The Coming Convergence

Imagine direct communication links between the human brain and machines, or tailored materials capable of adapting by themselves to changing environmental conditions, or computer chips and environmental sensors embedded into everyday clothing, or medical technologies that eliminate currently untreatable conditions such as blindness and paralysis. Now imagine all of these developments occurring at the same time. Far-fetched? Not So. These are actually the reasonable predictions of scientists attempting to forecast a few decades into the future based on the rapid pace of innovation. Author Stanley Schmidt - a physicist, a writer, and the editor of Analog: Science Fiction and Fact - explores these and many more amazing yet probable scenarios in this fascinating guide to the near future. He shows how past convergences have led to todays world, then considers tomorrows main currents in biotechnology, cognitive science, information technology, and nanotechnology. Looking even further downstream he foresees both exciting and potentially dangerous developments: Longer, healthier livesCheap, generally available food, energy, and technologyReduced pollution and environmental stressEconomic disruption during transitional periodsExcessive power in too few handsIncreased vulnerability from overdependence on technology. Schmidt notes that even a routine technology such as the CAT scan is the result of three wholly separate innovations started many decades ago which recently converged: the

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United States Jun, 2013


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