Robert Hickson • Nov 13, 2016 •
SingularityU’s summit happens in Christchurch this coming week. It’s purpose is to see how to “… thrive in an exponentially changing world” I’m not a fan of SingularityU. They seem overly enamoured with exponential change, rather than taking a more considered approach to looking towards the future. However, as an event to highlight emerging technological trends it is … Read More
Robert Hickson • Jun 26, 2016 •
In my previous post I noted that the last 90 years saw a tremendous amount of change. Are the next 90 going to be as, or more, turbulent? Or as “golden”? Given that no one in 1926 could predict what the world in 2016 would be like, what’s the point now of looking ahead? One reason is … Read More
Robert Hickson • May 25, 2016 •
In one of my very first Ariadne posts I referred to the prediction pundits. You have, perhaps, noticed the prevalence of this species in the technology world. In a recent newsletter the folks at CB Insights have called this the pundit industrial complex, and illustrate it with various headlines about the future market size for drones and virtual … Read More
Robert Hickson • May 21, 2016 •
Here’s a really absurd mis-reading of biology from a Professor of History in a Huffington Post interview: The whole of biology since Darwin can be summarized in three words: “Organisms are algorithms.” I wasn’t aware that we were living in the Matrix. This is the type of talk you most commonly hear from Silicon Valley folk talking or writing about technological progress and what … Read More
Robert Hickson • Jan 20, 2016 •
It’s Davos time again. As usual the World Economic Forum publish their Global Risks Report to coincide with that. Source: World Economic Forum http://reports.weforum.org/global-risks-2016/shareable-infographics/ Also as usual, it mostly seems to be the here and now issues that pop to the top. That’s not surprising, given that it is based on a perceptions survey. It … Read More
Robert Hickson • Dec 24, 2015 •
Tis the season of prediction. However, the Wonkblog “re-discovers” a whimsy from 1893 predicting the future of fashion. The original article, written by W. Cade-Gall, has popped up previously. The revealed truth from a dreaming gentleman in Cade-Gall’s piece is that during the 20th Century the “immutable laws” of fashion were discovered, and fashion became a science … Read More
Robert Hickson • Nov 18, 2015 •
Why is it more commonplace to attempt to predict technological developments, but not to be as speculative about cultural changes? Tom Vanderbilt, writing in the Nautilus, discusses this. I’ve touched on this previously (and here) but Vanderbilt does it in more depth. He suggests that we both fail to notice some changes, and fail to … Read More
Robert Hickson • Nov 13, 2015 •
An article by Lee Billings in the September edition of Nautilus caught my attention this week. While it looked at some of the forgotten work of Polish science fiction writer and philosopher Stanislaw Lem (someone I haven’t, yet, read), what struck me most was Billings’ phrase “commodified futurism”. He applied this to “Silicon Valley billionaires”, and meant those … Read More
Robert Hickson • Oct 16, 2015 •
Everyone’s got their own view on what are, or will be, the greatest inventions or most disruptive technologies. Live Science offer up their top 10 inventions that changed the world, though no clear criteria for why these 10 and not others are the top. Other sites do the same, with varying degrees of overlap, but similarly opaque criteria. Another … Read More
Robert Hickson • Oct 08, 2015 •
It’s a good time to be alive, on many counts. BBC’s Horizons show looks back on the progress of some of the technology developments that they covered over the past five years. That’s great, because often we only hear about the hype and hope at the start of a new development, and not what transpires later … Read More