This weeks we had 4 presentations which are pretty interesting.
The first group was on electronic commence. The method of shopping was changing in recent years. In the past, if a person wanted to buy anything, one has to go to a physical shop to choose. Now, everything is online which is more convenient for shopper and it gives the shopper more choice as the ‘shop’ can be across multiple borders.
The second presentation was on e-dating. This is another way of which the internet has helped to simplified our lives. In most developed countries, people’s lives are getting busier and busier to the point that it is becoming harder for people to meet their ideal partner. E-dating allows people to find others of the same interest thus simplifying the dating process and increasing ones chance of finding his/her soul mate.
The third group covered kinetic motions and how kinetic technology has the potential to change our life. The most interesting was the tiles which when people step on will convert the kinetic energy to electric energy. This will allow us to produce truly green energy.
The last group covered GN food. GN food has allowed us to increase our food production drastically so as to allow us to keep up with the food demands of the world. Now, we have the chance to take it a step further and produce food with high minerals and vitamins.
This weeks groups were interesting and I cannot wait for next weeks presentations
It was a rather interesting lesson this week as we learn about new ways to forecast the new and upcoming changes and how we should respond to it. We mus keep in mind that not all changes are in for the long run as some changes are only temporary as there will be other technologies that will come out and replace them.
One thing we must always keep in mind is that we must always look towards the future or we will always be catching up with it. One way to do so is to look at mega trends. This means to take a macro look at things ad observe the mega trends. This will allow us the ability to see what the current trends are and try to extrapolate them into the future.
Of course such extrapolations are not always accurate as there can be disruptive changes which may upset all forms of forecasting. We must always be prepared for such changes as they are the ones most likely to change how people do things and will have the highest tenacities to dictate how people do things in the future and if we are able to anticipate the change, we will be able to exploit such changes.
Recently, there has been more and more upcoming technologies that can change our world from simple AIs to new sources of energy.
These new technologies are poised to be disruptive as they can severely affect the way we do things. For example, Virtual reality can replace our need for human interaction as more and more people will communicate with the online world and forget about face to face interaction.
Such changes must be embraced for us to live in the new and upcoming world yet we must be aware of the dangers that such technology bring. Mayhap the governments can set up regulation bodies in order to moderate such technologies and ensure that they are not misused.
This week’s discussion was on energy and how it affected the world.
Currently, the world is generating energy through the use of fossil fuels which not only are not renewable, also pollute the environment and cause global warming.
The world’s primary way of generating energy now is unsustainable. We will burn out all our resources by about 2050. This would mean that our children and grandchildren would not have the resources they need to grow. It may lead to another dark ages for humanity.
A lot of the world’s attention is now on green ways to create energy. The so called green revolution. The Obama administration has been saying that it is a sector that will produce jobs and china is the world’s greatest investor in green tech.
Yet ironically, some of these countries do not sign the kyoto protocol cause they say that it will hinder their growth. Furthermore, with the world current financial crisis, most of the world governments have either scaled back or retracted past promises of investments into this sector.
To go green, not only does it involve the government, the people also need to play a part. We must be able to lower our demand of energy. Not only that, we msut be able to accept a higher cost of energy. Right now, all our energy cost are just the base cost of burning fossil fuels,
It does not include the external cost of burning the fossil fuel. One way which the governments had tried to internalise the external cost is the use of carbon taxes but without a global imitative, the high polluting industries will just move to countries that are not under such a scheme which defeats its purpose once again.
Companies should also play a part by investing money into trying to make their processes green. Not only will these result in lower energy costs as their processes are more efficient, they may also be able to market their innovative processes and sell them.
In recent years, the biotechnology sector has been expanding at an accelerating rate. In the past, most of the biotechnological spending were in improving agriculture yields but now more emphasis is being placed in other sectors like the industrial one. While spending on other industries is still little as compared to the agriculture sector, they have been growing exponentially over the years.
In the agriculture sector, the most common application of biotech would be the use of GM food. Over the years,shrinking pieces of arable land due to desertification and mismanagement of arable land. The use of GM food has allowed us to increase our yields over the years despite having less arable land.
In the industrial sector, the use of biotech has allowed us to produce new materials. This has led us to be able to produce a new range of environmentally safe products. This includes things like bio-degradable plastics. This allows us to reduce waste in the environemnt and allows us to reuse materials.
Biotechnology plays a huge role in our current lifestyle and will continue to do so in the future
Healthcare is recently becoming a more important aspect of government policies. In the US, it takes up abt 16% of the government spending in 2007 and it continues to rise. Even in Singapore, health care cost are rising at a rapid pace. It was assumed that as our technology gets better, health care cost will go down but that’s not really the case.
As our technology improved, more and more people are demanding healthcare. For example, in the past cataracts surgery was very troublesome and uncomfortable but now it is very fast and efficient. As a result, more and more people are undergoing the surgery for a better lifestyle. This has increased the healthcare cost due to increase demand of such surgeries.
The current IP laws are also untenable. When in the past, they are used to generate incentive for people to go into R&D. Nowadays, they stifle the R&D industry and make it hard for those who desperately need the drug to be unable to get it. This is because the firms, using the patents, set very high prices on the medicines under the pretext of high cost of research. Furthermore, other firms are not allowed to produce generic versions of the drugs due to the patents. This system has to change as many people ,who could be saved, are dying because they have no access to these drugs.
Currently, a lot of money is going into extending a human’s last few years of life and much lesser is in the early stages of life. This is especially so in the USA where millions of dollars are being poured into extending the lives of those who are on the last stages of their lives and little is being done( comparatively) for those in the early stages of their lives.
Aloysius Tan
Technology and World Change Individual Topical Review Paper Outline:
Nanomachines
Specific Innovation of Interest
Imagine a day where any injury you get heals immediately, where you can connect wireless to any network through your brain, where the lines of virtual reality and reality becomes blurred, where you never age as ur cells regenerate indefinitely and perfectly. It has been a dream of most sci-fi writers and it is a dream that may come true. I have decided on nanomachines as my topical review paper as it is the up and coming thing.. Nanotechnology was originally envision as a tool to manipulate individual atoms and molecules but now it can be used a myrid of other purposes.
Rationale for Selecting this Innovation
Nanomachines have applications in many fields including medical and military. For example, one can use nanomachines to kill cancer cells thus removing the need for chemotherapy. Another example would be self replicating nanomachines, more commonly seen in sci-fi, which can repair buildings thus reducing the need to mailtain the buildings. While no feasible nanomachines have been created so far, millions of dollars are being poured into its research. I decide to choose this due to the huge impact of nanomachines and if a feasible prototype is invented, it will change the world for if we can manipulate the atoms themselves, we will have unlimited resources in this world.
Proposed approach to development of paper:
•Executive Summary
– Reasons I chose it
– Brief origins of nanomachines
– List of possible impacts that it may have
•Background/Introduction
– Definition of nanotechnology
– Reasons of the fascination with nanomachines
•Historical Perspective
– What was the status before machines became smaller
– Timeline from the conceptualization of the idea to the current state
•Current Situation
– The current status of nanomachines research
– Detailed elaboration of the multiple approaches of research into nanomachines
– Regulations against nanomachines
•Future Considerations
– Possible impacts of nanomachines across multiple sectors of civilization. (both positive and negative)
•Conclusions
– Summary of entire paper
Information and communications technology has been a huge driver for world change especially for globalisation. The ability to communicate with anyone anywhere in the world has ” shrunk” our world. With this ability, efficiency has been improved since we can share knowledge regardless of borders. While there have been a few governments who have been trying to restrict their citizens use of such technology by banning sites and such, one can see that they are not doing a very good job as the only way to restrict is to remove the technology in the first place.
Of course, there is the negative side to ICT. Due to the increasing ease of sharing information, there has been increasing piracy. ICT is an amplifier. In the correct hands, it can do a lot of good but in the wrong hands, it can do a lot of damage. ICT has increased the ease of identity thief, cons, bullying and such.
Currently, our technology has allowed us to have near instantaneous communication almost regardless where you are in the world. Firstly there was the telegraphs. This allowed for quick transmission of data over long distance. Then came the telephone which allowed voice transmission. With the invention of the internet, telegrams became obsolete as more and more people use emails. And now with the internet comes video conferencing tools and social media which enables people to stay in touch and see each other over long distances.
So where would ICT proceed in the future? In the short term, the only foreseeable thing will be improvement to our current networks to ensure that they are able to cope with the increasing demand. As for the long term, one just need to delve into the realm of sci-fi . There may be holograms which enables you to see the 3d image of the people you are talking to. There may also be the ability to touch and feel the other persons over the distance by plaing around with the nervous systems. There is also the possibility of wormholes or teleportation technology being available. The possibilities are endless.
Technology has been a important driver of world change from when we were hunter- gathers to recently the dotcom boom. With every improvement or breakthrough in technology, the world has changed.
Regardless whether the change has been beneficial or detrimental, we must learn to embrace it and not shun away from it. In this world where technology is ever-changing and what is considered hi-tech now will soon become outdated in months, we must learn to not only keep up but be at the forefront of the technological changes or we risk being outdated and left behind.
One key example would be Nokia, which a few years back was the dominant player in the mobile phone industry, is now losing market share to their competitors. One must keep in mind that to continue to be a dominant player in any industry, one must be able to keep up with the times and not be chained down by the past.
Yet even with the need to keep up with technology, one must always keep in mind about the cost of the technology. As with the previous post, sustainable development is getting more important. Besides environmental concerns, one must also keep in mind the ethical concerns of technology and be very careful especially when humans start playing god.
The world is changing rapidly and it is easy to be overwhelmed by the constant changes in technology. Yet keeping up with technology is now a prerequisite to survive in today’s world. Singapore is nicely placed to thrive in today’s world due to our huge emphasis on knowledge- based economy.
Sustainable development has been the rage in recent years especially since governments all over the world are beginning to acknowledge the fact that our current rate of industrialisation will cause our future generations to run out of resources. Not only that, there is also global warming to consider.
More and more countries are following the tried and tested way of growth without any regard for the environment. This has been seen in cases like China where rapid industralistaion has caused heavy smog in Beijing even though in recent years the situation has been improving.
Our fossil fuels are not unlimited. In fact, there are some estimates that our oil supplies will last for another 40 years. While this may not be true, the fact that our oil supplies are running out is still true. We must take steps to safeguard the future of our descendants or they may enter another dark ages.
These days there has been growing support for the so called ” green tech” which allows us to produce renewable energy. The ironic thing about this is that the technology exists quite a while back but there has been no motivation for any companies or government to adopt it until recently. Take for example the car industries. Before this century, the tech to produce cars that does not produce so much greenhouse gases was already around. Yet they only started to produce these cars at the turn of the century. This is mostly due t the fact that there was no consumer demand for such products back then.
In the end, it is us the consumers who determine the fate of our future generations. The government can only do so much and most companies are only concerned about their profit margin. We must think of the future whenever we do anything for the fate of our descendants lie in our hands.
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