technological forecasting

"A stark and urgent warning on the unprecedented risks that a wave of fast-developing technologies poses to global order, and how we might contain them while we have the chance-from a cofounder of the pioneering AI company DeepMind. Imagine a world in which anyone with a $20,000 desktop DNA synthesizer could develop and unleash a deadly virus. Imagine an undetectable deepfake video of a U.S. president making a racial slur racing across the internet on the eve of an election. Imagine terrorists or paramilitaries stockpiling autonomous weapons designed to make their own decisions about when to engage. As cofounder of DeepMind, the pioneering AI company now owned by Google, Mustafa Suleyman has witnessed firsthand just how rapidly our technology is advancing-and how flawed our approaches to grappling with these changes are. The coming decades, he argues, will be defined by a burst of innovation, an inevitable wave of powerful, fast-proliferating new technologies across fields like synthetic biology, artificial intelligence, and quantum computing. Driven forward by immense strategic and financial incentives, these breakthroughs will solve huge challenges and create vast wealth-but upheaval, too, on a once unimaginable scale. Will humankind make it through the narrow corridor between dystopia and catastrophe? In The Coming Wave, Suleyman shows how this new technological super-wave fits a historical pattern of innovation and proliferation, while departing from it in key ways: namely, the speed of change, the breadth of risks, and the wave's potential to democratize access to dangerous, world-altering power. The cumulative risks threaten the very nation state, humanity's centuries' old "grand bargain" of living under centralized authority in exchange for security. As our fragile governments sleepwalk into catastrophe, humanity is left in an existential bind, with techno-authoritarianism on one side and even more catastrophic outcomes, like societal collapse, on the other. We are about to cross a critical threshold in the history of our species. In this groundbreaking book from the ultimate AI insider, Suleyman firmly establishes "the containment problem"-or the challenge of maintaining human control over dangerous technologies-as the essential dilemma of our age, showing that radical steps must be taken if we are to live alongside technology of once unimaginable power"--.

Robot dogs! Jet packs! Cyborgs! Super-sleek space suits! It's not science fiction, it's science reality. And soon, it may be part of everyday life. This book is a jam-packed collection of the coolest tech and wildest ideas that are shaping the world of tomorrow.

An assessment of the revolutionary potential of artificial intelligence and robotics traces how technology arrived at this point and how artificial life, machine consciousness, extreme prosperity, and technological warfare will be hotly debated issues of the near future.

"What has A.I. brought us? Where will it lead us? The story of A.I. is the story of intelligence--of life processes as they evolve from bacteria (1.0) to humans (2.0), where life processes define their own software, to technology (3.0), where life processes design both their hardware and software. We know that A.I. is transforming work, laws, and weapons, as well as the dark side of computing (hacking and viral sabotage), raising questions that we all need to address"--Provided by publisher.

"From a top scientist and the creator of the hugely popular web comic Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, a hilariously illustrated investigation into future technologies--from how to fling a ship into deep space on the cheap to 3D organ printing. What will the world of tomorrow be like? How does progress happen? And why do we not have a lunar colony already? What is the holdup? In this smart and funny book, celebrated cartoonist Zach Weinersmith and noted researcher Dr. Kelly Weinersmith give us a snapshot of what's coming next--from robot swarms to nuclear-fusion-powered toasters. By weaving their own research, interviews with the scientists who are making these advances happen, and Zach's trademark comics, the Weinersmiths investigate why these technologies are needed, how they would work, and what is standing in their way. New technologies are almost never the work of isolated geniuses with a neat idea. A given future technology may need any number of intermediate technologies to develop first, and many of these critical advances may appear to be irrelevant when they are first discovered. The journey to progress is full of strange detours and blind alleys that tell us so much about the human mind and the march of civilization. To this end, SOONISH investigates ten different emerging fields, from programmable matter to augmented reality, from space elevators to robotic construction, to show us the amazing world we will have, you know, soonish."--Jacket.

Explore the possibilities in the next one hundred years of space travel with Luna Li, including space elevators, galactic hotels, and interplantary travel and exploration.

From solar-powered parking lots to algae biofuels, find out what types of power sources the people of the future may tap into. Power up with Luna Li to see what the next 100 years of energy may have in store for the human race.

From robotic nurses to designer babies, the future of medicine may take some unbelievable twists and turns. Step into the future with Luna Li to find out how medical care may change in the next 100 years.

Argues that technological innovations in artificial intelligence, robotics computing, biology and other growing technologies will improve the future of humanity.

Contains speculative stories about robots and chapters on designing a robot.