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Future Shock

Page history last edited by Danila Medvedev 17 years, 8 months ago

When people are introduced to radically new ideas, they experience "future shock". Today we can deduce many things about the future, ranging from relatively simple, like PDAs and ubiquitous computing, to extremely radical, like molecular manufacturing and the Singularity.

 

People generally proceed through distinct "Future Shock Levels" starting with SL0 (familiar with 20th century technology), then SL1 (biotech, information technology), SL2 (immortality, major genetic engineering), SL3 (nanotechnology, human-level AI) and ending with SL4 (the Singularity, megascale engineering, etc.).

 

People exposed to ideas that are more than one level from what they are familiar with, will experience strong future shock. It is best to introduce your audience to ideas 1 SL from where they stand.

 

When people hear your explanations of expected future developments, they usually aren't aware of your long learning path to conclusions. Your chain of arguments starts where you were a few months (or a year) ago, not where these people stand. Premises that are obvious to you (mind is an information phenomenon arising from computational activity of neurons; supercomputers in 2030 will be able to simulate 10^10 human neurons in real time) are absolutely NOT obvious to the audience.

 

You have to start from the very simple level - SL0 or SL1, only very basic understanding of science, and guide your audience to more advanced levels of understanding.

 

Results of one contact

In a good lecture (such as our supertech lecture) you can probably bring people up from SL0-SL1 to SL2. In a long (4-5 hours) discussion in a small group (4-6 people) you can probably bring people from SL1 to SL3.

 

See also

 

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