[Nemencine]

@QUINTUS CURTIS

I used to read sci fi. i especially like sci fi from decades ago. It is funny how their projection of the future(our present age) is completely different from what eventually materializes today. I enjoy reading and seeing what they get wrong and right... what is their thought process like.... From h.g. wells to arthur c clarke to a.e. van vogt. or isaac asimov, etc...

Which leads me to the obvious conclusion that all that teleportation, planetary terraforming, etc are merely extrapolation of current science and technology, obviously. Just like sci fi of yesteryears are merely extrapolation of science and technology of that time... new breakthroughs will lead to unexpected path. What we imagine will happen will hardly happen(only some will). The technological future will be radically different. It has always been, it will always be.

I remember reading how people used to see the world(scientists included) until blackbody radiation breakthrough happen with Planck's equation; leading to the dawn of quantum age that radically changed everything. In fact, there was a time that the US patent office was recommended to be shutdown because there is not a new invention that could be invented.

that was how limited their views were. How limited is our present views today?

That is why all the doom and gloom about feminism, etc may (a) not materializes (b) materializes in such ways that nobody expected or anticipated. Due to the changes future science and technology will impact society. Immediate future is easier to predict. A few standard deviations farther, in my humble opinion, all bets are off. It is anybody's guess.

Technological breakthroughs has a way of making total fools of social science predictors.

Which leads to two things.

Firstly, my issue with historical analyses by historians... based on some of the things i have read, i think it will really help if historians are strongly familiar with science and technology to see the significant role that science/technology play in pivotal historical development. In fact, i am willing to postulate, that you cannot have major historical shift without (a)technological development to make that historical shift happen (b) politician and political consciousness/zeitgeist to push that historical shift.

Historians tend to focus on "b" while ignoring "a". Generally, you read stuff that basically says "Julius ceasar did or that" or "napoleon did this or that" or "ghenghis khan did this or that". Few historians are familiar with science and technological enough to really grasp the role that without technological breakthroughs, Julius ceasar or ghenghis khan or napoleon may very well had become nobody. I cannot blame them. They are historians, not scientists. I am of the conviction that these historical leaders/politicians wont be able to do what they did without technological breakthroughs laying the foundation. I think major historical changes has a twin leg: first,the technological breakthroughs that lay the foundation; secondly, the leader that recognizes an opportunity and is able to exploit that technological changes to their benefit. Even Obama wont be able to become the president of america in 2008 without social media.(i think howard dean was the trial run with social media).

anyways, that is my hypothesis.

So, what is the technological changes of the future going to be like? Only heaven knows. How is it going to affect society? that is even more unpredictable--it all depends on the technological breakthroughs and the kind of political leader that materializes.

The near future is easier to predict with google glasses and stuff. Even that, dont be surprised if something came out of the left field and render that obsolete overnight. Like what? Genetic engineering.

Which leads to my second point:
the Chinese tampering with human genetics could cause two things: inadvertently unleash a devastating genetic plague on humanity or (b)inadvertently results in a genetic superbrain human. It only take one such superhuman intelligence to render all our current science and technology obsolete overnight. The seismic shift will be insane. There is no way we can control such a superbeing. it will be like a bunch of monkeys thinking they are soo intelligent and are capable of raising and controlling a leonardo da vinci. Not a snowball's chance in hell.

Most of the technological extrapolations that i have seen are based on what current humans are doing... not on what super-humans will do. What will a superbrain human do? We cannot imagine it. It will be like a monkey trying to imagine what a human will do. We wont even understand him. The day a superbrain human is born is the day the earth stops. There is no way we can imagine what s/he will be capable of inventing or doing, scientifically or politically or socially. On that day, we as a species are obsolete.

And that, my friends, is a scary thought.

I am not sure the future is all roses and rainbow and beautiful humming birds.