Sarah Connor: Three billion human lives ended on Aug. 29, 1997. The survivors of the nuclear fire called the war Judgment Day. They lived only to face a new nightmare: the war against the machines … [and] the computer which controlled the machines, Skynet.
The Terminator: The Skynet Funding Bill is passed. The system goes online Aug. 4, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, Aug. 29. In a panic, they try to pull the plug.
Sarah Connor: Skynet fights back.
The Terminator: Yes. It launches its missiles against the targets in Russia.
John Connor: Why attack Russia? Aren’t they our friends now?
The Terminator: Because Skynet knows the Russian counter-attack will eliminate its enemies over here.
— From the 1991 film Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Once upon a time, the future represented a place of hope, technology promised a life of productive leisure, and advanced communications guaranteed a safer global community. But a funny thing happened on the way to the future. Reality set in; and as Jesus once admonished, there is plenty of trouble for today without wasting time worrying about tomorrow. When exactly did the future stop being fun?
Visionaries and futurists, prophets and prognosticators, filmmakers, authors, and everyday housewives have tried with varying degrees of success to peer into “The World of Tomorrow.” It is a coming-of-age ritual for teenagers around the world to gather in late-night sessions and solve the problems of the world — if only someone would listen. Whether your view of the future is colored by rose-tinted glasses or half-empty glasses, there is really only one thing certain about the future: Ready or not, it will come.
Less is more
According to Thomas Frey, executive director of a Colorado-based think tank, we are in a race for miniaturization of information storage. “There is a physical limit to the ultimate small-particle storage feature, and we are approaching that limit,” he says. “We are in this interesting transition period; and each time we make a transition, there is a gatekeeper who says, ‘We will keep this; we will throw that away.’ The big question remains: Which format will become a viable business?”
One of the biggest innovations of the future will be the rise of nanotechnology — the study, design, creation, synthesis, manipulation, and application of functional materials, devices, and systems through control of matter at the nanometric scale. (One nanometer is equal to one-billionth of a meter.) Scientists believe that innovation
at the molecular level will soon allow health workers in remote areas of the developing world to obtain a complete diagnostic evaluation from a single drop of blood placed on a piece of plastic the size of a nickel. The so-called “lab-on-a-chip” is only one of the revolutionary products and processes currently emerging from nanotechnology research.
While such applications are still a few years away, human trials in nanomedicine are already being conducted. Nanotech companies like Marylandbased CytImmune believe cancer cells can be eradicated by injecting a swarm of gold-coated nanobots into the bloodstream. Programmed for microscopic search-and-destroy missions, these tiny guardians could seek out cancer cells and selectively destroy the diseased cells without harming the surrounding tissue.
Nanotech will radically shift the way we perceive health care in the next decade, yet medicine is just the tip of the nano-iceberg. Experts believe nanotechnology may also hold the key to solving the world’s energy crisis.
Researchers at Virginia Polytechnic have developed a supramolecular complex that can use sunlight to break apart water molecules, generating hydrogen for fuel cells and producing oxygen as its only byproduct, though Frey insists most new energy technologies will bring their own set of headaches. Still, the implications for low-cost, clean energy — particularly energy produced by wind or sunlight — are staggering. Just consider the value of self-powered homes and vehicles.
And speaking of clean, clothing manufacturers such as Levi, Strauss, and Hager are already using nanotech to make stain-resistant pants. Expect the next step to be materials that are altered at the molecular level to be stain-free, odor-free, and even bacteria-resistant.
Now you see it. Then you won’t.
As technology marches inexorably into the future, many of the conventions that we currently consider standards will fade into oblivion, victims of innovation.
“The year is 2050, and you are standing in front of a vending machine. What form of payment will you put into it?” Frey asks.
Chances are, it won’t be a coin. And it probably won’t be plastic either. Both will be replaced by some form of biometric funds transfer, as cash becomes obsolete, although some form of local specie will probably exist for minor barter items. The paper check, once the paragon of payment systems in the United States, will go the way of the dodo, replaced first by image-exchange and later by e-cash. Perhaps we will need to carry a mark on our forehead or right hand in order to buy or sell — but that’s another article.
Chicken nuggets without the chicken? Prime rib without the rib? Cattle ranches, chicken farms, and catfish ponds will slowly go the way of the buffalo as meat is grown in vitro. The advantage of “cultured” meat over the homegrown variety includes the ability to produce meat that looks like, cuts like, and tastes like beef, pork, poultry, or fish, and contains the same healthy nutrients, but without all the bad stuff like cancer-causing Omega-6 fatty acids. NASA engineers have already produced small amounts of edible meat in the laboratory. The next step is to ramp up for mass production.
Just as electronic calculators sounded the death knell for the slide rule and silicon chips buried transistors, the personal computer of the future will be a whole lot more “personal” than that dinosaur PC on your desk today. It will be built into your home, your vehicle, your clothes, and tied into the ever-expanding World Wide Web. It will anticipate your needs, perform the menial tasks of housekeeping and food preparation, keep your schedule, and balance your account book. And, working in tandem with the nanobots implanted in your brain, it will not only maintain your environment but create alternate reality environments for your pleasure.
Retirement is another thing the future will make obsolete. When the planners of the American Social Security system set 65 as the retirement age, the average lifespan of an American citizen was 63. Today, chances are good you will live to be 83. And with the continued rapid advances in medical technology, longevity will be extended to over 100 during the next quarter-century. While older citizens might slow down, they will remain active and productive in this “third phase” of their lives.
Wires will disappear as the world goes wireless for information, communication, entertainment, and power transmission. Personal security will increase, but you can kiss your concept of privacy goodbye as RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) tags become embedded in virtually everything from your currency to your clothing. Certain forms of crime will also disappear. It doesn’t make much sense to steal when everything can be traced immediately.
Education Revolution
The home school revolt will continue to grow, forcing both public and private education institutions to innovate or die. Academics will be conducted through telecommuting, making it not only possible but advisable for a student to be enrolled in a variety of specialized academies. The much-ballyhooed rallying cry of “socialization” will be
handled by a variety of structured activities available to children of the same and varied ages. Emphasis on neighborhood identification will increase, although the definition of “neighborhood” will expand to include much more than just the physical location of the home.
A.I.: A new way to be human
On May 11, 1997, an IBM supercomputer named Deep Blue beat world chess champion Garry Kasparov in the final round of a six-game match. The age of artificial intelligence had arrived. Deep Blue weighed in at one and a half tons, sported 512 collaborated processors and was capable of evaluating one billion positions every five seconds. It was big, and it was fast; but did that make it “smart”? That is a debate that still rages among the intelligentsia.
Deep Blue was slow by current standards. A low-cost PC today can deliver more than one billion calculations per second, but it still can’t tell you whether you should wear the red tie or the blue one with those slacks. That will all be changing soon. With advances in neural net processing — a computing method that simulates the human brain — within the next 10 to 20 years, humankind will have to concede that we are no longer the smartest things on Earth.
If you really want to get into some scary sci-fi projections, just ponder the implications of “brain porting,” the ability to download our thoughts, memories, and emotions onto a separate “hard drive,” thus achieving a sort of eternal life (as long as someone doesn’t hit the “delete” key).
Freed from the limitations of corporeal life, these software-based humans would live on the Web, projecting virtual bodies holographically. Such an existence raises lots of philosophical, not to mention theological, questions. If you upload your mind, who is the real you? The one in your body, or the one in the computer? Is the ability to learn the definition of intelligence? Have you created a new life? And if you have, does it have a soul? Can it die? And is death, after all, such a bad thing? Does it not give shape and meaning to time? Is it not the portal through which we finally enter eternity?
Eventually nonbiological brains, extended versions of our human brains, will overtake the intelligence of their biological creators, with some experts predicting that crossover to occur within the next 25 years. Once that happens, the inevitable question will be, “Who is the master, and who is the servant?”
“I think we will actually find a way to put real human intelligence into a machine,” Frey declares. “But I think the trend will be more toward real intelligence than artificial intelligence.”
Of course, technology run amok has always been the stuff of great science fiction; but science fiction of the past has a nasty habit of becoming science fact of the future. The same technology that produces electric power to run nuclear submarines also provides us with enough nuclear weapons to end human life as we know it on Earth.
Biotechnology, which offers staggering hope for relieving pain and suffering, inherently carries the potential for creating devastating pathogens that are more dangerous than nuclear weapons. Cloning a new liver for spare parts could easily give rise to cloning a whole new race of slaves. Nanobots used to cure cancer or expand
our mental prowess could be used by “them” (whoever “they” are) to spy on us or even control our thoughts and actions.
“I don’t think the future is that grim,” Frey laughs. “The next big thing was always invented 25 years ago. Any significant new technology takes at least a generation to wrap our minds around. The next big thing is already out there. It just hasn’t ignited yet.”
Old-time religion in a new-fangled world
With the future perpetually just around the corner, this is probably a good time to ask, “What will the American religious landscape look like in 50 years?” The United States has always been one of the most religious countries in the world, with our faith impacting every aspect of our cultural existence. From the raging, at times violent, debates over such issues as abortion, stem cell research, race relations, and the death penalty, to hotly contested spiritual and moral issues such as homosexuality, universalism, and the place of private faith in the public forum, religion continues to be one of the most contentious factors in our society.
While a huge percentage of Americans participate in either organized or private religious practices, that doesn’t mean we are a homogenous culture. On the contrary, the United States is not only the most religious but the most religiously diverse nation in the world. And with the trend toward more open immigration, that diversity will continue far into the 21st century. Former “world religions” such as Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism, and Islam are now considered “American religions.” According to some sources, Islam now has more adherents in the United States than Judaism. In 2001, the U.S. Postal Service even issued the Eid stamp, commemorating the two most important festivals in the Islamic calendar.
Along with the dizzying array of new religious groups that are gaining a foothold in America, there is a rising tide of people opting out of organized religion altogether in favor of individual spirituality. Although they express a general disillusionment with religion in general, they are still searching for a way to make sense out of their lives — for something to connect them to something larger than themselves. They are seeking but not finding. Therein lies both the challenge and the opportunity for the church.
Youth workers of the future have only two options when confronting this brave new world: They can hunker down into a conservative protectionism as a means of guarding their religious identity; or they can actively engage the culture, finding new and relevant ways to communicate the Truth to a culture that has little use for absolutes.
Nobody said it would be easy. Perhaps Reese, the warrior from the future in the original Terminator movie said it best: “Thank you for your courage through the dark years. I can’t help you with what you must soon face, except to say that the future is not set. You must be stronger than you imagine you can be.”
The future is yours to make. While you’re at it, why not make it fun again?
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MIKE PARKER is an award-winning freelance writer, author, playwright, actor, film reviewer, and editor. His articles have been featured in such magazines as CCM, HomeLife, BookPage, and Today’s Christian. Visit him online at www.wordcrafts.net.
