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greatest technological challenge facing humanity

greatest technological challenge facing humanity

perseus
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Posted 02/17/08 - 10:12 AM: Subject: greatest technological challenge facing humanity	#1
Any thoughts on the greatest technological challenge facing humanity in the 21st century? These are the 14 greatest challenges thought most important by the US National Academy of Engineering. Perhaps we only need one, to reverse engineer the brain, then this will solve the others for us ? Make solar energy affordable Provide energy from fusion Develop carbon sequestration Manage the nitrogen cycle Provide access to clean water Reverse engineer the brain Prevent nuclear terror Secure cyberspace Enhance virtual reality Improve urban infrastructure Advance health informatics Engineer better medicines Advance personalised learning Explore natural frontiers http://www.engineeringchallenges.org/cms/8996/922...
_____________________ The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. George Bernard Shaw

unrealist42
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Posted 02/17/08 - 01:58 PM:	#2
The greatest problems we face are not technological but economic and social. All of the things on that list are easily feasible in a technological sense. What is missing is the social and economic will.

180 Proof
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Posted 02/17/08 - 02:59 PM:	#3
Reverse engineer the brain.
_____________________ If faith is irrational, then it is rational to dismiss "faith-based claims" out of hand. If faith is rational, then "faith-based claims" must be testable and/or sufficient -- but they are neither. If faith is a-rational, then "faith-based claims" are inexplicable and thus cannot explain anything.

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Posted 02/17/08 - 08:20 PM:	#4
If you reverse engineer the brain with the goal of creating an artificial brain -- you get one more brain. Do you hope that one extra brain can do what 6 billion brains working together might not be able to do? Its like you are going to reverse engineer feet in order to create perfect shoes. Shoes have a purpose which serves as an adjunct to perfect the mostly sufficient function of feet. A better goal is to design an adjunct to 6 billion brains with solving the other problems in mind. I think a lot of those "problems" are issues that could be easily solved if people were able to accept major social/economic changes. It is easy to secure "cyberspace", but requires more constraints than most consumers are willing to accept, even though it seems strange to impose "freedom" on what is essentially a consumer medium. Some of them sound political and very narrow focus of current trends. I think the biggest technological challenge is probably "peak oil". Most people only think of the energy aspect -- but even if you could effectively replace all the energy, you would still lose out when the petroleum products start drying up -- making fertilizers, pesticides and plastics. Many of these are essential for life and without them, life has to make cutbacks. Every other problem is fairly minor in comparison when the world falls into global economic and social decline. I think it will require major economic/social changes and, unless people are willing to make those changes, there isn't a lot of hope. One of the biggest changes is to the entire economic model -- which is based on a kind of consumerism/hedonism focused on short-term pleasures rather than long-term goals and sustainability. I would even rate "global warming" as a lower concern than "peak oil". Once the oil dries up, global warming will ease off as people are unable to produce as much carbon emissions anymore -- unless we are past the "tipping point" at which global warming becomes self-sustaining for a while.
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perseus
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Posted 02/18/08 - 12:19 AM:	#5
swstephe wrote: If you reverse engineer the brain with the goal of creating an artificial brain -- you get one more brain. Do you hope that one extra brain can do what 6 billion brains working together might not be able to do? . Well I guess the theory is if you can understand how the brain works then it may be possible to enhance its positive characteristics in a similar way to how we (controversially) genetically engineer biological organisms. These meet our needs better than can be achieved through natural selection within reasonable timescales. swstephe wrote: I think it will require major economic/social changes and, unless people are willing to make those changes, there isn't a lot of hope. One of the biggest changes is to the entire economic model -- which is based on a kind of consumerism/hedonism focused on short-term pleasures rather than long-term goals and sustainability.. I totally agree our economic model is flawed for the reasons you suggest. However, perhaps we need technological short term fixes as a sort of 'methadone' supplement to get the human race of the 'heroin'. swstephe wrote: I would even rate "global warming" as a lower concern than "peak oil". Once the oil dries up, global warming will ease off as people are unable to produce as much carbon emissions anymore -- unless we are past the "tipping point" at which global warming becomes self-sustaining for a while. We may have had this discussion before, but even if you believe in peak coal there are vast quantities of hydrocarbons available though oil shales and on the sea bed that can be refined into petroleum type fuels at a cost. Wouldn't these become available to us in the same way as deeper water oil reserves have? Edited by perseus on 02/18/08 - 12:25 AM
_____________________ The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. George Bernard Shaw

swstephe
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Posted 02/18/08 - 02:19 AM:	#6
perseus wrote: Well I guess the theory is if you can understand how the brain works then it may be possible to enhance its positive characteristics in a similar way to how we (controversially) genetically engineer biological organisms. These meet our needs better than can be achieved through natural selection within reasonable timescales. So it is all just a justification for eugenics? You could go for the simple approach -- only the people with the most positive mental aspects are allowed to reproduce. It would be reasonable to balance the need to solve current problems with greater "firepower", but as a software engineer, it sounds a lot like "goldbricking" -- insisting that problems need an advanced technology to be solved when a simpler solution is possible. perseus wrote: We may have had this discussion before, but even if you believe in peak coal there are vast quantities of hydrocarbons available though oil shales and on the sea bed that can be refined into petroleum type fuels at a cost. Wouldn't these become available to us in the same way as deeper water oil reserves have? I'm lumping everything together under "peak oil" because it is a resource that isn't renewing as fast as demand. It is inevitable that whatever resources we have currently are going to take a sharp downturn at some time in the future, whether it is in the next decade or centuries away. All the other sources of oil depend on cheap regular oil to keep the demand up. The expense of extracting oil is always climbing. If there is a way to get virtually unlimited energy from space-based solutions, then every year is making that goal harder to reach. At some point, perhaps we have already passed it, achieving that goal might mean extreme economic hardship in other areas.
_____________________ A software developer is someone who, when you tell them to "go to hell", they are more worried about the "goto".

perseus
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Posted 02/18/08 - 10:39 AM:	#7
swstephe wrote: So it is all just a justification for eugenics? You could go for the simple approach -- only the people with the most positive mental aspects are allowed to reproduce. It would be reasonable to balance the need to solve current problems with greater "firepower", but as a software engineer, it sounds a lot like "goldbricking" -- insisting that problems need an advanced technology to be solved when a simpler solution is possible. I was just using genetics as an analogy of how you can enhance a mechanism that is already there. I actually meant through silicon based brains possibly using quantum computation although I agree this is somewhat pie in the sky. This subject is indeed where I found the link http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7248875... swstephe wrote: I'm lumping everything together under "peak oil" because it is a resource that isn't renewing as fast as demand. It is inevitable that whatever resources we have currently are going to take a sharp downturn at some time in the future, whether it is in the next decade or centuries away. All the other sources of oil depend on cheap regular oil to keep the demand up. The expense of extracting oil is always climbing. If there is a way to get virtually unlimited energy from space-based solutions, then every year is making that goal harder to reach. At some point, perhaps we have already passed it, achieving that goal might mean extreme economic hardship in other areas. The point I'm getting at is that environmental issues will prove to be the limiting factor not the supply of hydrocarbons, there is enough 'fuel' in various forms to melt both ice caps entirely unless sequestration techniques are used. Edited by perseus on 02/18/08 - 10:44 AM
_____________________ The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. George Bernard Shaw

unrealist42
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Posted 02/21/08 - 03:30 PM:	#8
There is enough energy in a coffee cup to boil all the planets oceans according to Richard Feinman.

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Posted 02/22/08 - 11:11 PM:	#9
This refers to the energy released by colliding matter with anti-matter? Isn't this method supposedly more efficient than fusion? I wonder why it's not on the list. On reverse engineering the brain, I think it'd work wonders. We'd be able to fully understand the nature aspect of humanity, and formulating methods of social change would be much more efficient and accurate. Attempting to build a house without fully understanding the tools you are using could lead to some catastrophic failures.

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Posted 02/23/08 - 10:18 PM:	#10
kkiiji wrote: On reverse engineering the brain, I think it'd work wonders. We'd be able to fully understand the nature aspect of humanity, and formulating methods of social change would be much more efficient and accurate. Attempting to build a house without fully understanding the tools you are using could lead to some catastrophic failures.
_____________________ If faith is irrational, then it is rational to dismiss "faith-based claims" out of hand. If faith is rational, then "faith-based claims" must be testable and/or sufficient -- but they are neither. If faith is a-rational, then "faith-based claims" are inexplicable and thus cannot explain anything.

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Posted 03/17/08 - 11:13 AM:	#11
How about non aging gene? Can that be made? That'll be a sure hit. We'll outlive the sun heheh...

Goaswerfraiejen
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Posted 03/17/08 - 07:31 PM:	#12
Learn that increased technologization often just perpetuates problems rather than solving them? The answer to global climate change, for example, is not to build a space shield (which was a serious suggestion, by the way). Other than that... "reverse-engineer the brain" seems like the most impossible of all. Is it appropriate to or for the 21st century? I doubt it. Honestly, I think that the problem facing technology in our century is for technology to learn its place in human society--and, still harder, for human beings to learn technology's place.

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Posted 03/18/08 - 10:51 PM:	#13
Technology is here to satisfy human`s desires. I agree with unrealist42 100%. ANY technology can be harmful or helpful depending on who uses it. Other means of energies can be employed in war. Like nuclear can be used as warheads and warship's fuel. What's the idea in reverse engineering brain any way. It's not that I think that it won't be useful. Just curious. Can it eliminate religion? The prospect of being fully figured is kinda scary I must say. Just think about how those capitalist marketing bastards would make out of such knowledge.

perseus
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Posted 03/19/08 - 11:08 AM:	#14
I'm not sure how NOT building a space shield solves climate change. I can see how it perpetuates the problem due to the fuel used unless it is propelled into orbit by a non carbon based launch mechanism. If a machine could be made that provides an accurate and rational answer to complex questions such as the true value of consumerism to society those Capitalist marketing Bastards might get put in their rightful place alongside the Clerics. However, genuine Metaphysical questions must remain, since science cannot even in principle answer them, and even if this superbrain could conceive of them how could it communicate the knowledge to us?
_____________________ The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. George Bernard Shaw

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