My reflections on my 2020 predictions about technological advancements. The pandemic emphasized technology’s central role in society, from remote working to vaccine development. New regulatory measures give hope for increased internet access and technology legislation in India, recognizing the need to adapt and engage with technology in new ways.
Earlier this year, as news of the incredibly realistic prose that GPT-3 was capable of generating reached me, my first thought was that I needed to figure out how to use this technology to churn out new Ex Machina articles. It wasn’t long before I realised that as a technology, it flattered to deceive. I would be far better served investing in consciously building a personal knowledge management system that help me synthesise all the various elements of knowledge I came across so that I was able to surface hidden connections.
Technological advancements can have a transformative impact. This includes deep neural networks, augmented reality, autonomous transportation, and personalized medicine. I predicts a future where technology will become more intuitive, education will be revolutionized, personal vehicle ownership may decline, and medicine will become highly individualized, though regulators may lag behind these changes.
There is a significant environmental impact to livestock production. It accounts for 40% of global agricultural output and has significant greenhouse gas emissions. To meet global warming targets, a drastic dietary shift is needed. We need to explore meat substitutes like Impossible Foods’ products, that are a promising and nearly indistinguishable alternative to traditional meat.
Every new technology has disrupted the one before it and there is always opposition to the creative destruction technology fosters. In the long run disruption is necessary and we need to favor innovation to constantly reinvigorate the economy.
The command and contro style of administration that we have been using to manage our electricity and urban water utilities so far are unable to cope with the demands of rapid urbanisation. We need to leverage technology to build decentralised urban management solutions that will enable distributed generation and supply of urban power and water.
Technology is inherently neutral but depending on how it is used it can be either good or bad. This applies to gene editing, drones and even to identity.
In the “attention economy,” businesses compete for user attention through persuasive technologies, leading to a potential technological addiction. There is a need for ethical boundaries in app design that will call for major tech companies agreeing to rewrite rules to discourage addictive persuasion, and aim for a more sustainable approach.
In a world rejecting globalization, the critical role of synchronized time, essential for modern civilization, is often overlooked. Medieval Europe’s independent timekeeping evolved with industrialization, requiring precise coordination. Today, technologies like mobile networks, electricity grids, and GPS rely on exact time synchronization. GPS, a US Department of Defense system, underpins these technologies, highlighting the interconnectedness of global systems amidst rising nationalism.
Consumption is one of the cornerstones of capitalism and modern society actively encourages it. Planned obsolescence feeds this philosophy by making a placing time limits on technology to make it stop functioning so that replacements can be purchased. If we prioritise access over ownership utilization will increase and products will no longer have to be made obsolete to encourage greater consumption.
