Honestly, not that far off... granted it seems to have more of a political perspective then technological: this is paragraph one from the section on Europe.
"First, European governments will be absorbed by the need to renegotiate the social contract, i.e., the entitlement programs of the social welfare state hammered out in the post-1945 period. This is not a choice but a necessity: a large, aging population sits atop a shrinking labor pool and declining birth rates, unemployment remains chronic, and growth rates are projected at 2-3 percent per year at best--acceptable by historical standards (as well as the standards of other countries) but short of public expectations. Labor market rigidities and lack of productivity growth will strengthen protectionist tendencies."
I can travel to almost any point on the planet in less than a day for the cost of a few days work. I can converse with billions of people instantly at almost zero cost. I have access to medical tech that makes it trivial for me to survive ailments that would have killed anyone in the last several million years. We can "see" hundreds of planets around other stars, and are finding more every day. These are just the first few that popped into my head.
Compared to all of human history, we are already superhuman.
"As with the NIC’s previous Global Trends reports, we do not seek to predict the future—which would be an impossible feat—but instead provide a framework for thinking about possible futures and their implications." Consideration of possible futures seems like a difficult but important task. You disparage PM, but in reality is this speculative task so different from the work that product designers/inventors do when they attempt to predict the behavior patterns and wants of future users?
I have the Washington Post from Jan 1, 2000. Below the fold is an article on what the future would hold tech-wise for a child born that day. By 2010, we were all supposed to be wearing wristbands with all of our medical information on it, so doctors would simply have to scan them to gain our history. We also wouldn't have cheap (meaning not thousands upon thousands of dollars) mobile computers with the ability to access the internet from anywhere until 2020.
I can't remember any of the others, but all of the predictions for around now (other then the smartphone one) are completely and totally off. All of these prediction things are bullshit, as most futurist ideas generally are. There's no accountability, because no one will remember the reports. It's ridiculous that the government pays people to write these things, and just as ridiculous that Wired publishes them.
There are so many awesome and fascinating things being made and discovered now. I don't see why you need to go and make some ridiculous predictions about the future to be inspired as to where technology is leading us.
What is stopping something like the medical wristband thing? Nobody would wear a bracelet like that, but why not an RFID card? That seems like a great idea. What would it take to start something like that?
Security is a big problem. Do you want everyone who gets within 10 feet of you to have access to your complete medical history, name, social security number and insurance information? Then there's the fact that RFIDs can't send much data; you could have them send a UUID that allows doctors to look you up over the internet, but now your wristband is a universal tracking device that allows anyone to track your movements.
Beyond that, a medical history that can't be updated is pretty useless, but our fragmented healthcare system isn't able to agree on standards for electronic medical records or how to synchronize them across different providers. Actually, getting doctors to use EMRs will probably be the work of a generation.
The UUID thing I think is a non-issue... RFIDs are already in passports, credit cards, student IDs, etc. Having a UUID on the RFID that is associated with a secure database seems like it would solve this problem.
Then the problem becomes, how do you get doctors and hospitals to use something like this? Creating a private database that providers could optionally use seems doable. The hard part would be creating a large enough percentage of adoption at first. After that, more and more providers would see the benefit of using the system, and patients might even start asking for it, or preferring hospitals that have it.
HIPAA, for one. If you want to design, build or market anything that deals with patient data, you better build a hoop-jumping machine first.
Reluctance to change, for two. You have to convince most hospitals to change from whatever they have installed now to your system, or you have to make your system 100% compatible with the current hospital systems, with minimal changes.
For it to be useful, I think it would have to lessen the bureaucracy of patient records, and decrease medication mistakes by being more searchable and accessible than current record systems. If it were done correctly, I believe there would be a financial gain. Maybe not for the patients, but for the medical care providers.
I agree, but providers (especially recently) have been notoriously poor with pricing. I don't see them making an effort unless the entire industry is forced to reduce costs (which it should, hopefully soon!).
Note that this doesn't solve a problem that providers have right now.
For people with serious medical conditions that need to communicate that to EMS, we have physical medalert bracelets that can tell healthcare providers that you have diabetes or epelipsy. That technology works even if your provider doesn't have power or reliable internet.
Most patient provider interactions don't require history transmission because you're at a scheduled office visit or your in emergency care at a facility that is part of your giant local health network. In those cases, providers can look up your name (that they can get from your wallet even if you're not conscious) in their database and find all they need. They don't have to worry about synchronizing data with arbitrary providers and trying to remap their ontologies or deal with lossy translations.
The number of cases where providers need fine grained history information for people that they've never treated before and they need it right NOW and can't afford to wait is...very small relative to the volume of patients treated. I mean, if you've been shot in the chest, the ER is going to focus on keeping you from bleeding to death rather than poring through a history to note that you're allergic to ragweed pollen, have slightly elevated blood pressure and fractured your tibia 8 years ago.
Firstly it's your data so the better question is really why don't I have a web page with my medical records encrypted on them and key sign my local doctors when he wants to update them
This is a much much better way round, but two things hold it back - well three.
1. Key sign? PKi? Wtf?
2. Doctors actually don't want many records to be available to the patient - it frankly compromises medical care (heard the phrase GOMER - Get Out Of My ER. Much diagnosis is still hunch and guesswork - and needs to be carefully phrased If patient will read it
3. We still think something centralised should track all our medical care when really something decentralised is much much better
Every futurist claim I've ever heard has overestimated human capability and underestimated the impact of other things they possibly should have seen coming.
mmhm, for one thing, I wonder why there's no mention of what's going to replace/augment the relatively cheap fossil fuels of today. And point at some massive current developments in that area.
Here is the actual report instead of just a summary, in case any one else was looking for it. To be honest i found the technical projections/forecasts to be quite spare on details (at least compared to the geopolitical ones; but I suppose that is to be expected)
Everytime these predictions are made, the outcome seems to be the exact opposite. That said, in 2030 I predict:
- After toying with 3D printers for a while, they will go back to vat-grown organs
- With widespread Internet access, remote work being a reality and local energy generation, people will leave the big cities seeking better life quality in smaller, country-side cities
I think predictions overdo the 'physical' improvements like hover cars.
I mean, it's almost 2013 and a majority of the population has general computers connected to the internet in their pockets, through which we can watch almost any movie or listen to any song. Try explaining that to someone from the early 80's.
Too bad the head of wired is a pessimist when it comes to the singularity; I think he's just as deluded as everyone else when it comes to accepting what exponential means.
Hell, cochlear implants are pretty damn close already, and we are making progress on the optical equivalent. These technologies, plus 20 years of improvements to them, are really only a mere application away from giving the user augmented reality.
I think the only real question is will the economics of the implants permit "casual" usage.
Interesting, the second point flies right in the face of the entire arc of written history. Humanity has been increasingly migrating to urban areas. I doubt that changes with the pervasiveness of the internet.
The problem is that those predictions are about taking the current trend line and extrapolating it ad infinitum, while nature and history shows us that most patterns are cyclical.
Just in the past 100 years, my country (Brazil) has seen people move from rural to urban to rural again.
I wouldn't be so sure. If it becomes feasible to work remotely all the time, I would love to live in a smaller city or the countryside, and I'd be more free to live close to my family and friends. Right now, we move cross country and away from any friends or family we have, just for a new job. Rinse and repeat after 10 years. It can lead to a lonely existence, but for a highly specialized work force it's very necessary today.
People are already seeking better life quality in smaller, country-side cities. I recently bought a place in a mountain resort 2 hours outside of DC. Housing there costs 30% what it would cost in Montgomery County or Fairfax, it is insanely beautiful, and they have more reliable power/internet. I was told by my realtor, the home inspector, and a local bartender that there seems to be an influx of programmers moving to the area.
> people will leave the big cities seeking better life quality in smaller, country-side cities
"quality of life" is subjective. I've lived in the countryside, and while it's nice to sit on your porch and sip wine and watch the sunset, it's also nice to have a wide selection of nightlife.
I love how our predictions of the future never account for the existence of poor people. That's why they're always so wildly off; the vast bulk of humanity are never factored into the equation.
While I don't doubt there'll be printable organs and brain-integrated silicon by 2030, the majority of people will not benefit, and the tensions brought about by escalating inequality will set progress back by years.
I have nightmares about neural implants being available but out of my ability to pay for them. And I am fortunate enough to be able to afford food and shelter. Poverty is a serious problem that should be solved. Food, shelter, healthcare, and neural implants should be available to everyone.
There will always be poor people, but quality of life goes up for everyone. Just look at e.g. how many people own computers/TVs/Cell Phones compared to 20 years ago.
World wide (outside of my native US), I have less of an idea.
If you enjoy these kind of brain modification technologies, check out the book The Brain That Changes Itself, which discusses neural plasticity http://www.amazon.com/Brain-That-Changes-Itself-Frontiers/dp.... This is the science that led to the cochlear implant and may lead to other brain-interface devices.
Also, the part about biohacks and bio-weapons, reminded me of the movie Prometheus.
50 comments
[ 9.6 ms ] story [ 149 ms ] threadApple, 1990: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlfTDlgAl_A
http://web.archive.org/web/20110519014210/http://www.dni.gov...
Surprisingly, the direct link no longer works, so I had to go through archive.org
Yeh, right. I think around as much homes have it today, as there were in 2000.
"First, European governments will be absorbed by the need to renegotiate the social contract, i.e., the entitlement programs of the social welfare state hammered out in the post-1945 period. This is not a choice but a necessity: a large, aging population sits atop a shrinking labor pool and declining birth rates, unemployment remains chronic, and growth rates are projected at 2-3 percent per year at best--acceptable by historical standards (as well as the standards of other countries) but short of public expectations. Labor market rigidities and lack of productivity growth will strengthen protectionist tendencies."
That's totally off. There's no renegotiation going on of the social contract.
Regardless of the accuracy of the predictions.
Compared to all of human history, we are already superhuman.
Poor project managers are useless, but so is a poor developer, technician or any other specialty.
Great project managers are gold. Just as is a great dev.
Don't be so myopic.
Don't know what the deleted comment said, but I second that. A good PM protects you from the nonsense that kills focus.
I can't remember any of the others, but all of the predictions for around now (other then the smartphone one) are completely and totally off. All of these prediction things are bullshit, as most futurist ideas generally are. There's no accountability, because no one will remember the reports. It's ridiculous that the government pays people to write these things, and just as ridiculous that Wired publishes them.
I think SMBC put it best:
http://www.smbc-comics.com/?db=comics&id=1968#comic
Beyond that, a medical history that can't be updated is pretty useless, but our fragmented healthcare system isn't able to agree on standards for electronic medical records or how to synchronize them across different providers. Actually, getting doctors to use EMRs will probably be the work of a generation.
Then the problem becomes, how do you get doctors and hospitals to use something like this? Creating a private database that providers could optionally use seems doable. The hard part would be creating a large enough percentage of adoption at first. After that, more and more providers would see the benefit of using the system, and patients might even start asking for it, or preferring hospitals that have it.
Reluctance to change, for two. You have to convince most hospitals to change from whatever they have installed now to your system, or you have to make your system 100% compatible with the current hospital systems, with minimal changes.
+ People don't know how good it would be until it's actually used, so adaption would be slow.
+ No real financial gain- health providers just add the cost of bureaucracy into the bill.
So yes, it would be cool/useful, but there's not exactly a huge need for it (and many potential problems).
For people with serious medical conditions that need to communicate that to EMS, we have physical medalert bracelets that can tell healthcare providers that you have diabetes or epelipsy. That technology works even if your provider doesn't have power or reliable internet.
Most patient provider interactions don't require history transmission because you're at a scheduled office visit or your in emergency care at a facility that is part of your giant local health network. In those cases, providers can look up your name (that they can get from your wallet even if you're not conscious) in their database and find all they need. They don't have to worry about synchronizing data with arbitrary providers and trying to remap their ontologies or deal with lossy translations.
The number of cases where providers need fine grained history information for people that they've never treated before and they need it right NOW and can't afford to wait is...very small relative to the volume of patients treated. I mean, if you've been shot in the chest, the ER is going to focus on keeping you from bleeding to death rather than poring through a history to note that you're allergic to ragweed pollen, have slightly elevated blood pressure and fractured your tibia 8 years ago.
This is a much much better way round, but two things hold it back - well three.
1. Key sign? PKi? Wtf?
2. Doctors actually don't want many records to be available to the patient - it frankly compromises medical care (heard the phrase GOMER - Get Out Of My ER. Much diagnosis is still hunch and guesswork - and needs to be carefully phrased If patient will read it
3. We still think something centralised should track all our medical care when really something decentralised is much much better
http://www.acus.org/files/global-trends-2030-nic-lo.pdf
- After toying with 3D printers for a while, they will go back to vat-grown organs
- With widespread Internet access, remote work being a reality and local energy generation, people will leave the big cities seeking better life quality in smaller, country-side cities
- There won't be brain chips
I mean, it's almost 2013 and a majority of the population has general computers connected to the internet in their pockets, through which we can watch almost any movie or listen to any song. Try explaining that to someone from the early 80's.
Too bad the head of wired is a pessimist when it comes to the singularity; I think he's just as deluded as everyone else when it comes to accepting what exponential means.
Sure about that?
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/142797-brain-pacemaker-he...
I think the only real question is will the economics of the implants permit "casual" usage.
Just in the past 100 years, my country (Brazil) has seen people move from rural to urban to rural again.
"quality of life" is subjective. I've lived in the countryside, and while it's nice to sit on your porch and sip wine and watch the sunset, it's also nice to have a wide selection of nightlife.
While I don't doubt there'll be printable organs and brain-integrated silicon by 2030, the majority of people will not benefit, and the tensions brought about by escalating inequality will set progress back by years.
Worldwide poverty has been declining for decades. Costs of technology is declining at an ever rapid pace.
Income equality between the top bracket and the bottom != less access to technology for everyone
World wide (outside of my native US), I have less of an idea.
Also, the part about biohacks and bio-weapons, reminded me of the movie Prometheus.