The possible advances in medicine, engineering and technology sound remarkable. However, nowhere in this lengthy report is there any suggestion on what 85% of earth’s inhabitants will be doing for a living. That fact of life has been given no consideration whatsoever. The old phrase was called ‘painting oneself into a corner’.
I will be too old (maybe) to care that much, but multitudes of people will need to have some short term, in your face reason for living, other than waiting for a new techy toy.
I predict there will be societies of people who defiantly chose to live as we now exist. Most people both work to live and live to work. This must be recognized as a legitimate human need, and not just joked away, calling them ‘Flat-Earthers’.
How about something like roads that could generate electricity by the friction of car tires? Or picture all road surfaces that when paved they become solar panels? Wire them up to mini power plants. Or desalination plants that also act as batteries?
Everyone will probably divide up into Morlock’s and Eloi.
The entire concept of “work” might change. As recently as 150 years ago, for 90% of us, work meant growing your own food and maintaining the land you grew it on and the animals that lived with you. People did not even dream of professions like “airline pilot”, “auto mechanic” or “software engineer”.
With automated farms and 3D printers, I suspect that a lot of people will be free to choose to follow their joy, whether that is creating books and art, research, athletic competition and coaching, entertainment, etc. There will also be a lot of people needed to keep nanos and robots working, supervising automated activities, pushing medical and science technology further, and designing the next “toy”. I’m sort of bummed that I will not be around to see it, unless the medical researchers step up their game a little quicker.
The workforce will evolve with the tech. Got to have people who maintain the machine somewhere in the process, and develop, and coordinate all matter of detail until they can program a machine to do that, and then there is still progress to be made that is inconceivable from today. Or can we all stop progress at the Amish point of technology?
interesting post
The real Amish already do that. Live as they did 100-200 years ago.