Taking a quick look back to 1999 will make your realize how much technology has evolved and how much it has changed the way we [humans] operate. In fact I was looking at an old issue of PC Magazine from 1999, where a 266 MHz PC with a 256MB hard drive was priced at $2,599.00 [wait, what?]. Nowadays, your average coffee machine packs more computing power than a $2K machine from the 90’s. Well, that is probably a bit of a stretch, but it is still amazing that you can buy a simple home desktop PC for $300.00 today with technology specs considered “super” or “military grade” back 15 years ago.
What if…we could go back to the future, say 2022, what kind of society we would find ourselves in? Some say we all would be “idiotisized” by technology just like in the cartoon show “Futurama”, for others a bleaker outlook such as Babylon A.D. or Surrogates, while others claim a complete apocalyptic scenario such as Mad Max or Terminator – can you tell I love movies?. Regardless of where you stand on what the future holds for us, technology will play a huge part in our lives, and an important fabric of our daily mundane tasks. A future where we can order on demand pretty much everything from food to a life partner, where 3D printers or atomizers will be in place of vending machines, where cars drive themselves, and where you can plan vacations in other astral bodies (moon and beyond).
According to Moor’s Law, every 18 months computing power in microprocessors should double its capacity and remaining cost effective. The law was named after Intel co-founder Gordon E. Moore, who described the trend in his 1965 paper about Microprocessors. This trend has continued for more than half a century, and sources expected it to continue until at least 2015 or 2020. (Thank you Wikipedia)
Consider this: social media and the iPhone/smartphones are just five year old infants; video game consoles as we know them are less than 10 years old, and full 1080p HDTV broadcasts are just a few years old. In fact, today on my way to work I heard on NPR about the State of Nevada passing legislation that would allow autonomous cars to operate on its highways. Specifically, the law authorizes Nevada’s Department of Motor Vehicles to come up with rules that would allow for the free operation of autonomous vehicles on state highways. These cars will even get their own driving permits: a neon green [as GO!] license plate.
What does the future hold? Nobody knows, what we do know is that we will be more dependant and more integrated with our tech, and how we will balance it in our daily lives will be the ultimate challenge. Hello? Are you there McFly??
Sources:
http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2011/06/nevada-passes-law-permitting-autonomous-cars.html
