Hold on Future!

Think back to how you communicated with people 5 years ago. Think back to how you entertained yourself 5 years ago. Think back to how you used technology 5 years ago. Ok cool you get the point..but now think how everything will be 5, 10, even 50 years from now. What ever you are thinking right now, you’re probably wrong…well maybe, maybe not, WHO KNOWS. So basically, is it even worth trying to predict how the future will be decades from now?

I never seen an episode, but from what I know about The Jetsons is that it is an older animated show that takes place in the future of 2062. Since the Jetsons was made in the 60s and later updated in the 80s, it’s crazy how they predicted such far fetched ideas on how the future was going to be in about 80 years. But after going over class discussions and researching some more, The Jetsons’ creators may have pretty accurate predications on the future accordingly to what futurists are claiming. Going back over the article we read in class “Ray Kurzweil On The Future“, I read through what Mr. Kurzweil had to say about the future and then piggy backed my research on futurism off his ideas.

So going back over Kurzweil’s predictions, I still can’t decide if I fully can agree with all of his statements. I understand the technology is increasing rapidly in what us humans can do with it, but some of the stuff he is predicting to happen just seems like it’s going to recreate the human race. So ya, I actually do disagree on a few of his predications:

1. “Our brains will extend to the cloud, which will allow us to learn new things at any age.”

Now what we know about the cloud on much simpler terms is that it consists of online services and storage that exist in the sky rather than on our computers. From 2006 to now, I think people still till this day don’t really understand what the cloud really is besides when Apple forces you to connect to their iCloud service. But what ever it really is, it comes from a physical computer made up of hundreds of miles of wire and cable all in a huge building…multiple buildings located all around America actually. So since this “cloud” thing involves a crazy amount of data and internet to serve millions of people, Kurzweil predicts that the human brain can connect to it. When the internet and technology is involved with the human brain ever, I personally get a little skeptical. I am not for sure what Kurzweil means by “extending the brain to the cloud”, but the human brain is the most powerful thing on this earth and the idea of physically linking, connecting, or attaching it to the internet is just wayyyyyy too sketchy in my opinion. We can barely go get an X-ray at the dentist without feeling concerned of getting internal damage from technology.

2. “We will be able to selectively erase pieces from our brain of our memory”

Once again on the topic of doing anything with the brain, I ain’t about it dude. Unless you are Jim Carrey starring in a romantic drama, I highly doubt it will be possible to erase certain pieces of memory from the all mighty human brain without damaging it. But not only do I doubt the actual process of erasing pieces of memory from the brain, I guess you could say I am against the principle of it. Without getting too deep, our lives are made up of what we do, see, and feel from all of our experiences which makes us who we are. Also I can recall a lot of things that I wish I didn’t do or experience in my 21 years of life, but guess what, some of those experiences made me who I am. So ya, basically we would be erasing a part of ourselves technically. I’m not a scientist or anything, but I pretty sure the parts that would be targeted to get “zapped”, are tied to other parts of the brain which would just cause a bunch of serious brain damage. But what do I know?

[youtube id=”2ke2HjqVXfc” width=”” height=”” wmode=”transparent” showinfo=”1″ autohide=”0″ quality=”auto]

(Video: Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind)

3. “Within 25 years, computers will be the size of a blood cell and we’ll be able to connect it to the brain without the need for surgery”

WHAT THE HECK? What’s the deal with connecting our brains to the internet! I’ll say it again, our brains are the most powerful thing on the earth and without them, man would be nothing. I understand that technology and even the internet is being created in smaller sizes so I don’t doubt that something could be as small as a blood cell. I just don’t know how that’s possible, but thats what we all said about a smart phone years ago.

Overall we as humans need to step back sometimes and realize what the future needs to look like as far as technology goes. It’s sad that big technologic companies will make what ever new invention, regardless how it affects society, to make more money. So I guess we need to find the balance between how far technology should be advanced along with how humans are using it. But unfortunately, we now live in an era where we want more, more, MORE…no matter what it is and what it really does to us. I just pray that all these future predications don’t end up transforming the human race into monotoned, personality less, and careless robots.