Technology never stands still: it’s always changing, adapting and progressing, and oftentimes things that seemed improbable (or even impossible) one year can quickly start becoming possible only a few short years afterwards.
Wearable computers seemed like a fanciful idea only recently, but now they’re pretty much the next big thing to go mainstream. The emergence of the Oculus Rift could probaby catapult virtual and augmented reality into literal reality.
Two decades is not a lot in the grand scheme of things, but owing to accelerating change we can expect to see the emergence of some fairly disruptive technological innovations in the coming years. Here are 10 mindblowingly futuristic technologies that should appear by the 2030s.
As a futurist, it’s my job to make predictions. But I absolutely hate timelines, and you’ll rarely find me making claims about when some specific sort of technological wizardry will make an appearance. Feasibility interests me more than dates on a calendar.
But the fog is starting to clear on what we can expect to see within the next twenty years. All the technologies I’ve listed below have a better than 50/50 chance of being actualized.
Some of you may complain that I’m being a bit conservative by not includingAGI (artificial general intelligence), molecular assembling nanotechnology,hive minds, IA (intelligence augmentation), radical life extension, powerful spacecraft propulsion engines, useful quantum computers, mind uploads, orwhole human brain emulations — but I just don’t see these things coming to fruition until much later.
Alright, here’s what we should expect by the year 2033:
1. Artificially intelligent personal Assistent
I’ve been impatiently waiting for this one for quite some time now. Microsoft got the ball rolling on this concept with Clippy, the office assistant that proved to be more annoying than useful. More recently, Apple developed SIRI for its iPhone, an intelligent assistant that can respond to specific language cues and access the Internet. But this is nothing compared to what’ll be available two decades from now.
Looking ahead, we can expect our personal assistants to fully respond to natural language, including colloquialisms and our personal idiosyncrasies. And owing to ubiquitous computing (which we’ll look at next), our personal assistants will be accessible to us 24/7.
What’s more, these agents will exhibit an uncanny level of general intelligence. We’ll even be able to have conversations with them. They will know everything about us, including our behaviors, our tendencies, our preferences, and our typical ways of responding to certain situations. Accordingly, they’ll be our virtual clones. In essence, they’ll be our proxy selves, representing us on the Internet and in the real world by taking the form of telepresent holographic avatars. They’ll write emails for us, book appointments, perform menial thought tasks, and even anticipate our needs. Of course, we’ll still be responsible for the decisions they make on our behalf — so we’ll need to be careful about the degree of autonomy we give our mind clones.
2.Jet pack international H202
Jet Pack International are making great strides in jetpack technology H202 and H202- Z jetpacks. As the name suggests, both the H202 and H202-Z are hydrogen peroxide- fueled jetpacks that will allow uers to fly at up to 77 miles per hourat a maximum height of 250 feet.
So far thought, the higher-capacity H202-Z is only capable of a maximum flight length of 33 seconds and a maximum travel distance of 3,300 feet.
The Jet Pack International H202 and H202-Z are actually currently available, albeit not commercially: you can assemble the jetpack yourself, if you have$100,000 lying around.
3. Virtual Animal with Digital Minds
Whole brain emulations of human minds are quite a ways off, and likely won’t appear until the second half of the 21st Century. But in the stage leading up to this we’ll be able to emulate the brains of much simpler organisms. Already today there’s the OpenWorm project, an effort to digitize the brain of a nematode worm.
Within the next two decades, we will most certainly be able to emulate the brains of other organisms, like ants and bees. And who knows, by this point we might even be able to start emulating the brains of simple mammals, like mice. But by virtue of doing so, we will have created virtual animals who essentially “live” inside a computer. And someday, perhaps even by the 2030s,these digital brains will be uploaded to robotic avatars.
4. An Interplanetary internet
Chinese researchers have recently been looking into the next phase of train transportation, beyond even Maglev technology. China and Japan already have very fast Maglev trains that are capable of reaching over 260 miles per hour, but the new next-generation Maglev technology, dubbed super Maglev, will apparently be even faster.
This one’s fairly straightforward, but no less profound. Someone from Earth will reach Mars by the early 2030s — whether it be private enterprise or a government agency. At least we freakin’ hope so! But regardless of who gets there first, one of the first things they’ll do is set up an Internet connectionwith Earth. And why not? The explorers — or settlers, if they’re part of theMars One project — will both want and need to access and share information. Oh, and they’ll probably want to purchase something while they’re there when supplies run low.
The interplanetary Internet (based on IPN, also called InterPlaNet) is a conceived computer network in space, consisting of a set of network nodes that can communicate with each other. Communication would be greatly delayed by the great interplanetary distances, so the IPN needs a new set of protocols and technology that are tolerant to large delays and errors. Although the Internet as it is known today tends to be a busy network of networks with high traffic, negligible delay and errors, and a wired backbone, the interplanetary Internet is a store and forward network of internets that is often disconnected, has a wireless backbone fraught with error-prone links and delays ranging from tens of minutes to even hours, even when there is a connection.
5. Super Maglev Train
Chinese researchers have recently been looking into the next phase of train transportation, beyond even Maglev technology. China and Japan already have very fast Maglev trains that are capable of reaching over 260 miles per hour, but the new next-generation Maglev technology, dubbed super Maglev, will apparently be even faster.
Super Maglev is built on the same Maglev technology, but it encapsulates the train in a vacuum tube, further reducing air resistance, allowing for higher, mind-boggling speeds. Researchers claim that such enclosed-tube Maglev systems could see trains reaching speeds of up to 1800 miles per hour.
Of course, there are doubts about the feasability of constructing long vacuum tubes and keeping them pressurised, but if scientists and engineers can figure that out, we may one day be able to cross large distances quicker and more safer than we’ve ever imagined possible
6 .Back To The Future” Hoverboard
Yeah, we know, it was a hoax, but for a brief, glorious moment, it seemed like all our Back to the Future-fueled dreams were coming true: an actual working hoverboard that wasn’t just a scientific experiment constrained to a laboratory. The promo video, from a company named HUVr and featuring famous faces like Tony Hawk and Dr. Emmett Brown himself doing everything from just riding around to catching footballs and even controlling the hoverboard with an iPhone.
As it turned out only a day later, the video and the entire hoverboard was a hoax by Funny or Die, but the fact that it captured the imagination of so many people shows that, yes, people really do want hoverboards. It’s safe to say that if researchers ever do figure it out, it’ll be an achievement that nobody will ever forget.
