The Convoluted World of 2034

The Convoluted World of 2034
The Convoluted World of 2034 Mohammed Alshammari Western Oregon University
During the last two decades, many things have been invented that have changed the world we live in today. Technology played the major role in these changes, it has shaped the way people live, communicate, learn, play, and think. Much of the technology we take for granted today did not exist or was an expensive luxury in the past. For example, today it seems as if everyone owns at least one computer. However, this has not always been the case. In 1984, only 8.9% of American households had a computer; by the year 2000, 51% of American households had a computer ("Reported internet usage," 2009). For nearly thirty years, the internet was unheard of outside of computer science, physics, and aeronautical research laboratories (Leiner, Cerf, Clark, Kahn, Kleinrock, Lynch, Postel & Roberts, 2003). By 2009, 76% of American households were using the internet on a regular basis ("Reported internet usage," 2009). It is impossible to envisage the future however mans gift of conception, his tendencies to analyze and evaluate makes it possible to predict and foresee. By analyzing the current world and the manner in which evolution has taken place in the past we are able to make certain assumptions and deductions into what is to come and what may or may not come to pass. If one were able to travel to the past and speak with their grandparents or even their parents generation and told them about the world of today they would be amazed. Though many of earlier predictions for the 21st century did not come true, many things depicted in science fiction came into some form of existence. Looking at how the world was and how the world is today, perhaps the movie Men in Black summed it up best when it said, "1500 years ago, everybody 'knew' that the earth was the center of the universe. 500 years ago, everybody 'knew' that the earth was flat Imagine what you'll 'know' tomorrow" (Solomon & Soddenfeld, 1997).
Education is a key facet of the modern way of life. Assuming this is a continuing trend, changes in the way in which education is performed will continue to advance at a steady rate. Twenty years ago most education took place in a classroom, and most research was done via books or periodicals. Today much of the educational experience is interactive through the internet and most studying is done with Google scholar or various academic databases. Printing of all hard-copy books may stop by the 2030's. The use of tablet computers in scholastic and research settings is already becoming more and more common rather than traditional hard-copy books. The automated digitizing of books will also play a significant role in the diminishing presence of print materials. Today, automated digitizing machines already are coming into existence. For example, the Ion Audio Book Saver and The Espresso Book Machine are already involved in the process of turning printed materials into e-books and pdf's (Ridden, 2011; Pinkowski, 2007). Given this trend it is possible that no-one will use physical books in any educational perhaps even professional fields, as carrying around a secure and handy tablet computer is far simpler than hauling several heavy books from class to class. The use of tablets rather than physical print materials becomes even more plausible with the emerging presence of internet access without the requirement to be plugged in or within range of a wireless hotspot. Given this trend and the wide availability of information on the internet, memorizing written text is already becoming less and less necessary for students: why memorize a bit of history when you can just look it up on Wikipedia? As future teachers concede defeat to the aforementioned availability of information through the internet, it is plausible that traditional lectures in most educational fields will become obsolete. Having said that, teachers will approach childhood education in such a way as to impart
how to use this information (i.e., how to think abstractly and creatively, finding novel solutions for problems.) In order to teach children how to think, future teachers will become more and more reliant upon methods proven by psychologists and sociologists alike. In order for this approach to become applicable, many institutional and governmental regulations will become much more lax to support this more fluid educational methodology. As teachers will become less and less burdened by spouting facts and as the inherent problems within online courses become less detrimental, many students and teachers opt for online courses. By taking a look at today's trends, we can see how many students are moving toward a more long distance education, particularly amongst international students. This is not purely unique to students. Many educators find it difficult to commute to and from school while also balancing their workload insofar as grading and planning classes is concerned. In 2034, we will see most if not all basic classes being taught online rather than face-to-face. The systems of testing shall also have revolutionized phenomenally and instead of written, oral and practical tests technology may have come up with a system of evaluation that does not require testing. As can be seen by modern trends, the jobs that people will perform will have shifted to an extreme by 2034. The percent of people who have a blue collar career is rapidly declining and has been for many years ("Occupational outlook handbook" 2009). Machines have been proven time and time again to be capable of performing tasks much quicker and with better precision than humans. Unless strict laws are put into place to force business owners to maintain human workers, it is plausible that little to no blue collar careers will exist in 2034. Factory workers will be replaced by multi-purpose worker robots (Parrish, 2010); farmers will be replaced by automated tractors and fruit/vegetable picking machines (France-Presse, 2012).
As artificial intelligence taking over the service sector in our lifetime is unlikely, we will see
more and more people with careers in this area as the possibility for blue collar work disappears. Future students will have to develop better social skills and specialized skills in intangible services and products (e.g., computer science, tech support, law, psychology and sociology). Though it is hard to predict just what the consumer demands of tomorrow will be, it is logical to assume that they will for the most part be dependent upon solving various problems rather than fabricating goods. As can already be seen, it is becoming harder for people to find the time to perform many basic household tasks. In the near future, many new houses will be automated for both the comfort of their inhabitants and to reduce the homes environmental impact. Much housework will be performed automatically by the house itself, from thawing to cooking meals to automatically adjusting heat settings based on when people are home and/or awake (Chibber, 2011). Considering housing trends (i.e., most people buying or renting homes that were made or updated within the last 30 years), we will see most people, although not everyone, will live in these kinds of homes. In addition to automation in household tasks, people will be able to perform basic tasks remotely. We will begin to see peoples cell phones or tablet computers becoming the primary way in which they do things around the house. With wireless technology becoming more affordable, it is possible that many things such as preheating your oven, starting a bath, turning lights on and off, and adjusting various setting throughout the house will become a common practice. This might even go so far as remotely telling a robot what you want for dinner so that it can begin preparing the basic components of the meal, such as pulling the food out of the freezer to thaw, collecting the spices, and chopping the vegetables.
While not everyone will live in a smart home, people will likely purchase, rent, or otherwise have home robots to do some of the aforementioned things that a smart house does. Today, we are already starting to see several robots like this, robots that have been created to do a lot of chores around the house. They are becoming increasingly sophisticated, capable of taking on the burdens of household tasks, not only basic ones, such as cleaning or bringing its master a glass of water, but also more complicated tasks, such as helping to take care of children and the elderly, tutoring students, and providing basic home security functions (Domestic Robot, 2010; Waibel, 2009). In the past people would spend their free time spending time with their friends, going to the mall, playing sports, or otherwise going outside and doing something. As can be seen from the current obesity epidemic in the world, many people today spend more time in front of some sort of technology (e.g., television and computers.) This trend, unfortunately for the health of people is not likely to disappear; if anything, it is likely to become more prevalent. What may change is what sorts of technology people choose to spend their time using. Another trend that is likely to persist and become more prevalent is gaming. In the past playing video games was seen as a nerdy thing to do. This was probably because of the limitations that made it so games required a good imagination or a love of solving various puzzles. Today, many young people are addicted to video games. This might be because the average computer can play thousands of highly advanced games that require little to no imagination or problem solving. Just as gaming changed from games like Tetris and Pacman in the 80s to games like Modern Warfare 3, Angry Birds, and Farmville, we will also see changes in gaming over the next 22 years. It is likely that the use of joysticks, keyboards, and other such physical controllers
will cease to exist in favor of cameras with gesture recognition software. This will allow us to no longer need bulky consoles or computer to play games. Instead, we can more easily switch to more mobile platforms. We are already seeing tablet computers become very popular for gaming (Byford, 2012). However, the price of the hardware versus the capabilities does not yet match up. It is possible that since cloud computing will become more and more advanced, the next generation of cloud servers will be able to perform a lot of the computationally intensive functions, allowing client platforms to be less powerful therefore cheaper. As we see the increasing reliance on technology to get by in the world of tomorrow, we will consequently see a breaking down of current problems with international relations. People will no longer identify themselves by the country they come from but instead the global community that they are a part of by spending most of their life online. Perhaps one of the most obvious consequences of this will be that the nations of the world becoming increasingly interconnected. We are already starting to see a shift towards a true global economy such as common currencies in many countries (McLeod, 2006; Pernar, 2009; "A short history of the euro," 2003; Hasan, 2006; Haffar, 2009). It is possible that by 2034 there will be a single world currency that all nations trade in, rather than dealing with always changing exchange rates and various taxing issues. This interdependency will not stop at currency trends. Almost all aspects of a countrys day-to-day operations will be an interdependent collaborative effort. Countries will begin to collaborate more, not only on large scale research projects, but also on things as simple as small scale business ventures and trading. For example, say that Saudi Arabia needs certain goods from other countries; it will reduce the price of the oil to help those countries provide these goods at a
lower price, which will allow both countries to be more profitable as well as establish a better relationship. The last obstacle for this global community will be the language barriers. Though machine translations have existed for years they have always been problematic. They try to translate the literal meaning of sentences, or use fuzzy phrase translations which usually do not work very well. However, machine translation has come a long way and recent research has begun to overcome many of the problems with machine translations (Huck, Vilar, Stein & Ney, 2011). It is possible that in the year 2034 machine translations will have advanced enough that anyone with a cell phone, tablet computer, or headset will be able to hold a conversation with anyone regardless of which language they speak. This will allow people to work on pretty much anything with anyone in the world. In the field of Medicine specialists and futurists have predicted that man shall have progressed such that human life expectancy shall increase and men will live up to 200 years. The recent Smart phone technology has paved the way for revolutionary future achievements; where intricate testing such as ECG, Sugar, blood, urine, saliva tests and sweat tests etc can be achieved through the mere click of a smart phone, without the use of wires, machines, blood and other samples and the device can monitor and trace all kinds of bodily defects and changes. When such an advanced technology is available in todays world we can then foresee technology that will not even need this single finger touch and an intricate sensor shall perform the tests, generate instant results, suggest treatment plans and instead of medicine a variety of internet applications shall achieve the cure. In this world where pace makers are used, the future shall see mechanical organs being used for transplants without the need for human donors. However, there are drawbacks to longevity; the world might become a place filled with old men who
cannot earn a living and serve no utilitarian purpose, becoming a strain on the economy and a burden on the world. The example of Japan is present even now where longevity and family planning regulations have resulted in a decrease in youthful work force (Topol, 2013). The future world will see monumental atmospheric changes, unpredictable weather, extremities in climate such as extremely hot or extremely cold, snow in places that have never seen snow before, some hints of these critical and severe changes can be seen even today. Some specialists even predict that the world we see today might not even exist and some parts of the world may be lost under water. The future may see a shortage of global water resources. Where our fresh water resources appear at an end even today, after 22 years man may need to search for some alternate for water. Water shortage may trigger the creation and use of alternate energy sources such as solar, nuclear, wind, bio-energy etc in place of dams that are used for the production of electricity. Water conservation and conservation of natural resources may become a vital and massive dilemma in the future. (Croitoru, 2010) In 22 years the system of communication and transportation will evolve to even greater degrees, the world will see smart cars, and solar cars, and battery operated cars, given the conservation and shortage of natural resources and mans probable inability to use fuel driven cars etc. There shall have been colossal developments and even more intricate systems of tubes, trains etc and thus a highly expanded system of local transportation. Where distances shall be shortened through technology distances shall also lengthen between people. Technology shall have replaced direct human communication and life in an advanced machine age may become more prone to psychological breakdowns and a lack of human affection.
In the arena of entertainment real life actors shall soon be replaced and shall be competing with animated characters created by CGI (computer generated imagery). The animated characters shall be so life like that it may render real actors extinct. The meaning of entertainment shall have changed in 22 years; technology may even bring an end to the culture of watching movies in cinemas and people shall have their own elaborate and personal entertainment systems at home. Globalization and development in Social media shall bring everyone in everyones drawing room. Cultural diversity, inter-cultural interaction, advanced technology and improved communication shall result in a loss of social and cultural values. Individual societal values, and the diversities that are the distinguishing marks of colonies shall turn to generalized values which make individuals into stereotypes (Nye, 2013). Progress and development shall allow easy access to sophisticated technology and so an increase in crimes and violence. However, on the other hand where crimes will be committed man may create technology that will be able to predict record and even pre-conceive human actions and thought also resulting in a kind of pre-crime technology. The enhancements in genetic technology where it has paved ways for animal cloning human beings as the subjects shall also not be far behind. Genetically modified and engineered crops, to replace and conserve natural resources will also be there. The future will give way to the use of Genetic Engineering in surgery. Technology in the next 22 years shall create an ambiguous, complex world where the threat of lost human identity will be a widespread predicament (Medvedev, 2005). Another giant change may be the conversion of universal religious values and beliefs. Secularism and extremism may also augment as a result of an increase in materialistic interests.
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Religiosity may even be lost since a technologically advanced world is a competitive one and there is no room for sentiments. Todays trends shape the future, and when we really think about it, 22 years is not a lot of time. Although it is not a lot of time we can see that things will be very different in 2034. Looking at what is currently happening in the world of technology and the world as a whole, the world of tomorrow will be very reliant on technology. People will be dependent on it for almost every aspect of their lives from learning to working to playing; governments will be dependent on it for pretty much everything they do from international relations and things as easy as trading agreements. The world of tomorrow will not be a world of nations but rather one global community with thousands of new problems and solutions. A world of shifting paradigms and conversing values shall come into existence as a result of mans quest to attain an even more comfortable and convenient life. The expanded scope of education and technology in 22 years shall see an unnatural, cultured, prototypical, robotic, mechanical world, devoid of humanity, sensitivity, ethics and the tendencies for hard work. Man will be living in an ever shifting, ever evolving world whose pace of change shall also increase making all of mans acquired knowledge redundant as soon as it is conceived, because man will not be able to keep up with the speed with which technology shall be changing the world. Where we hope for and strive for an advanced and convenient world we are also diving into an uncertain realm of disease, a threat of extinction because of the depletion of natural resources, a conflict of technology, social values, beliefs, etc. Futurists refer to this phase as The Singularity, when life shall take on unforeseeable and intensely rapid changes. The concept of simplicity and the word simple shall cease to exist; because in the journey to making life easy man is creating an even more complex world (Croitoru, 2010).
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