 |
| Arthur C. Clarke |
The future is
unpredictable. The information revolution that began in the 80s with the personal
computer, followed in the 90s with the global expansion of the Internet,
and continued in the first decade of this century with the smartphones, came
as a surprise for many futurists. Half a century ago, all predictions agreed that
future computers would be larger. In fact, they became smaller. By 1965,
something like Internet seemed a
prediction for the next century (see the story by Arthur C. Clarke, Dial F for Frankenstein). Looking back, many of the
scientific advances of the twentieth century were surprising. Why then do we
insist on making predictions, if they are almost never met?
The March
2016 issue of the Spanish version of the journal Scientific American includes
an article entitled Neuroscience: how to avoid disappointment, by Professor Alfredo Marcos,
which reviews some of the modern predictions about research on the human brain,
which he considers far too optimistic. If these forecasts are not met, as can
be expected, the disappointment of the public and the governments that sponsor
and fund these scientific efforts could lead to a wave of excessive skepticism.
These are a few of his words:
However much we learn about the brain, we must not expect that
it will provide us with the immediate healing of all our medical and social ills,
from Alzheimer's to violence; much less with the keys to human existence.
Half a
century ago, the scientific world also abounded on optimistic forecasts that
were never fulfilled. I have considered them in other articles on this blog:
Some of these
supposedly
immediate predictions never came true. A few (very few) have been fulfilled.
In some fields, such as space exploration, it is clear that the expected advances
were not achieved: for instance, by 2000 we were supposed to have built colonies
on Mars. Just compare what actually happened with the film 2001, A Space Odyssey. Following the success of the
Apollo project to put a man on the moon, the subsequent disappointment was
evident and led to an almost complete abandonment of space exploration, which was
confined to space telescopes, automatic interplanetary capsules, and the space
station, a far less ambitious achievement than was foreseen at that time.
But as man is the only animal who stumbles
twice on the same stone, we find ourselves flooded by an avalanche of optimistic
predictions about immediate scientific advances, covering virtually all fields
of science:
- In physics, we are told that we
know practically everything and what little remains will be discovered
shortly.
- In medicine, we
are about to beat cancer and to
achieve immortality.
- In biology, the deciphering of the human genome
will soon put an end to all genetic diseases. We are also about to create
synthetic life, which will lead us to fulfill the myth of Frankenstein:
making
human beings from a genome stored in a computer.
- In neuroscience (see the quotation and article
by Alfredo Marcos) we will soon be able to cure all our medical and
social problems related to the brain.
- In computer science, we are about to create strong
artificial intelligence and will soon be able to download our
consciousness into a computer (another non-medical way to achieve
immortality).
 |
| Ray Kurzweil |
Summarizing,
in the words of Ray Kurzweil, the
singularity is near. Or in those of Nick Bostrom, we are about to reach superintelligence
and transhumanism.
All these
things are forecast for an extraordinarily immediate future: some for 2030;
others, at the latest, by 2050 or 2100. Many people who are alive today should be
able to see them. I do not think I am excessively pessimistic if I anticipate
that at least 80% of these predictions will not be fulfilled. What will happen
when this is evident? Will the subsequent disappointment lead to the collapse
of scientific research, at least in some fields? I’m afraid we are running that risk.
Manuel Alfonseca
No comments:
Post a Comment