| Announcements
 Happy
New Year
What great innovations will 2005 bring? We wish a prosperous,
peaceful, and insightful New Year to you and yours. Onward to
a faster future!
AC2004 Audio
Free
streaming and downloads courtesy of Doug Kaye and
our premiere media partner, IT Conversations. Check
here to see the AC2004 speaker archive to date (David
Brin, Helen Greiner, and Jim Spohrer).
More added every month. Feed your brain with these great presentations!
AC2K5:
Save the Dates!
Accelerating
Change 2005: IA and AI — Intelligence Amplification and Artificial
Intelligence, comes to Stanford University on September
16-18, 2005. Noted mathematician and science fiction author Vernor
Vinge will likely be one of our keynote speakers (to be
confirmed shortly). More on this in coming issues.
Dennis
Whipple Donation Fund
ASF videographer Dennis Whipple lost
his van to a car fire on the freeway earlier this month (a clogged
catalytic converter, be sure to change yours regularly!). He also
lost a lot of his recording equipment, which has been a major professional
loss, as he has no replacement insurance for these items. We are
very thankful to Dennis and Ted St. Rain for their
excellent work on our AC2004 DVD, to be announced soon.
Dennis
reports: "I lost 3 large 3-CCD Sony cameras, 2 large ITE professional
tripods, 2 TRV-900 Sony digital cameras, a home Sharp DV camera.
my Sharp DVD Recorder and portable DVD player with screen, and my
Telex Audio Duplicator (paid $2,900) along with other associated
accessories and who knows what personal items."
If
you'd like to help Dennis out this holiday season with a small donation,
that would make a major difference in his life. He has set up a
PayPal account under his e-mail
address: denniswhipple(at)yahoo.com.
The
Acceleration Story... in Five Spaces
This
year, our newsletter will cover world news and insight in five "Spaces."
We've chosen these five because the story of accelerating change,
the most fascinating story of our time, appears to a first approximation
to be a story of movement from outer, to human, to inner, to cyber,
and ultimately, to hyper space.
We
feel that each space deserves understanding by those who seek a
multidisciplinary perspective on the future, and we look forward
to covering all five as well as we can in coming years:
Outer
Space (science, universal and life history, the environment),
Human Space (non-computer technology, business,
health, social, and mind),
Inner Space (miniaturization, accelerating efficiencies
and autonomies of the microcosm),
Cyber Space (computer and communication technologies,
simulations)
Hyper Space (phase transitions, computational
limits, multiverse cosmology)
While
many of our stories could be multiply categorized, we'll try to
include at least one entry in each of these five spaces in every
issue. If you have stories to contribute, we'd love to hear from
you.
Outer
Space
Environment
Asian Tsunami Disaster and Early Warning Systems
 [Commentary
by John Smart] In the third paragraph of its first
cover story on Sunday's undersea earthquake disaster in Asia, the
Los Angeles Times
(12.27) noted that tsunami warning buoys would have provided several
hours of warning for residents in most coastal areas, but that the
warning network is still underdeveloped, especially in that section
of the world's oceans.
The
Times should be commended for putting their emphasis on
shortcomings in our technological infrastructure so early on in
their reporting of this disaster. Increasingly, we are coming to
realize that improving the transparency and reliability of our technology
is the single most achievable and cost-effective solution for so
many of our recurring problems.
Back
in 1999 Robert Roy Britt at Space.com wrote a prescient
article on tsunami warning systems (A
Way to Track Tsunamis from Way Up High) that was an early
warning system of its own. It recalled the 1998 tsunami in New Guinea
that killed 3,000, and the 1896 tsunami in Japan that killed 26,000.
It mentioned the importance of getting these up everywhere (a funding
problem), and of eliminating recurring false positives (an engineering
problem). From what I've read, these problems still persist today.
A
global warning system, and an emergency broadcast system that allowed
the autodialing of landline and cellphone numbers in every coastal
prefix, would seem like an excellent way to minimize loss of life
from tsunamis in the future. Cellphones are rapidly becoming ubiquitous
in emerging nations, driven by the massive price deflation in communications
technology. Once we had a digital emergency warning system, we could
use it to warn against other natural and human disasters as well.
Will the 2004 Asian Tsunami Disaster spur us to a new level of cooperation
and commitment in our emergency warning systems? I hope so. 114,000
are dead in coastal areas of 16 countries as of this writing. Let
us know if you hear of promising long-term developments along these
lines. Meanwhile, here is Google's listing of ways you can help
with tsunami
disaster relief.
Argo
Robotic Sub Network: Oceanic Transparency
[JS] Nice overview of autonomous robotic
submarines. What new efficiencies will these provide? Autonomous
mining of manganese nodules from the ocean floor? Prospecting and
recovery of deep sea fossil fuels? Continual census of undersea
life? Aquaculture? Thanks
to Iveta Brigis for this.
Evolutionary
Development
Eyes, Defense, and the Evolutionary Arms Race
[JS]
In
the Blink of an Eye, Andrew Parker, 2003
is a great book about the Cambrian Explosion. His thesis is that
the emergence of complex eyes was the primary force fueling this
famous explosion of animal body types half a billion years ago.
The whole thing occurred over just a few million years and then
it was over, the "optimal" forms having been discovered
(given the limitations of cell-based life).
As
this fascinating Guardian article (Natural
Defences, Nov 18, 2004) shows, this year Parker has been working
with Britain's Ministry of Defense and the Pentagon applying lessons
from the Cambrian evolutionary arms race to a global security models
for terrorist threats. I'm sure a lot of insight could come from
that approach.
Perhaps
one of the most useful insights might be how digital evolution will
develop as more and more computers acquire eyes and mental maps
(simulation spaces) that allow them to view and respond to the human
world. George Gilder's new book will be about Foveon,
that cutting edge digital imaging company that grew out of the neuromorphic
engineering labs of Carver Mead at CalTech.
What
will it mean when our computers can see better than we can? How
soon will all our cars come with vision chips that can see images
in the dark, and that connect up to automatic braking and collision
avoidance systems so that we can cut our traffic accidents in half?
What else will change when computers everywhere can see?
Human
Space
Education
Templeton Project on Educational
Acceleration
 [JS]
The Dec
2004 Templeton Foundation Newsletter has an excellent report
on their project to help accelerate bright youth in U.S. schools.
Acceleration involves grade skipping for smart youth who are bored
and underchallenged, and it strongly promotes a culture of excellence
in our school systems. Over the last several years the Foundation
has supported an extensive study of acceleration, which recently
culminated in the publication of the two volume report, A
Nation Decieved: How Schools Hold Back America's Brightest Students,
Nicholas Colangelo, Susan G. Assouline, and
Miraca U. M. Gross, 2004. (Report is free at http://www.nationdeceived.org/)
The authors conducted extensive studies of kids who have accelerated
in the past, and have shown that contrary to stereotype, these kids
are just as or even more well adjusted, and measurably more successful
than high functioning youth who were denied this option. They argue
that we need to stop holding our kids back if we want them to succeed.
Acceleration is one of the simplest mechanisms we have for reforming
our educational system, and Templeton has done a commendable job
of bringing this issue to public light.
Energy
Interview with David O'Reilly of ChevronTexaco
 [JS]
David O'Reilly, Chairman and CEO of ChevronTexaco,
gave an excellent interview to Charlie Rose 12.29.04.
The video is pricey ($30 at CharlieRose.com)
but may be worth buying if you would like to know more about energy,
a commonly misunderstood topic among futurists. Among the facts
as O'Reilly sees them:
1)
there are more proven oil reserves available today than in the
1980's.
2) gas is cheaper in real dollars today than it was at that time.
3) cars today are over 100X less polluting than in the 1960's.
4) 50% of U.S. electricity comes from coal-fired plants (there
are thousands of years of coal reserves globally).
5) A hydrogen transportation network looks quite unlikely for
the forseeable future, as the economics aren't there. They are
doing pilot projects in mass transit but they aren't promising.
6) the cheapest source for the hydrogen for hydrogen cars would
be natural gas reserves.
7) China is now the second largest oil importer after the U.S.,
and ahead of Japan. China used to be a net exporter but their
economy is growing so fast, and oil is still so cheap, that buying
has been easier than developing more fields, so far.
Accelerating
efficiencies in prospecting, extraction, refining, and use continue
to be the main story that keeps energy so tractable. Technological
efficiency is also the thing most environmental groups continue
to misjudge in their future scenarios: the emerging intelligence
of our planetary infrastructure. O'Reilly didn't cite any studies
that compare the projected needs of developing countries to projected
oil reserves, or discuss when he expects oil to become expensive
enough that we'll start switching to alternative sources, like gas
or liquifacted coal. If any of you have seen informed, technology-aware
studies on this, let us know.
There
are a number of underappreciated fossil fuel sources on the planet,
so much reserve capacity that we will probably never build robot
tankers to bring us liquified natural gas from Jupiter's atmosphere,
as Bucky Fuller suggested during the last Energy
supply crisis of the early 1970's. One of the most interesting sources
is methane hydrates (frozen methane under the continental shelf
at the ocean's edges). Conventional wisdom, which needs to be better
assessed, is that there is twice as much methane hydrate available
on Earth as all our oil, natural gas, and coal reserves combined.
That's a tremendous store of fossil fuel, if true.
There's
also an increasing suspicion that massive methane outgassing may
have been the prime cause of several of our past mass extinctions,
even including the K-T meteorite extinction! Fortunately the U.S.
DOE has a desire to assess both the potential risk to humans of
future outgassing from drilling, and how much complexity might be
involved in recovering gas hydrates in the future. ChevronTexaco
is leading the first
major effort to assess gas hydrates in the Gulf of Mexico, so
we should see some valuable data in a few years.
 From
what I watched (tuned in late), O'Reilly didn't share his opinion
on biodiesel as a way of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Folks
like the National Biodiesel
Board are promoting the model that biodiesel can cut life-cycle
CO2 emissions for engines by up to 78% by comparison to conventional
fossil fuels. Efficiencies in biodiesel production and use are also
accelerating. What role should home-grown fuels like biodiesel play
in our future energy economy?
I'd
also like to know his—and your—thoughts on carbon sequestration
technologies, if we decide to sequester, rather than reduce our
carbon emissions. Apparently two of the major ways our planet has
traditionally kept CO2 within a narrow range is:
1)
biosequestration, the creation of additional biomass (algae, etc.)
that traps the extra atmospheric carbon in plant bodies, and
2) geosequestration, the creating of calcium carbonate deposits
that eventually subduct back into the earth's mantle (via plate
tectonics).
So
will the main result of more CO2 in the atmosphere be a greener
earth? Is there an efficient way to turn algae farms into limestone?
That sounds like a great biotechnology project. If so, could each
country that burns fossil fuels be responsible for their own bio
and geosequestration programs in coming years?
Foresight
Human
Performance Enhancement in 2032: A Scenario for Military Planners,
John Smart, December 2004, 16 pages
I recently subcontracted on a transformative technology
scenarios project for the U.S. Army. This articlelooks at the way
human performance enhancement is likely to be viewed by army planners
thirty years hence, and explores some of the military implications
of accelerating information technologies (infotech), such as the
conversational user interface, personality capture, and the valuecosm.
One of the main messages is that biotech and cognotech are likely
to be a lot less disruptive than infotech over the next thirty years.
If the data continue to validate this perspective, we should prioritize
our development resources accordingly. Let me know what you think.
Governance
Social Security Complexities
 [Commentary
by John Smart] Is Bush's Social
Security reform unnecessary? Paul Krugman certainly
thinks so. His 12.7.2004 New York Times article, "Inventing
a Crisis," sees a scheme being perpetrated by the current
administration for the purposes of further privatization, and perhaps
also to keep the U.S. stock market from prematurely melting down
in coming decades. But
extremist views in politics, economics, culture, or just about any
field except our continually surprising technology, are rarely as
correct as more balanced perspectives.
In
favor of Krugman's position, it is certainly acceleration-unaware
to claim that social security will be broken in 2041 or 2052, and
to use this as justification for a crisis. Tech-aware folks know
that machines will be engaging in vast new areas of the human economy
around that time, and we'll live in a world with untold new productivites.
So maybe there's nothing to fix here.
On
the other hand, when one looks at the general trend of technologically
developed countries to become less competitive over time, when one
compares the socialism of a long-developed Europe to the eager capitalism
and innovation of Asia, it is easy to understand the U.S. as a balanced
mix of these two extremes, yet unhappily sliding toward the economic
doldrums of socialism. From this perspective the logic of careful
privatization makes more sense. Wherever we can champion innovation
and personal responsibility, we will stay in the zone between extremes
longer. Perhaps even indefinitely.
Of
course, there are questions of whether this particular approach
is the wrong way to reform the system, a way that may increase the
U.S. rich poor divide if we aren't careful. On the other, other
hand, this is one of the few opportunities the current administration
has for a systematic reform that might increase accountability,
and such opportunities are rare.
Partial
social security privatization could end up being a useful innovation,
or a mediocre investment of our time and effort, even with good
intentions. It's doubtful it will be a terrible thing, so let's
not get too worked up over it either way. It helps to remember that
politics today is a third level discourse, less important for accelerating
change than economics, which is less important than sci-tech. This
is useful work, but there are much more powerful accelerating transformations
under foot.
Social
Activism/Corporate Responsibility
Bhopal Disaster, 20 Years After
[JS]
The Union Carbide pesticide gas disaster in Bhopal, India, on Dec
3, 1984 killed 4,000-7,000 people in the worst industrial accident
in history. According to NGO accounts, in the two decades since,
an additional 15,000 have died and a reported 100,000 have ongoing
health problems due to the inhalation of methyl isocyanate (MIC)
pesticide gas. Final site cleanup still isn't complete, and would
take an estimated additional $20 million. Union Carbide maintains
a site Bhopal.com, with their
information about reparations made after the disaster, including
a $470 million settlement paid in 1989 to the Indian government:
http://www.bhopal.com/irs.htm.
The
major unresolved problem appeasr to be that Union Carbide thought
they could get out of the situation simply by payment. Life teaches
us that often, money simply isn't enough.
 Amnesty
International has a 100 page PDF on the ongoing problems at Bhopal
at http://bhopal.net/amnesty/amnestybhopalreport.pdf
They note that $330 million of the UC settlement monies (with
interest) still have not been paid out to victims as of September
2004. The report details the way the Indian government let Union
Carbide off the hook with the settlement, has stopped research on
health and environmental impacts since 1994, has failed to finish
site cleanup, and continues to underserve the victims. Dow Chemical,
which purchased
Union Carbide in 2001, was warned by activists that cleanup
was still needed, and that corporate social responsibility remained.
So far, they've avoided the issue.
Fortunately,
activists continue to keep this issue alive. On the 20th anniversary
of the disaster, the Yes Men
(who call themselves "identity correction" social activists)
fooled the BBC into a news conference where a "Dow Spokesperson"
pledged $12 billion in
compensation for the victims. The story got traction for a short
while before it was exposed. It is helpful to compare Dow's official
company site, and the Yes Men's clever hoax site, Dowethics.com.
Dow's doing its best to shut this down, but in today's internet,
that's not an easy thing to do.
Amnesty
notes: "There is already a clear trend to extend international
obligations beyond states, including to individuals (for international
crimes), armed groups, international organizations and private enterprises.
Amnesty International supports this trend and believes that companies
have an inalienable responsibility for the human rights impacts
of their operations." Well said.
What
could UC/Dow Chemical do today? They could finish cleanup. They
could pay more, even though not obligated to do so by Indian law,
and pressure the Indian government to make necessary changes. They
could stay involved, and provide the expertise that has failed to
materialize after the check was signed. If Dow doesn't step up to
the plate, let's make sure that we do, for them. Visit the activist
sites Bhopal.net and Bhopal.org
to see simple ways you can help.
I've
just completed a futures scenario on Human
Performance Enhancement in 2032. It includes the concept of
our digital twin (DT), an avatar that records our preferences as
we talk to it using a conversational user interface (CUI). These preferences
are expressed to others in semantic web protocols I call the Valuecosm.
In that kind of world, it will be convenient and practical for us
to react to articles like this by changing our preferences such
that we buy as few Dow products as possible until they are willing
to take some action X, as proposed by NGO group Y. In that kind
of world, the power of the many will hold accountable the excesses
of the few. I'm looking forward to this coming era, and there's
a lot we can do today to make it emerge sooner, rather than later.
Thanks to Chris Phoenix and Mark Finnern.
Tools
Free
Conference Calling
[JS] Dump your telco's "3 way calling"
service and move up to FreeConference.com.
A number of free sister sites for Europe can also be found on their
homepage. They can handle a minimum of 25 on the line at once. Combine
this with good speakerphones for everyone at home or office and
you've got instant community. We have been using it for a few months
now and are quite happy with it. FAQ
is here. Thank you IDC and the internet!
Inner
Space
Microtech
Industry
Gears Up for Two Headed PC Processors (Free, Registration Required),
Matthew Fordahl, Kansas City Star, 12.20.04
[JS] Announcing the advent of multicore
microprocessors for our personal computers (network and server computers
have dual core architectures for a couple of years now). This is
the beginning of the "three dimensionality" of our ubiquitous
PC hardware, as predicted by Ray Kurzweil in 1999.
Multicore chips are slower, but they have significantly lower power
consumption, which gives us relief from the overheating problem
the smaller the die size goes. If I were beginning my career as
an electrical engineer today, N-core technology would be fun and
challenging opportunity. Nicely done!
Nanotech
The Promise of Coal Liquefaction
 [JS]
Why isn't coal liquefaction ever discussed by those who say we are
running out of fossil fuels? Some energy futurists need better long
term vision. See this executive summary of Nanotechnology Now's
insightful "Nanocatalysis
and Fossil Fuels" report. It tracks the dramatic advances
in coal liquefaction technologies in recent years, and mentions
the high-grade gas that China is now extracting from its gargantuan
coal reserves. See "First
Coal Liquefaction Centre Set Up in Shanghai", 3.12.2004,
for more on this fascinating story. Will the U.S., Australia, and
many other coal-rich nations eventually do the same?
Coal
liquefaction is still a low yield process, but given the amazing
efficiencies of inner space, whenever we choose to do the research,
I would bet liquefaction doubles in efficiency/halves in cost on
the order of every few years, due to advances in nanocatalysis and
process automation.
After
all, that's exactly what has happened for three decades now in desalination
technology, which gets half as expensive roughly every 5 years.
In the early 1980's desalination was primarily a research effort,
like coal liquefaction today. Only Saudi Arabia could afford to
use it commercially at that time. Today, desalination is a thriving
industry expanding in arid regions all over the world, and it will
be cheaper than most every other source of potable water within
just another decade or so.
Scholars
Probe Nanotechnology's Promise and Potential Problems, Toni
Feder, Physicstoday.org
[Commentary by Iveta Brigis]. Corporations,
governments, universities and others spent an estimated $8.6 billion
on nanotechnology research and development in 2004. The US National
Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI)’s 2004 budget alone was $961
million. These numbers indicate that studying inner space is "in."
 While
developing the possible practical positive applications of nanotechnology,
the scientists and businesspeople behind nanotech have an equally
important task: finessing nanotech’s public image. The nanotech
world has learned from the difficulties of GMO development that
it must respond to the needs and wants of the public to maintain
long-term support for its mission. As one example, the DoE's Molecular
Foundry puts on Saturday morning nanotech classes at U.C. Berkeley
for students and the public. Attendance is packed.
A take home
lesson: The public is asking the nanotech world to control the acceleration
of this science until we get a better sense of the consequences
of nanotechnology. And the nano world is responding: Eleven percent
of the NNI’s budget goes to research on health and environment.
New innovations
from the nano frontier (at least the way the marketeers see it)
will ensure that nanotech stays in the public eye for years to come.
Are you a golfer? Nanodynamics’
new golf ball is expected in stores this spring. The ball is
purported to "correct its own flight," so it flies straighter
than conventional balls and is supposed to be more controllable
on the putting surface, too. We'll see. The cost? $7-$8 a piece.
For
Further Research
Nanotechnology:
Any fabrication technology in which objects are designed and built
by the specification and placement of individual atoms or molecules
or where at least one dimension is on a scale of nanometers.
Nanometer: One billionth (10-9) of a meter.
21st
Century Nanotechnology Research and Development Act, passed
in 2003.
Wikipedia
on Nanotechnology. A great history and overview of the science.
Foresight
Institute, the oldest nanotech analysis and advocacy group.
Center
for Responsible Nanotechnology, a newer advocacy and policy
recommendation group.
IBM
Nanotechnology Research
Greenpeace’s
Nanocautionary Report “Future
Technologies, Today’s Choices: Nanotechnology, Artificial
Intelligence, Robotics”
Femtotech
Nuclear-Powered Microbatteries
 [JS]
IEEE Spectrum Online's Dec 2004 feature article, "The
Daintiest Dynamos," by Amit Lal and James
Blanchard, tells an amazing story about
the newest innovations in Radioisotope Energy Generators (REGs),
tiny batteries that have thousands of times greater energy
density than today's best chemical batteries, and which are entirely
appropriate for everyday use.
REGs have been
in use since the 1960's to power satellites. They were called SNAP
(Systems for Nuclear Auxiliary Power) generators back then, for
those who remember their history. Even back then a serious technology
roadmapper could have predicted that they might eventually outcompete
all other battery sources, as their energetics and simplicity are
so appealing.
Today's chemical
batteries improve their efficiencies about 5% per year, which makes
conventional chemical energy technology effectively stagnant by
comparison to our Moore's law driven improvements in processing,
storage, and bandwidth. Can inner space research programs get our
energy storage technology back on an exponentiating track? Todays
clean and safe MEMS REGs make it clear that they can, and will.
This would be a fabulous field to work in, if you've got time and
energy to spare. Thanks to Jim Spohrer for the
link.
Cyber
Space
Metaverse
Virtual
Island Sells for $26,500 in Cyber Assets, by Will Knight, NewScientist.com,15.12.04
(Also blogged
on Corante) [Commentary
by Jerry Paffendorf] A 22-year-old Australian gamer,
David Storey, has purchased a 6,000-acre piece
of virtual property inside of the massively multi-player game Project
Entropia—a game that, like the digital world of Second
Life discussed in previous
Tech Tidbits newsletters, allows users to convert real
world money into virtual world currency and vice verse. Storey now
has the right to tax other players who hunt and mine on the land
(called Treasure Island) and to parcel it out to buyers looking
to build their own homes and businesses. In a statement released
by Project Entropia’s creators, MindArk, the new virtual land
baron says he wants to “create a thriving, fully functional
settlement for all to enjoy.” Depending on the future success
of Project Entropia and, specifically, player interest in the Treasure
Island territory, Storey stands to make a profit on his investment.
 Serious
interest in the creation, ownership, and exchange of virtual goods,
services and land for real money is poised to go mainstream in the
near future, with much higher participation due to come from casual
gamers and non-gamers participating in new breeds of open-ended
digital worlds. For the last two years, lawyers, game designers,
and social scientists have been gathering at the New York Law School’s
State of Play conference
to discuss issues of real world law as applied to these issues within
virtual worlds (highly recommended video archive here.
Indiana University professor Edward Castronova
(“the Adam Smith of virtual worlds”
according to Wired) has noted that “The minute you
hardwire constraints [read: scarcity] into a virtual world, an economy
emerges [and] One-trillionth of a second later that economy starts
interacting with ours.” So, as author and virtual world entrepreneur
Julian Dibbel dubbed it, it’s high time you
prepare yourself for the "unreal
estate boom".
Betsy
Book over at Virtual
Worlds Review has written some interesting articles on her site
(itself a great general into to virtual worlds) addressing the role
and desirability of place (and by extension property) in virtual
worlds, including Traveling
Through Cyberspace: Tourism and Photography in Virtual Worlds
(which has lots of nice screenshots from a variety of 3D virtual
worlds). Cory Ondrejka, VP of Product Development
for Second Life, also has an interesting short paper called
A
Piece of Place: Modeling the Digital on the Real in Second Life
that presents a theory of place in digital worlds modeled on the
real world. These two works should go a long way towards answering
the "Why?" question for those who shake their heads at
this sort of thing (as in Why in the world would anyone even think
of buying something you can’t catch, paint green, and sew
a button on?).
Automation
Event-Driven Architecture (EDA)
[JS] If you were at Accelerating Change
2004, you probably recall that Shai Agassi's excellent
keynote addressed this subject. EDA and web services are the newest
revolution in transaction automation across the enterprise, quietly
saving companies billions of dollars annually, and playing critical
roles in who wins the consolidation game in mature industries.
Tibco is one
example of an innovative company creating new "rich clients"
that take advantage of the emerging web services infrastructure.
Janice Carter and William Grosso
had Luke Birdeau of Tibco speak on this at their
Emerging Technologies SIG
in Palo Alto this December. You might get on their mailing list
if you live in the SF Bay Area. A quote:
"The
Internet is rapidly moving into its next phase of evolution. Concurrent
with the dominant trend towards service-oriented architecture
on the server side, a new generation of presentation tier capabilities
called "rich clients" are enabling companies to deliver
the look, feel and performance of desktop installed software solutions
that far surpass the limits of HTML while retaining the best of
the Web's centralized application management and distribution
characteristics."
Such systems
leverage existing browser technology to enable feature rich, high
performance applications. EDA is a fascinating new field of innovation.
Where will tomorrow's intelligent avatar-equipped, 3D browser go?
One thing's for sure: it will include a fusion of technology competencies
best seen today at companies like Microsoft, Google, SAP, and Second
Life. Thanks to Mark Finnern for the link.
Hyper
Space
What
I Believe But Cannot Prove: Speculations on Evolutionary Development
and the Cosmic Purpose of Accelerating Change,
John Smart, 2005
I wrote
this 1,000 word piece as a personal response to the 2005 World
Question at Edge.org: "What Do You Believe is True Even
Though You Cannot Prove It?" Belief plays an important role
in all our lives, and this question brought out a number of the
beliefs underlying my own intution with regard to accelerating change.
It is one of several possible proposals for hyper space as the developmental
destiny for local intelligence.
Black
Hole Computers (abstract only, fee required), Seth Lloyd and
Y. Jack Ng, Scientific American, November 2004
[JS] A fabulous article about new insights
in quantum information theory and the perception of the universe
as an ultimate computer. Seth Lloyd is a professor
of quantum mechanical engineering at MIT and a designer of quantum
computers. Y. Jack Ng is a professor of physics
at UNC Chapel Hill, and researches the quantum structure of spacetime.
This is some
of the most fascinating work in physics today, and I see it as a
significant step closer to the model that black hole physics, a
hyper space threshold, is a "universal developmental attractor"
for local computing systems. I expect this to be one of the most
important new stories of accelerating change in coming years.
Fun
We
all deserve a little fun in every day. Send us your entries for
the next issue!
Humor
Season's
greetings over at Despair.com.
Thanks to Brent Bushnell.
.jpg)
Play
LiveYourAdventure.com
[JS] Mark
McMahon is a Tucson dentist who sold his practice and took
a three year trip through South America, just because he could.
He has a great sense of humor and I've just burned up more time
than I should reading some of his fun
journal entries. May this inspire you to take your own trip
as well. Motivating and inspiring new experiences are right next
door to all of us, if we just take the time to look!
Call
for Submissions
ASF
is seeking submissions for our Accelerating
Times (AT) web-based publication. AT
is a "free and priceless" monthly to bimonthly newsletter
covering scientific, technological, business, and humanist dialogs
in accelerating change. Anyone may submit reader feedback, scan
hits, article links, original papers, questions, and artwork (for
you illustrators out there) to mail(at)accelerating.org. Accepted
work will appear, fully credited, in future issues. |
