What the Future Will Bring, Essay Example

The future may truly be the end of privacy as we know it. But it should not be a cause of concern because we have always found a way to address the potential hazards of each new technology. The loss of personal privacy may be inevitable if we look at the trend of the past few decades. The last few decades have taught us that we continue to desire an increasing level of connectivity which is why we readily embraced technologies with greater connectivity potential such as mobile phones, internet, and notebook computers. The trend continues towards portable communication devices that continue to shrink in size and improve in functionality. Technology companies such as Google (Gage) and automobile companies such as BMW (Yahoo! Cars) are already working on technologies that help cars recognize their passengers, drive themselves without any human assistance, communicate with other cars on the road, and understand human speech.

Medical science will take advantage of progress in genetic engineering to come up with treatments that do not carry the side effects of some current treatments, for e.g. chemotherapy is known to destroy both cancerous as well as healthy cells (The Rhode Island Cancer Council, Inc.). The patients may be able to communicate with their physicians without leaving home through internet enabled devices which will take patients’ data and transfer them to the physicians (Minnear). The patients may also have monitoring devices that will watch for signs of trouble and contact healthcare specialists without the patient doing anything. The genetic engineering may also help parents discover the potential health defects their children may have and take steps accordingly. In addition to more advanced medical treatments, humans will live longer and healthier also because science may better understand the working of cells and will come up treatments that slow down cells’ aging or repair damaged cells.

The challenge of global warming may be less severe than now as the world will have embraced electric cars and other car technologies with negligible or zero emissions. The science may also become better at slowing down species’ extinctions through more effective cloning techniques. In addition, the slowing down of deforestation will also help preserve natural habits as humans may discover reliable alternatives to wood and in many cases, reduce the use of products such as paper. Textbooks and notebooks may be completely replaced with digital devices that will not use paper and will probably be more effective in academic setting, for e.g. e-textbooks may have videos and interactive features that are not possible in paper textbooks. The academic institutions may also have changed a lot in their traditional structure and online education will be as much if not more common than traditional classroom teaching.

The traditional family structure as we knew before the emergence of internet may never come back. Students may leave their parents’ home even earlier because we may find a way to reduce the traditional school and college education in terms of time element while at the same time, making teaching more effective so that our students will learn more in less time. Due to the increasing competition and globalization, time will become even more precious commodity so we will take steps to improve the traditional education system we have become used to. The importance of Multilanguage skills will improve because non-English speaking countries will emerge as economic powers. It is possible that many countries will consider the formation of regional economic blocks on the pattern of European Union to offset some of their individual economic disadvantages as individual countries.

References

Gage, Deborah. Google’s self-driving car. 11 October 2010. 23 July 2011 <http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/thinking-tech/googles-self-driving-car/5445>.

Minnear, Bobby. Rise of the (Internet-Connected) Machines. 11 March 2011. 23 July 2011 <http://www.internap.com/2011/03/11/rise-of-the-internet-connected-machines/>.

The Rhode Island Cancer Council, Inc. Side Effects of Chemotherapy. 23 July 2011 <http://www.ricancercouncil.org/cancer-info/chemotherapy-facts.php>.

Yahoo! Cars. BMW makes self-drive car. 23 July 2011 <http://uk.cars.yahoo.com/08102010/36/bmw-makes-self-drive-car-0.html>.