As you look into your baby's eyes, you surely wonder what the future
will bring. What will she be when she grows up? What will the world be
like when she starts a family of her own? These questions are no longer
the sole province of psychics. Scientists studying physics,
bioengineering, and information technology offer surprising prophecies.
In
1980, Ray Kurzweil, inventor of music synthesizers and
voice-recognition software, wrote The Age of Intelligent Machines. In
it, he predicted that within ten years, a computer would defeat a human
chess champion, that a new era of economic stability would be created
by information and computer technology, and that a worldwide
information network would emerge. All of these predictions came true.
In his latest book, The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers
Exceed Human Intelligence (Viking, 1999), Kurzweil makes some
astounding predictions. Given his track record, we might want to pay
attention to what he has to say, which includes some of the following:
Life Expectancy
Your baby could live to be 120 years old, thanks to advances on several fronts:
Blood-clotting bandages have been developed and are now ready for
human trials. These bandages can stop bleeding within a matter of
minutes, greatly reducing the number of accidental deaths. For deep
wounds and internal bleeding, a self-expanding sealant foam is
currently being developed.
By the time your Y2K baby reaches kindergarten, scientists
will have identified and sequenced the 100,000 genes that comprise
human DNA. As soon as they understand the effects of DNA variations
among individuals, there will be a revolution in our ability to
diagnose, treat, and even prevent the thousands of disorders that
affect human beings.
By 2020 medical doctors will be able to take a piece of a
patient's skin and "read" their genome. Genetic defects, such as genes
that predict some cancers or diseases like sickle cell, can then be
corrected by injecting the appropriate gene.
Also by 2020, 95 percent of all human body parts will be replaceable with organs grown in a laboratory.
By 2029, most diseases, including cancer and heart disease, will be preventable and their courses, reversible.
Thanks to modern medicine, life expectancy will be of less of
a concern. Instead, we will debate the definition of life: Can a
computer-generated entity be considered a life form? What if it
possesses the downloaded version of a human brain, and is able to
express emotions? Kurzweil predicts that by 2099 human beings and their
computer-generated counterparts will be indistinguishable from one
another. Human beings may live to be 150, but their computer-generated
copies might live forever.
Lifestyle
With a
long life ahead how will your child fill the years? Kurzweil predicts
that by 2029, there will be 12 billion "real humans" in the world. The
U.S. Census Bureau's estimates are more conservative, predicting 8.2
billion people by 2030. Either way, in thirty years there will be at
least 2 billion more people populating the land, and your child may
seek to live in more wide-open spaces such as an undersea community or
a space station, or join a commune of settlers on another planet. The
First Millennial Foundation is one of many organizations developing an
ocean-based community, with the ultimate goal of creating settlements
in outer space. (Other organizations working toward these goals include
The Freedom Ship Project, Island One; Oceania, The Atlantis Project;
and the League of New Worlds, see The IslandOne Website)
Even if
your child settles in an earth-bound community, his or her personal
space will differ dramatically from the way we live now. Within 20
years, personal computers will be small enough to be implanted in and
around our bodies, monitoring health, diagnosing acute and chronic
health conditions, and providing recommendations for treatment. Tiny
PCs will be able to recognize voice commands and carry out tasks such
as business and financial transactions. Individuals may have a dozen of
these invisible or nearly invisible computers in and around their
bodies. Kurzweil predicts that your child's home will be kept tidy by a
robot, and many people will employ a computer-based personal assistant,
with custom-designed personality and voice, to solve problems, answer
questions, find information, and conduct transactions. By 2019 these
programmable personalities will be so appealing that they will take on
the role of teacher, caretaker, or even lover.
Leisure
Kurzweil
predicts that by 2019, 3-D displays will be built into eyeglasses.
These displays will create realistic virtual environments, projected
directly onto the retina, allowing friends to meet for coffee at a San
Francisco bistro even if neither of them happens to be physically
present in the state of California. Care to return to the old family
farm or travel to foreign countries? Put on your glasses.
Careers
"What
will he be when he grows up?" Your baby's generation may make this a
moot question, taking advantage of the Internet economy at an early
age. In the next decade, preadolescent entrepreneurs will create
successful businesses, such as inventing computer software that are
beyond adult imagination. This phenomenon will raise concerns about
self-employment law and the rights and responsibilities of minors.
The
grown-up world of work will change as well. In The Biotech Century:
Harnessing the Gene and Remaking the World (Penguin Putman, 1998),
Jeremy Rifkin predicts that agriculture will change dramatically, with
food and fiber grown indoors in tissue culture in giant bacteria baths.
While this shift will dramatically increase production and lower costs,
the technology will displace millions of traditional farmers all over
the world. We're already seeing controversy regarding this issue, as
large corporations overwhelm the traditional family farmer in a global
marketplace.
Ray Kurzweil is more optimistic about work in the
new millennium: "The creation of new technology is fueling the
expansion of economic well-being." He believes that automation and
technology create more and better jobs than the ones they eliminate.
Your baby may grow up to invent "virtual experience" software or be a
bioengineer who combats viruses for an international or interplanetary
security agency. You may see this, and more, for yourself, since
biomedical advances will lengthen our generation's life expectancy,
too. Stay healthy for a few more years or decades and you'll have much
to tell your great-great grandchildren about life before the turn of
the century. Seems a bit primitive now, doesn't it?
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