How do you picture the world in 20, 50, 100 years? Professor of the New York University Michio Kaku shared his vision of the future with the students of the Kyiv Mohyla Academy. The charismatic physicist not only writes bestsellers, but also hosts programs on the TV channel Discovery “How the Universe Works” and “Sci Fi Science.” Kaku is one of the few serious scientists, who explain in simple language problems of theoretical physics and the universe. As a futurist he is trying to look into the future, but still remains not simply a dreamer but a recognized scientist.
Many feel that the medicine is something very complex that can’t be interpreted fully by a computer. In Kaku’s opinion, the medicine will change considerably in the future. Real doctors will perform surgeries from another room and will make incisions not on a body but on a tablet PC. Movements of their fingers will be mimicked by robots while operating real people. During a surgery doctors will look at the full scan of a patient’s body on a screen.
Toilets in the future will be more filled with technology than hospitals today. People will be able to run tests in there. Clothing will store your database and when you’ll put it on in the morning, you will immediately go online. The downside of all of these things is the complete lack of privacy.
Here arises the problem of a “big brother.” Still, the professor sees the positive aspects of the Information Society: “The countries that have Internet access will have significant development in science and will prosper. Those that won’t have it will be doomed for poverty. The reason for this is that now commodity capitalism is being gradually transformed into information capitalism.”
His statements may sound like lines from a science fiction novel by Ray Bradbury. Nevertheless, the author himself makes them without a hint of any doubt. Perhaps, it is this positiveness of his statements that make his theories so popular.
To a provocative question about where he might be afraid that machines will become highly intellectual and will begin to manage people, Kaku responded that people shouldn’t worry about it. First, this won’t happen any time soon because today’s robots have “cockroach intelligence.” Second, inevitably the time will come when people start thinking whether they really need machines or they can do just well without them. By law of a boomerang, the longer one nation controls the other, the longer it will be paying off its oppressor. In different ways. The same principle may apply also to machines. First they will work for people and then they will “get smarter” and the situation will change diametrically opposite in their favor. The writer Lewis Mumford in his Myth of the Machine warned that computers can deprive people of freedom and destroy “life-improving values.” Technology transforms people according to its needs, not the other way round.
However, there is always a choice in the course of the development. Nothing is impossible for a man if he acts prudently and is guided by the need of life. Michio Kaku told the students at the end: “Do not be afraid of discovery. People say that there are not enough jobs here. Some say that they can’t do anything about it. But if you see an opportunity, you better be the masters of your own lives. You can create new jobs and develop industry.”
