The Speculist

Seven Questions with Stephen Gordon

New Posse member Stephen Gordon has provided his answers to our Seven Questions About the Future. His answers were so interesting and thought-provoking, I thought I should put them up here where more of you will see them.

1. The present is the future relative to the past. What's the best thing about living here in the future?

   The Chinese supposedly have an ancient curse: "may you live in interesting times."

   http://hawk.fab2.albany.edu/sidebar/sidebar.htm

   Perhaps we've been cursed, perhaps blessed, but there is no end to avenues to pursue today if you are intellectually engaged. Do you have an interest in politics? Word is that there's an election this year. Are you a hawk or a dove? Either way, you'll want to keep up-to-date on the war. Science? It's impossible to keep up. Do you want to find a date but you're only interested in Jewish cowboys who have a passion for lawn darts? Kiss.com probably has five to choose from. Traveling, shopping, working and playing have all been changed by one development – The Internet.

   When I graduated college in 1991 few of my class outside of the computer department had ever heard of the Internet. When I told a college student last year that I first logged onto the Internet two years after graduation she looked at me with a certain amount of pity. For her, college IS the Internet - instant access to knowledge 24/7.

   The rise of blogging makes our relationship with information even more intimate. Blogging allows instant reporting/analysis of the news. Memes can rise, become either conventional wisdom or be discredited before print editions can even run.

   So, absolutely, the neatest thing about living "in the future" today is the communication/information revolution brought about in the last ten years by mainstream adaptation of the Internet.

2. What's the biggest disappointment?

   When I was about seven years old I had an uncle tell me that by the time I got to college there'd probably be learning machines that would zap knowledge straight into my brain. That idea sent shivers of uber-cool down my spine. And I still want to be able to dial the operator and tell him that I need to be able to speak Japanese and ZAP! Matrix-style I'm ready to go.

   Alas, we don't have that yet. I would guess that this sort of technology is singularity-related (it will either a close cause or product of the singularity). So for now, the Internet will have to do.

   
   

3. Assuming you die at the age of 100, what will be the biggest difference be between the world you were born into and the world you leave?

   I must start by saying that I doubt the premise of the question. Not, necessarily because I doubt that I will live that long (I have a long-shot of living 66 years more even with today's technology), but because if I manage to stay alive another 34 years I will probably live to be much older than 100. Such is the nature of exponential advances in all fields of knowledge – including geriatric medicine.

   So I'll let that be my answer to your question. By my 100th birthday senescence will be optional (and I'm guessing a not very popular option). This will be a huge civilization-shaking change. Objectively death is the loss of a unique individual that cannot be replaced and the loss of a huge body of knowledge. Subjectively death is even more catastrophic. And the process of getting there is no joy ride either.

   Whether this will be the biggest difference is, by definition, impossible to forecast if you believe as I that the singularity will occur within the next 66 years.

   
   

4. What future development that you consider likely (or inevitable) do you look forward to with the most anticipation?

   USAToday published an editorial by the head of the National Cancer Institute saying that its realistic goal to eliminate suffering and death by cancer by the year 2015.

   Here's the address:

   http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2004-01-21-cancer_x.htm

   Over 500,000 Americans die each year from cancer. A cure will happen. But faster, please.

   
   

5. What future development that you consider likely (or inevitable) do you dread the most?

   A year and a half ago

   http://www.nature.com/nsu/020708/020708-17.html

   a team of scientist demonstrated that viruses can be assembled from scratch with chemicals readily available through mail order. Worse, "the gene sequences for ebola, influenza, smallpox, HIV and many other viruses are publicly available on the Internet."

   A nuclear bomb requires facilities that are huge and, therefore, difficult to fund and hard to hide. A virus-based WMD program could be put together in a trailer house.

   My answer is not to outlaw this research but to push it forward faster. Preserving life is always more difficult than destroying it, but the same researchers that showed us that virus construction is possible may be able to help us defend against a man-made viral attack.

   
   

6. Assuming you have the ability to determine (or at least influence) the future, what future development that you consider unlikely (or are uncertain about) would you most like to help bring about?

   Nanotech is a very exciting field (or group of fields). And of all the possible nanotech developments that are within our near-term grasp "peptide nanotubes that kill bacteria by punching holes in the bacteria's membrane" excites me the most.

   http://www.techcentralstation.com/122303C.html

   We are losing the antibiotic arms race against bacteria. There are already bacterial strains for which the only treatment is to excise the infected tissue. It is only a matter of time before some highly contagious air-borne bacteria that is resistant to all antibiotics strikes us down by the millions… Unless some development like this one intervenes.

   If this develops I think it will be very difficult for bacteria to evolve resistance to it. All bacteria require the protection of their cell encasement. I can't imagine a mutation that would provide a defense to a battering ram that breaches that protection.

   
   

7. Why is it that in the year 2004 I still don't have a flying car? When do you think I'll be able to get one?

   While we've made remarkable strides in small scale technology – circuitry, the human genome, nanotech, it seems like we've lost ground with the big macho stuff. We haven't been to the moon in 30 years; we can't buy tickets to fly supersonic anymore.

   While we're discovering inner space and creating cyberspace, we've done so little with outer space. Maybe this is a necessary retreat – a pause to let technology catch up with our aspirations. But I'm inclined to believe rather that its a lack of aspiration.

   One piece of evidence that it's the latter: we've never tested artificial gravity. I'm not talking about exotic tech here. I'm talking about the kind created by spinning. This would require no technology that we don't presently have. Heck, take two Apollo era capsules, tether them together and spin away. Each capsule would then have gravity of sorts. We know we are going to need to do this to go to Mars. Astronauts can't take zero G for a year and a half before exerting themselves on Mars.

   So why hasn't this been tested? Because NASA hasn't had the courage or the vision to do it.