Paul Krugman: A famous economist and Nobel Prize winner claimed in 1998 that by 2005 the internet would have no greater impact than the fax machine on global economics. This claim was based on a counterargument he had made regarding Metcalfe’s Law, which states that the sum of connections in any network is the square of its participants; Krugman argued that this model was flawed regarding the internet - most people had nothing to say to one another
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The weekly Throwback Thursday thread! A place to discuss past predictions of the future and their outcomes.
Absolutely terrific! I can’t wait to see them painted. Are you going for the original colours from the cardboard ones?
Legendary! Thanks so much I will enjoy these
Thanks so much for your input! You make some very valid points about the integrity of the paper and trends in academic publishing in general. I must admit I am a bit of a casual when it comes to academia so it’s valuable to have people like yourself here to scrutinise the information we discuss!
Same here! Such a nostalgic throwback. I recall one bit about robots not being able to walk upright due to the amount of calculations needed to keep their balance, “it would be decades before they will walk the way we do” and then Asimo was unveiled
Let’s start a new thing! Throwback Thursday, a pinned weekly post where we can discuss past predictions and how accurate they were now that we are living in the future!
What happened to the Moller Sky Car? Are our Jetsons video watches available sooner than we thought they’d be? Where’s my domestic household nuclear reactor?
I wonder how long we would have to wait after capturing a planet and inserting it into the suns habitable zone before we can live on it? I imagine there would be a very turbulent period where it would need to settle in to the new gravity and radiation environment
Awesome thanks for the info! Which filaments did you use?
Excellent summary! Yes the obsolescence will be a massive problem given the high-risk nature of any procedure to access the cranial vault. I can’t see this technology moving out of the therapeutic realm until viable non-invasive alternatives exist, I feel people will be much more comfortable to experiment with this tech once they know they can simply switch it off or detach it without risking their biology. I can see a cultural shift occurring with the advent of this type of technology, from short sighted consumerism to something a bit more holistic and long-term
I agree, the creators will have considerable influence over the robots but what I am wondering is to what extent that power will be curbed if a charter of rights is developed for the robots? The creators’ motivations will no doubt be driven by profit and the promise of inexhaustible labour. I think it is possible that the robots may end up with rights as a way to protect human workers, in the sense that they need to be more difficult to exploit in order to reduce their ability to compete with humans. In that way the robots could even receive rights before they develop sufficient sentience to appreciate them
I suppose that will be based on what we consider their rights to be. Perhaps an employer will still have some kind of obligation to the welfare of these robots in the sense that they will require maintenance and protection of the integrity of the hardware and software
Oh. My. God.
Well put. I imagine they will be programmed with that as a constraint. The fourth law of robotics
Sorry! in English “how did/do you find” something also means what is your opinion on something. I meant to ask what do you think of the driveline, is it strong, easy to lubricate, did the parts fit well? I’ve been thinking of building one
Great stuff! How did you find their gearboxes and driveline strength?
That is a very good point, the world would be a far darker place if the concept of withholding labour hadn’t come about. Another question - what would make the robots want to strike?
Cobot: Coworker Robot. How do you think we will fare when the ‘new guy’ at work is a machine? As these machines become increasingly intelligent and closer to sentience, how will we share the spoils of our labour? Will we have the same rights in the workplace?
Or being forced to watch ads every hour unless they upgrade to vision+ monthly subscription
This is top notch activism! I almost ate that onion
What if that implant was capable of curing you of a disease, like blindness or paralysis?
The broader implications of brain-computer interfaces
![What happens to obsolete brain implants?](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/a1e4623f-ac71-4edd-9ff2-073334d49036.jpeg?format=webp&thumbnail=256)
As the field of implantable brain devices moves in leaps and bounds, there will come a time in the future when we will need to consider obsolescence of these devices, and as the implants grow in complexity and scope, will we eventually have to redefine our idea of what it is to be human?
People working on *suffering risks* or *s-risks* attempt to reduce the risk of something causing vastly more suffering than has existed on Earth so far. We think research to work out how to mitigate these risks might be particularly important. You may also be able to do important work by building th...
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This article proffers a fascinating matrix by which we can categorise and stratify the risk of suffering as a community in the future. Could this be the root of a new real-life Asimovian Psychohistory?
This is really interesting. There are already established methods in radiation oncology for the purpose of mapping lung movement to direct treatment, it’s amazing to see it in use to direct a mechanical device
An interesting article describing the first very real steps towards a linguistic exchange of ideas with an animal; perhaps the non-human intelligence we have been seeking was right beside us the whole time
Already overwhelmed ports could face new risks.
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YouTube Video
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In the future it may be commonplace to genetically test an embryo for the likelihood of certain diseases, but the technology can do so much more; where do we draw the line?
Should insect protein become the dietary norm of the future, how will our descendants feel about our reactions to the first insect aisle in the local supermarket? Could we perhaps be the last generation to be seen as true meat eaters?
Lithium extraction from batteries has so far proven to be notoriously difficult; this recently published paper outlines a novel method of extraction which may have a great impacts on how we manage lithium resources as the demand for power storage continues to surge.
New technologies have long promised to make human software engineers redundant. But developers have only gotten more important over time.
![ChatGPT Isn't Coming for Your Coding Job](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/d8306003-615e-4c43-a1d1-33e0fac104a7.jpeg?format=webp&thumbnail=256)
While we are locked once again in a heated debate about the future of our professions in the wake of ChatGPT, this article digs deep in to our past to reveal similar discussions surrounding of advancements in computer programming throughout history