Our Technology Future - The Spiraling Introduction

I read and watch a lot of science fiction material. That was one of my early theoretical career paths – astrophysics and theoretical physics. Put simply I’m better at creating theories than I am at proving them. One of the things I think about a lot, considering my chosen career, is how science fiction interacts with reality. Because, many things once thought only fiction cross over into the real world, and become fact.

Theoretical physicist MichioKaku had a miniseries a few years ago that focused on various science fiction technologies and how the real-world application would likely work. The Science channel re-aired several of these episodes, covering topics like creating a Death Star, or creating a flying saucer (something more impressive than the Avrocar).

I tend to start thinking of how people would use these, and the applications of using these technologies in the social sphere. This begets the debate of social and technological inequity.

This topic came up last week in a slightly different way when Bill Gates criticized a theoretic effort from by Google to take internet access to impoverished parts of the world where there isn’t any infrastructure for internet access; eventually to locations in Africa and southern Asia. The Google idea is a rather simple, and for that reason elegant, idea to solve the problem of global internet access; balloons. They would be something similar to weather balloons, though obviously much more durable, and would essentially act as a hotspot floating in the sky.

But here was the point of Gates’ criticism; Google is looking to solve a non-problem, or at least a minor problem.

The internet is a powerful tool, and it can help to solve many problems in of itself. But to use the internet, one needs a device that can access the internet – PC or Smartphone. People living in remote regions where the government is dysfunctional at best, they hardly have reliable clean water, let alone electricity… what use is the internet to them?

We tend to make the false assumption that something as seemingly ubiquitous as the internet is easily available to everyone who wants it. Yet even in the U.S as much as half of the nation lacks access to the internet, mostly because of the cost of internet service. Connecting those people to the internet would likely prove to be a great economic boon. But in places like the Congo, or Uganda, or portions of the Philippines, where they are dodging horrible violence, struggle to get clean drinking water, suffer from sickness and disease, and earn pennies a day, floating internet providing balloons doesn’t really help many people.

The Bill and Melinda GatesFoundation have focused a lot of their resources on protecting people from Malaria, a mosquito-borne illness that kills over half a million people worldwide annually, and sickens many, many, more. Late last week it was announced that the U.S Navy, in cooperation with other scientific research organizations, seemed to have made a breakthrough in a Malaria vaccine that would be effective after only six doses. This means that if the probable vaccine works, six doses would make a person immune to Malaria. Vaccinate enough people and in the span of several years by way of treating people, you could plausibly eliminate Malaria. This is a significant step against the disease whose only counter thus far has been nets and insect repellent to keep away mosquitoes.

The question and challenge of course is how do you get that vaccine regiment to those who need it. Organizations like the Gates Foundation, and even Google if not indirectly through its philanthropic endeavors, will help to raise some money or donate some money towards paying for the medicine and administering that vaccine. But this is just a small reflection of the matter of where technology and society intersect.

Here’s an example to mull over; In the not too distant future, it is theorized that a person could become immortal by way of downloading their mind into a computer, regenerating a body to replace one’s aged or dying body, and re-upload the individual’s consciousness into that new body. The new movie Elysium that released a couple weeks ago is an example of the more dire prediction for how something like that would work (or so I’ve heard since I haven’t actually seen the movie). Who do we make available the technology to live forever? Is that something covered under the Affordable Care Act? Is that considered an elective procedure? Is it just allowable to whoever can afford it? This could potentially be a means of curing a person of cancer or any other rare or otherwise incurable disease; how much does that weigh in on opinion on what should be done?

Over the next couple weeks I will look at a few of these issues a little more closely. I’ll give some details about the technology, how it will likely be implemented, and the potential impact on society as a whole. I'll also give my opinion on whether or not it is really worth the time, money, effort, and resources being given to it.