Image: Jason Holley
In Brief
- Ten experts in science and technology describe the revolutions they see as already happening or that will in the near future.
- Our lives already rely on fragile information networks, and will soon be constantly recorded. We will be able to shape our own biology and to produce food for all in sustainable way.
- Breakthroughs in science will lead us to wean ourselves from fossil fuels, create new forms of life, explain the riddle of consciousness and understand what makes us human..
More In This Article
-
Overview
The End
The Age of Digital Entanglement
By Danny Hillis
This article was originally published with the title What Comes Next.
Subscribe
Buy This Issue
Already a Digital subscriber? Sign-in Now
If your institution has site license access, enter here.
Already a Digital subscriber? Sign-in Now
If your institution has site license access, enter here.
Rights & Permissions
See what we're tweeting about
14 Comments
Add CommentSigh, $5.99? I guess that's what comes next.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisbuying articles now. I would prefer to buy the entire magazine for a year. One article for 5.99. not cool
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt won't be "man against machine" as we fear. There will never be such a war. It will, of course, be "man becomes machine". Neither man nor machine will survive. Master and tool will blend to become a new life form. Machine(s) with human genome. Human consciousness entombed in the networks of cyberspace. We are extinct. Is that such a bad thing as long as we can assure consciousness and knowledge thrives in some form? Eventually we will be happy that our thoughts and lives have been recorded. Our human thought patterns, perspectives, and views of the universe will be infused into future life forms. That's the only immortality we can hope for. We must help evolution replace us, or life on earth will ultimately be doomed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisToday's experts will probably be just as wrong as experts were 70 years ago when they said we would never travel faster than the speed of sound or put a man on the moon.Most of the advances that proved them wrong were cold war driven,and including some real ones.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn another ten years you will have floating cars. They will be powered by tapping energy out of the aether, like a Flying Saucer does. They will have an inherent forcefield that will make collisions virtually impossible.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEven places that are not connected by roads will be accessible.
That system will also be used to power homes and any kind of vehicle. Electric aircraft will fly faster and the farthest point on earth will be reached in two hours from take -off.
Wew will have real spacecraft that reach the ISS, if it still there, in one hour, using a constant acceleration of ONE G to make the crew comfortable. Braking will be done half-way with the same force. Trips to the Moon will take only a few hours. Mars will be reached within one day.
Tornadoes will be curtailed, earthquakes will be retarded to give people time to escape or make arrangements for safety.
Oil will be mainly used for chemicals and farm vehicles.
The many applications will start an industrial revolution like the World never has seen before. The invention of Gravity Control astounded even the engineers , asked to be witnesses for the patent application, when they exclaimed:
"My God, why did nobody think about that before?"
The basic system was described by Faraday as a problem in the mid 1800's but deemed impossible to do in practice.
Patent 4,095,162 is lapsed but the system of the tapping of energy out of the aether is not described in the Patent.
I believe that Tesla used it to power his electric Pierce Arrow Car in 1931.
Incompetent use of the circuitry can cause a disaster, it is possible to generate high voltages in the millions of volts.
I survived with my fist experiment a 150,000 volt poke and
was lucky that I did not kill myself.
Units will be installed by electricians of which we will need thousands of them. The Units for the different uses will not be sold, only leased to give investors and the Taxman their due. Yes, death and taxes will go on.
"Bikini (Ed hardy,polo) $18"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBikini in our future? That's all I need to know.
I love your views ennui! Yet must disagree with that notion that death will go on or a monetary system exist to benefit one more than the next. We will be telepathic as one giant organism working together much like ants. I believe death is just an illusion and physical immortality is just around the corner, 2012 to be exact. Or in a much purer sense our disassociation from the physical realm, and realizing that we are not our money in the bank, emotions, or even the vessel/body/vehicle we have so strongly rooted our existence. Vortex-based mathematics may be accepted by the weak to be a silly time machine [www.markorodin.com]. Avatar really sent a message to me by showing the possibility to live as one in harmony with the planet and don't have to consume our home. We will not be tricked into this seemingly potential demise. 2012/the 4th dimension/graduation from the 3rd dimension/awakening/our third eye/pineal gland [seed of the soul]/enlightenment/nirvana/ascension must be a choice made by Self and can only be limited by the limits that one sets before Self. We will metaphysically connect through faith manifesting our own destiny. as a silly time machine [www.markorodin.com; he's essentially made one]. And at that time will be a shift in polarity followed immediately with questions like: "how on earth could one eat themselves to death, people weighed HOW MUCH?", "what the hell is this white stick that we willingly lit on fire to ingest into our bodies, 'cigarette' you say?", "you're trying to tell me that we we weren't able to see the evil race that fed off of the all that energy we emitted through emotion, how could no-one witness those shapeshifters"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswww.markorodin.com This is the answer to everyone's questions. And not to embrace it would be fighting against our very flow of existence. Which infinitely polarize toward the positive or "Good always prevails" despite ANY-THING trying to say otherwise.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisweeee...and the fun begins.....
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisposters 1 and 2...i think the three year rate is something like 78 us dollars...just renewed and don't remember;-)
rshoff...don't doubt it will occur in the not to distant future...the only question is how fast we will integrate with machines...been happening for a while...some will except it and some will not...
jack.123...your very correct...predicting the future can only be based on what we know and what we think we know....
ennui...we've been though this before...please produce some proof...the russian buy out by july has passed what happened...
oldvic...bikinis are always good.;-)
kileshaper...it will be fun to see you change the date once 2012 has passed....even funner to have a website to go to....
gotta get my grammer checker fixed...previous post...rshoff..
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisexcept---> accept
Very interesting symbiosis, rshoff. I think you may be correct.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this___ Water ____________
Air.....
Oh man. sorry to disagree guys but we're in for a 'dark age' of a magnitude that we have never seen before....'the digital dark age'
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEver notice Western representations of progress (ie. first there was nature, then there was primitive man, the there was the 1950's, and then lazer beams and flying things?) Ever notice these representations always show a linear progression? What things in nature actually reflect a linear progression that never stops increasing? Nothing! Not the environment, not the economy, not even our own empires (Rome).
Closest I have found is a general 'cycle' progression (i.e the Parabola) a.k.a 'What goes up must come down.' Some cultures have ways of interpreting these cycles as part of 'eternity' or the unavoidable consequence of reality. (re-incarnation-Hinduism, nature-cycle worship-Cree/First Nations).
These cultures, before westernization, may have never had these energy issues that we have yet to sort out, these issue are directly related to our culture choices. Our culture (Western, N American) does not have a built in back up plan. Maybe that is why we are some of the worst for comprehending the meaning of sustainability, which is 'linear progression is not sustainable.'
We are boomer/buster type people, and unfortunately the consequence of a hard bust is disintegration of our social fabric and infrastructure. Add everyday essential technologies that rely almost solely one a few resources and thats a recipe for a dark age if I ever saw one.
You are an amateur science fiction writer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this