:
- 75% unemployment could be a possibility in our computer controlled future. The world is creating more jobs for computers than for humans.
- Insurance companies offer discounts to drivers who offer to have their driving tracked by sophisticated sensors. This has led to a reduction in the number of claims – since drivers know that somebody is always watching they are more likely to drive carefully.
- Human traders might become a thing of the past as computer programmed traders are faster and can process much more data.
- Small children whose parents have smartphones try to enlarge photos in paper-bound photo albums by dragging their fingers away from each other, mimicking the smartphone gesture.
- Sufferers of Parkinson’s disease can embed electrodes in their brains that can control their behavior albeit with tradeoffs. One individual can press a button to release chemicals into his brain that make his speech more comprehensible at the expense of his handwriting.
- Patients with chronic pain can shut off their nerves.
To read many more examples, what one of the creators of the microchip has to say about technology, why Google and Facebook are just a series of microprocessors, why cars are a waste of space, and how machines have already replaced humans in the cockpit read the entire three part article here.
Source: Spiegel Online
Via: Freakonomics
1. 75% unemployment seems unlikely, at least without some sort of “guaranteed income” or living standard. Automation usually has high up-front capital investment costs, and that giant pool of unemployed labor would eventually make it cheaper to substitute labor for machinery when possible.
2. More likely is that human driving disappears once automated cars hit the streets in force. I think eventually, the dangers of human driving would drive license requirements up and up, to the point where few people have a drivers’ license anymore.
3. I agree. You’ll still see some individual people dipping their toes in the trading market, but all of the large-scale trading will be automated.
4. Ha! I think that already happens – there’s a cute Youtube video of a guy’s 1-year-old daughter trying to play with a magazine like it’s an iPad.
5/6. I think we’ll go beyond these to the point of total mood synthesis. If we can get back the “immune system rejection” problem, then we’ll eventually have implants available that can periodically stimulate the “pleasure center” parts of your mind, keeping you generally up-beat and optimistic.
I think everything except for the mood thing is likely in our future. Even in a world of anti depressants and attention enhancers originally developed for those with ADD people still value authentic mood experiences. There will be occasional times when we might rely on the chemicals but it won’t over take the lives of the majority of people.