What can we realistically expect in the next 40 years?
Can we expect Mechs? AI? Augmentation? Cyberpunk?
I know technology moves a lot slower than fiction likes to predict, but I sure am tired as fuck of the current age we are living in.
>>7928113
This truth may be hard to swallow OP:
There is absolutel no way of knowing.
If you're getting bored of today's reality, you seriously need to check your attention span or get a hobby.
>>7928113
>Mechs?
Unless they have a really niche special use, probably not. At least not the larger mechs anyway.
>AI?
'AI' in the sense of well-crafted learning networks that can work on a problem and possibly be used to replace low-skill jobs. If you mean artificial general intelligence, then no.
>Augmentation?
Ethics will probably prohibit it in the western world, but not China. The western world will accept it eventually depending on how far behind we will be left by China. A timeframe cannot be established on this one, it's too unpredictable.
>Cyberpunk?
If you mean megacorporations taking over the world, then yes, corporations are already growing out of control. Google, Microsoft, Apple, Monsanto with gene patents have more power than whole governments. This will only get worse in the future. I can't say if the breaking point will be 40 years from now, but it will happen unless a radical change takes place.
There you go, that's my take on the current situation.
>>7928119
It's just shit, man. The 80s/90s were absolutely powerful. We got the internet and cell phones, that was huge. But in the last 20 years all they have done is change the shape of cellphone sand make them more powerful.
Pretty shit. We don't even have full-on electric cars yet, that's just beginning. People are seriously hampering progress intentionally for their own greedy ends.
We need flying cars that run on solar fuel. That would really facilitate travel.
>>7928113
no mechs. expect exoskeletons though. and maybe armoured exoskeletons in 100 years
No advanced prosthesis. Expect prothesis to stay at 2 or 3 degrees of freedom, unlike real hands that have 27. You know how myoelectric works? ON.OFF. switch grip. how boring.
Augmentation. Dont expect much. When we replace parts of our body, it hurts us. When you replace a hip,
The plastic bits grind against the bones and powder forms like when you play too much street fighter. Prosthetics wont get better for a long long while. we wont get anything like Deus Ex:HR for another 300 years.
Expect VR and augmented reality. VI not real AI.
>>7928113
Woot, another chance to post this cool paper.
OP, have a look at this (full report download after abstract):
http://www.arl.army.mil/www/default.cfm?technical_report=7417
The US military had a workshop to discuss the probable technologies that will be employed on the battlefield by 2050.
>>7928144
thats pretty cool, gonna give it a read
We came of age when the internet came of age. We're used to seeing massive changes taking place. That is NOT what virtually ALL the humans who have ever lived were used to. They were used to seeing no upheavals that completely changed the way they lived. We're spoiled. And now reality is finally here to fuck our shit up. Just accept it.
>>7928144
That's pretty fascinating, thanks
sex robots when
>>7928126
Agreed on everything but AI. There is a serious possibility of it happening in that time frame, and at this point not only le kurzweil meme agree on this but most people in the field.
Also just think about this; as you just said, tech corporations are taking over the world. But these same corporations need AI like never before, and they will pour more and more money and resources to crack it.
Add moore's law (read: its successor), and the military / governments realizing how powerful having a real AI may be, and I think we'll never see an AI winter again...
>>7928128
>We don't even have full-on electric cars
orlly?
what is tesla
what is nissan leaf
what is bmw i3
>>7928144
>augmented humans
We didn't ask for this
>>7928113
>I sure am tired as fuck of the current age we are living in
Why is /sci/ full of faggot pop-sci fantasists? Do you know how much it pisses me off to put years of effort into perfecting a system only for some fat asshole to waddle along and declare it "not cool enough"?
>>7929725
It is possible I guess... You're right that corporations will be pouring crazy money into it, but I don't know, I just feel like it's further away, we need to learn a lot more about how the brain works to create a general intelligence, but I really don't know, tech moves at an unpredictable pace these days, so you might as well be right.
>>7928113
>Mechs
Never. Mechs offer nothing over other vehicles and have more drawbacks. Powered exoskeletons definitely.
>AI
Watson style "AI" that's human interactable, definitely. SkyNet, no.
>Augmentation
Definitely. Powered prosthetics are already a big thing and are only getting better.
>Cyberpunk
As in plugging into a computer and living a fantasy life? Maybe. As in megacorps over governments? No -- not in that time frame.
>>7929725
>moore's law
is moore's law still applicable? I thought we were going to hit the limit of how small transistors could be pretty soon and then moore's law would stop applying
>>7930114
Downloaded the PDF and uploaded it here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B00E1ZTY-YeGdWNXRHcyMFhIWE0/view?usp=sharing
>>7930144
Did an internship at a big photolithography firm last year. It's getting tight, but they'll seem to push it for another 10 years before hitting a wall.
>>7928128
Check out the biotech sector. That shit's hot right now.
>>7930145
Thank you, sweetheart.
>>7929746
Im not kidding when I say this.
I was literally about respond with
>What is tesla?
> What is Nissan Leaf?
> What is I3 ?
In the same order and and wording.
>>7928113
AI still has a way to go.
Speaking of Go. Playing that game is state of the art right now.
This is not an AI that generalizes and somehow learns what go is and how to win it. This is an AI with go specific data-structures, architectures, and learning algorithms built to only to deal with go. Involvement with, of course, expert go strategists to build the system.
So right now, we've only built something a lot better but only a little bit better than the deep-blue expert systems that beat Kasporov.
The algorithms used for the search in go are still adversarial minimax searches. The only leap is that we've statistically approximated better heuristics for the AI.
In reality, what the google go thing does(as impressive as it is) is closer to hardcoding than it is to general AI.
