Peter Diamandis is the founder of the XPrize Foundation, a foundation that offers large cash prizes to incentivize technological solutions to big problems.
Peter Diamandis, entrepreneur and futurologist, is also co-founder of Singularity University, a non-profit organization based in Silicon Valley that offers training in futurology. In his new book out tomorrow, "The Future Is Faster Than You Think", Peter reiterates his thesis: the (already rapid) pace of technological innovation is about to increase enormously.
The future is faster than we think
Diamandis' book contains a sort of "roadmap" that shows where things will go over the course of the decade that has just begun. Because, yes, in the next 10 years we will be reinventing every industry on this planet, with huge changes in terms of longevity, food or economy.
To be precise, says Peter Diamandis: in the next decade we will have more progress than in the last 100 years.
Communication networks, sensors, robotics, augmented reality e virtual, blockchain e AI they are improving exponentially. And they improve each other, being branches that complement and intertwine.
The number of people with access to technology is increasing, so we are able to solve more problems. There is also more capital available than ever (in too few hands), which means more radical ideas are being funded, which in turn leads to more breakthroughs.
And the cost of "attempts" is also dropping: the number of experiments going on in the "Silicon Valley garage" is exploding.
Transport between now and 2030
Owning your car will be a thing of the past. We will transform the garage into a rumpus room and the driveway for the car into a flower bed. After the morning breakfast we will go to the front door, ready to get on the autonomous vehicle that awaits us.
Our AI assistant will know we are going to work, will know where we are going, and will also know that we have slept little. In the car soft lights and quiet music, and some time for us as we arrive at our destination.
Shopping between now and 2030
The tedious routine purchases will be handled by the AI assistant, with our supervision (if we like, otherwise he will do it himself). To buy clothes, we will enter a virtual reality shopping center where we will attend a VR fashion show of 100 of our copies, avatars wearing different clothes, to make us decide what we like.
If we choose a garment, our measure will be sent to us previously registered in the system. If we want advice, well, the AI assistant will show us our avatar dressed according to current trends, or perfect for a particular occasion.
Health between now and 2030
Here, too, artificial intelligence galore. We will have annual MRI scans that cover the whole body; it will become negligent not to use AI in diagnosis. Artificial intelligence will save money and lives.
With neural interfaces we will be able to connect our brains to a computer by the mid-30s. Neuralink, the company of Elon Musk that I told you about here, is making revolutionary advances: its technology has been studied in primates and the plan is that to begin human trials this year.
Many of the technologies mentioned in Peter Diamandis' book are already present today, albeit at an embryonic level. Longevity drugs, cell-based meat, computer-brain interfaces and others.
And the dangers?
There are fewer threats than opportunities, Diamandis says. The jobs that can be born in perspective are superior to those that are being lost, and this has positive implications also with respect to the fear that artificial intelligence overwhelms us. The real opportunity won't be AI versus humans; will be the AI CON The Humans.
The real danger is us humans. Our way of reacting to the speed of change that is coming. When things move too fast, we tend to say "Stop!", But there is no gain in this: for example, cities and towns that ban Uber may not implement some technologies. And this will have an economic disadvantage in the long run.
