Researchers at the Global Challenges Foundation released earlier this month a thorough and unsettling look at what threatens human civilization. Continue reading… “Top 12 threats to human civilization”
The fear of artificial intelligence
Our Fear of Artificial Intelligence
A true AI might ruin the world—but that assumes it’s possible at all.
By Paul Ford
Years ago I had coffee with a friend who ran a startup. He had just turned 40. His father was ill, his back was sore, and he found himself overwhelmed by life. “Don’t laugh at me,” he said, “but I was counting on the singularity.” Continue reading… “The fear of artificial intelligence”
Four Rules for Game Testing Our Way to a Better Future
Futurist Thomas Frey: At a recent video game tournament in Denver called ClutchCon, I was moderating a panel discussion on the future of video games, and we got into the topic of leveraging the time and energy spent playing video games into a “wisdom of crowds” approach for solving the world’s problems.
Continue reading… “Four Rules for Game Testing Our Way to a Better Future”
37 Critical Problems that need to be Solved for Drone Delivery to become Viable
Futurist Thomas Frey: It all started when Toni, one of our staffers working on our flying drone workshop, asked me a simple question. She asked, “Since I live in an apartment complex, if I order something to be delivered by drone, where would they leave the package?”
Continue reading… “37 Critical Problems that need to be Solved for Drone Delivery to become Viable”
Harvard professors: Privacy is dead and it’s never coming back
Imagine a world where a department store knows from your buying habits that you’re pregnant even before your family does or mosquito-sized robots fly around stealing samples of your DNA. Continue reading… “Harvard professors: Privacy is dead and it’s never coming back”
Technological Unemployment and our Need for Micro Colleges
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bKtsK-PRYA[/youtube]
Futurist Thomas Frey: Business owners today are actively deciding whether their next hire should be a person or a machine. After all, machines can work in the dark and don’t come with decades of HR case law requiring time off for holidays, personal illness, excessive overtime, chronic stress or anxiety.
Continue reading… “Technological Unemployment and our Need for Micro Colleges”
What we can learn about the future through reading science fiction books
What I Learned About the Future by Reading 100 Science Fiction Books
By Tiago Forte:
Over the past two years I’ve read 100 sci-fi novels, averaging about one per week. See the full list here, with my favorites. I started reading sci-fi to pass the time. I had good memories of readingJurassic Park as a kid. I continued because I noticed that it gave me something: a stronger imagination, a disrespect for the merely possible. Continue reading… “What we can learn about the future through reading science fiction books”
Ray Kurzweil believes we don’t need to fear artificial intelligence
Ray Kurzweil: Stephen Hawking, the pre-eminent physicist, recently warned that artificial intelligence (AI), once it surpasses human intelligence, could pose a threat to the existence of human civilization. Elon Musk, the pioneer of digital money, private spaceflight and electric cars, has voiced similar concerns.
Continue reading… “Ray Kurzweil believes we don’t need to fear artificial intelligence”
Top 10 Articles on ImpactLab.net
The articles posted on the Impact Lab represent an unusual mix, all of which are oriented around future trends, future thinking, or recent innovations that may more may not alter the course of history.
With that in mind, here are the posts that caught most people’s attention over 2014.
Our Newest Unit of Measure – 1 Human Intelligence Unit – and Why it will Never Happen
Futurist Thomas Frey: I’ve been closely watching the debate on artificial intelligence with people like Rodney Brooks saying it’s only a tool, and others like Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking giving bone chilling warnings of how it could lead to the destruction of all humanity.
Is the realtor an endangered species?
So far real estate brokers have done very well in the Internet era.
Last month, around 18,000 people gathered in New Orleans to look at the future of real estate brokerage. Inside the massive Ernest N. Morial Convention Center booth after booth at the 2014 Realtors Conference & Expo extolled the joys and efficiencies of the new electronic economy and the technologies which can make brokers and lenders more efficient and profitable.
The technology-driven future will bring upheaval and opportunity
Futurist Thomas Frey
Thomas Frey, executive director and senior futurist at the DaVinci Institute estimates that billions of jobs will disappear in the next 15 years due to the Internet of Things (IoT) and many associated technological advances, but these extreme and accelerating changes will also create many new industries and countless new jobs to replace those they’ve eliminated.
Continue reading… “The technology-driven future will bring upheaval and opportunity”