The Future, Actually

We talk a lot about the future here -- or, rather, we talk about a number of different possible futures. But what will the future actually be?

Barring the existence of (and our access to) parallel branching universes, we actually will experience only a single future. No matter how many different futures we may anticipate or speculate about, only one will come to pass.

Which one?

• Desktop Nanofactories - Every home has one, and every user can create any product for a few pennies per ounce (plus fees, if any, for downloaded product designs). Sophisticated CAD systems allow users to customize designs or invent new products at will. Bottom-up manufacturing means the economy is turned upside down, almost literally, as consumers become producers, and corporations scramble for relevance. Ingredients are now in place for a rapidly evolving and probably unstable new arms race. Tight technical restrictions are required to prevent illicit production of dangerous artifacts, and debates rage over the need for and dangers of ubiquitous surveillance. Many of society's longest-lasting problems have been solved, while many new ones have taken their place.

  

  Note: Most of CRN's efforts are placed in analyzing this particular near future (circa 2015-2025) when personal nanofactories have been developed and are used extensively. We're aware, of course, that other momentous technologies likely will emerge during that period, but our primary emphasis is on molecular manufacturing, because we believe it will be the most transformative, and potentially disruptive, during the next two decades.

• Jetsons - You remember this future (if you're old enough, that is): the one in which every family has a domestic robot; hot, delicious meals are ordered and produced at the touch of a button; people zoom around in jet cars between apartments and office towers that soar miles into the air, and so on.

• Cyborgs - Robots, computers, and humans (some, at least) merge into cyborgs. The variations here are endless.
  

• Bio-Morphing - Using techniques of genetic engineering and advanced nanomedicine, the human body becomes elastic, a designer's palette for experimentation in form, function, and frivolity. People look back at early body modification enthusiasts -- those indulging in piercing, tattoos, and implants -- and laugh at how quaintly conventional they seem.
  

• Human Speciation and Diaspora - An extension of the two futures above is one in which humans differentiate into a number of distinct species and habitats. If molecular manufacturing and other technologies enable easy access to space and ready colonization of our solar system, then almost without limit new homes may be available for beings descended from humans who bear little resemblance to their ancestors.

• AI - Vastly more powerful computers and better software writing finally result in the achievement of artificial general intelligence. If it is constrained by some form of built-in "friendly" (to humans) motivation, then maybe it's a good thing. If not, well then all bets are off.

• Singularity - The ever accelerating progress of technology and rapid changes in the mode of human life lead inexorably to a singularity. At that point, the dizzying pace of development surpasses our unaugmented human ability to predict what is coming next. (In practical terms, we may always be able to see what the near future holds, but the range of "near" will continue to shrink as the metaphorical event horizon comes closer and closer.)

• Techno-Apocalypse - Bad stuff happens. The machines take over, or a hyperwar kills us all, or out-of control GMOs destroy Nature, or grey goo eats everything. Very bad.
  

• Dystopia - Take any item from the previous category, plus other possibilities like rampant global climate change, a worldwide economic collapse, the pandemic to end all pandemics, or just an old-fashioned nuclear war, and you've got the makings of a thoroughly depressing future.
  
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• World Government - Continued economic globalization, a desire for better coordinated international response to terrorism, and a recognition that the challenges of ubiquitous molecular manufacturing can best be met with a unified approach: all this leads to the eventual end of state sovereignty. (I have predicted elsewhere -- apart from my role with CRN -- that before 2030, some form of international federation or global governmental structure will emerge that exercises ultimate authority over world affairs.)

• Plus ça change - The more things change, the more they stay the same. Years pass, significant changes emerge, and yet, somehow, we still find ourselves looking forward and wondering, when is that startling future ever going to arrive?

So, what do you foresee? All of the above? None of the above? Some of the above? What is the future, actually?

Mike Treder

Tags: nanotechnology nanotech nano science technology ethics weblog blog

Comments

[George J. Killoran]

This is an excellent forecast of things to come. I totally agree with your conclusion about the need for a world government. However I strongly believe a world government needs to take place soon to avert a dangerous nanotech arms race.

[Brian Wang]

I could see more solidification of the regional trade blocks and alliances. the asian (ASEAN, APEC) and american trade blocks (NAFTA, NATO) could drift toward more European Union like structures and institutions.

The big question would be how the international institutions deal with China and India. If China and India continue a powerful rise then how closely could China and India work together.

China seems likely to get into a trade block with Taiwan (if Ma gets elected next year) and then with ASEAN. Canada and Australia are talking to China.

China already has free trade agreements with Chile, Pakistan, Jordan and Thailand.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-05/24/content_879397.htm

Various bilateral agreements
http://www.bilaterals.org/article.php3?id_article=7996

Countering these forces are protectionist efforts
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/capitalcommerce/070524/free_trade_under_siege.htm

The follow up on international agreements on things like Kyoto and WTO could allow for harmonizationization, reduced friction and coordination of efforts, but I do not see full sovereignty being given up.

[John Acrinoe]

I agree with most of the above, with the exception of any world government. I would imagine pockets of abundance and prosperity as well as areas of dysotopia and abuse.

With increasing personal power from many new enabling technologies, I can't imagine how a world government would be able to work. Diaspora of the dissatisfied seems highly probable as personal power increases the friction between opposing views, values, and cultures.

I might argue that the singularity is already creeping upon us. The vast portion of the populace has no idea, nor would they believe if told, of these IMHO very probable futures. As such, many already don't see the future coming.

[Brian Wang]

The layers
world/regional cooperation-agreements-standards - alliances
military cooperation

interpol

International organizations

Intergovernmentalism
power is possessed by the member states and decisions are made by unanimity. Independent appointees of the governments or elected representatives have solely advisory or implementational functions.

Supranationalism the EU has some limited supranationalism.

Federations

Universal postal union

The level of influence of some international organizations or of other powerful nations over another nation depends upon things like how much does a poorer nation need a World Bank handout.

For technology there are some standards and coordination around patents internationally.
There are cooperative research projects (nuclear fusion ITER, International space station, Human genome project, particle accelerators)

there is some cooperation on public health issues, WHO, etc...
http://www.who.int/csr/en/
International Health Regulations, IHR(2005)

nations - military, national medical, tech research, federal law enforcement

State-provinces

Local government

I do not see governments going beyond intergovernmentalism and treaty limited supranationalism. I think this can be perfectly functional to approximate the functioning states in a mutually beneficial federal union.

for nanotech- the international health regulations, public health coordination, narrow weapon agreements etc... seem like the framework that will be applied and modified for various issues related to nanotech.

[Ted Stalets]

Being an avid futurist, I always enjoy reading Mike Treder's blog. Towards the bottom of his post, I was pleased to read about his prediction concerning an emerging world government.

I too believe that a world-wide system of law is inevitable. Terrorism, global warming, and other world-wide concerns (rogue nanotechnology applications..) will join the world together as one.

There are two superpowers in the world today - the United States and Global Public Opinion... The 2nd is much, much more powerful than the first...

Ronald Reagan addressed the 42nd General Assembly of the United Nations, September 21, 1987, with these words... "In our obsession with the antagonisms of the moment, we often forget how much unites all the members of humanity. Perhaps we need some outside universal threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world. And yet, I ask you, is not an alien force already among us? What could be more alien to the universal aspirations of our peoples than war and the threat of war?"

I'm honored to be on the Board of Directors of a a truly idealistic organization - Vote World Government dot org. Vote World Government is a non-profit organization, based in Canada. Our website provides all humans 16 years of age and older with the ability to vote in a global referendum required to authorize a new, democratic world government. Our goal is 2 billion votes - which would represent a majority of adult humans on our planet.

It's an ambitious calling, but our organization believes that the time to start making the voice of the world's 2nd great superpower heard is now - especially with the help of today's great democratic tool - the Internet.

As Lao Tzu, the ancient Chinese philosopher said, "A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step."

Please visit the website at www.VoteWorldGovernment.org - look over our referendum, and cast your vote "Yes" or "No".

I love the United States and am proud to be an American. But I am a resident of planet earth first, and of Nashville, Tennessee USA second.

Ted Stalets

[Eric]

What world-wide organization functions well? The United Nations is not at all effective. Resolutions that are not respected, let alone impactful.

I'm afraid you'll see the Have's vs. the Have-not's for a long while. Nanotech or MNT factories will help this a lot, but as other have said in other posts most of the world's problems today aren't beyond our ability to fix. The idea that anyone on the planet starves baffles me. However, it seems the bigger the organization, the less effective it is at actually solving a problem consistently. (Massive oversimplification and generalization warning!)

The more diverse we can keep politics and POWER the better chance we have at stability and representation of the minority. World government would likely consolidate power into the hands of a few, massive power...perhaps absolute power. Who is going to keep them accountable? The people...who have been unarmed and are kept docile and managed?? Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

What happens to a minority in dissent?

I could see a world where there isn't actually a formal centralized dominant government, but a centralized "currency" that is shared. Each independent group operates fairly free from the others and they will likely be independent of geography as well. I don't know how much longer nation-states will be critical entities, but it will likely be until we get nanofactories going...control of resources and production.

Rambling, but skeptical that an even bigger, more controlling government would be a good thing. How accurately and well do various interest groups in the USA feel they are represented? Throw in every cultural, racial, religious, intellectual, financial, etc. group on the entire planet and just how well would everyone's interests be represented?

What is the goal of good government?
Good representation or maximizing production or what?

[John]

A common currency is probably inevitable. It won't be easy to actually pull off though.

World government will never happen. The number of countries has been rising for some time and that trend appears likely to continue. Humans are too diverse for one government to make even a large minority happy at any given time. People will be less likely to accept policy from a world government even if a local government would have propagated the identical policy.

For purely numerical reasons, democracy is impossible on a global scale, as Eric notes. With the ready availability of information, people are going to want a voice in their government's affairs, and no world government can ever provide that. I'm skeptical that even the United States has 100 years left intact.

[Eric]

Another thought I had on this last night was that rather than a common currency being controlled by some central bank, etc. Perhaps it is the means of production, the desktop nanofactories that are distributed are controlled via the net with software... This could be the new universal currency.

Though I'm skeptical that material things will have as much value in the future as IP, ideas and designs. The Central Idea Bank in Geneva divies out the goods so people around the world can "print" them out.

[Mike Treder, CRN]

Eric, that idea sounds like it has a lot in common with the approach in CRN's paper on Safe Utilization of Advanced Nanotechnology.