Gaia
Evolution: Gaia, Unlimited Human border, Open network
Technological impact
2010 - Media pervades everything, everywhere. Technology just keeps getting better, smaller and cheaper at every level, from global distributor devouring satellite capacity to the everyday user with a small device that captures global content wirelessly throughout metro area.
Humans will be experiencing multiple realities in the virtual wireless world.
Convergence of technology will boost the development of open source software rapidly replacing old technology (Linux)
Wireless connection will be provided by local communities as a basic service, such as electricity and water (Leiden)
Nano-technology for human network connection will be ready and available.
2015 - Workers can access all personal computer files from many locations without having to lug around a laptop. Business and individuals program customized schedules and playback options for media, information and entertainment, taking full advantage of a variety of new software that helps combine multiple types of media effortlessly. Human to human connection is directly established through a combination of nanotechnology and electric technology. Virtual realities will be equivalent to the physical reality. Connection between human-human-computer will transform the concept of external vs. internal resource. Every computer will be perceived as an extension of the proper body. Every experience will be perceived as its own experience.
Economical impact
2010 - In the media world, different businesses will merge (cable, satellite, phone, mobile, TV, cinema, news.) and differentiate on service level, information filters, customization. Business will fragment with the fall of today's monopolies (e.g. Microsoft). New leaders will emerge in nanotechnology and virtual realities.
2015 - Increase flow of information/goods/people will reduce the differences between poor and rich countries. Technology will no longer provide a competitive advantage. Energy resources will determine the competitive advantage but the fall of national barriers enhanced by communication and technology will create a global awareness for the need for a different distribution of energy resources.
Political impact
2010 – National government will lose control on the internet as well as on the flow of goods/knowledge. Global interdependence will increase and the role of nations will diminish accordingly. Large organizations will emerge on a continental basis.
2015 – Large organizations will emerge for the control and redistribution of energy and water and pollutants control.
Social impact
2010 – Virtual reality will enter into everyday life with the creation of delocalized communities (based on interest, religion, sport, etc.) This will change the perception of reality, life, needs, wealth, poverty: awareness of global interdependence will increase.
2015 – human-human connection will create a global network. People will feel, listen what others feel and listen. Actual boundaries will disappear changing the perception of privacy. The same perception of human being will change from an individualistic perspective to a collective perspective.
GAIA:
The earth will reach its final stage in what Sir James Lovelock in 1979 defined GAIA: The living matter of the planet will function like a single organism.
“The inhabitants of Gaia are all tied together into a telepathic group consciousness; this consciousness is eventually extended to the non-human life, and later to the inorganic material of the planet.
Gaia's ability to store data does away with information technology. Gaia has no written records; every amount of information is stored in the collective consciousness. Naturally, a good deal of this is stored in humans and other large-brained animals, but some is stored in inanimate objects such as water, geological features, or trees. Historical records are based on the memories of individuals stored forever in the collective consciousness. Any part of Gaia can access these memories directly, as if they were just another part of their own mind and can work on the solution of any complicated problem using the resources of all its distinguished elements. All GAIA resources are used for the common benefits of all its different parts: inorganic material, animals, humans” Asimov, Foundation Edge, 1982.
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