Gathering together 18 of the world’s leading thinkers to debate the challenges humanity is about to face is always going to present us with great reading material.
Yesterday we looked at Ray Kurzweil’s vision of a nano-infested future that has got me shaking in my boots. Today though, we look more than just nanobots and extended living cycles.
Convened by the US National Academy of Engineering (NAE) to brainstorm over what challenges humanity is soon to face, 18 of the world’s leading thinkers came together. The group included biologist Craig Venter, inventor Dean Kamen, noted futurologist Ray Kurzweil, Google co-founder Larry Page and Harvard University professor of international development Calestous Juma.
They presented their report and list of challenges at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in Boston
The group focused on four areas in which to make their projections; sustainability, health, vulnerability and joy of living. "As the population grows and its needs and desires expand, the problem of sustaining civilisation's continuing advancement, while still improving the quality of life, looms more immediate," they wrote in their report.
"Old and new threats to personal and public health demand more effective and more readily available treatments. Vulnerabilities to pandemic diseases, terrorist violence, and natural disasters require serious searches for new methods of protection and prevention."
Not surprising, clean energy was a top priority, and they focused on sunshine as being the savior. They described it as a "tantalizing source of environmentally friendly power, bathing the Earth with more energy each hour than the planet's population consumes in a year".
"We only need to capture one part in 10,000 of the sunlight that falls on the Earth to meet 100% of our energy needs," said Ray Kurzweil "This will become feasible with nanoengineered solar panels and nanoengineered fuel cells to store the energy in a highly decentralized manner."
Following on from clean energy, though was the desperate need for clean water in many parts of our planet. Their report suggested that “new technologies for desalinating sea water may be helpful, but small-scale technologies for local water purification may be even more effective for personal needs."
Similarly, personalized medicines were another challenge that they viewed as a priority in the 21st century. They pointed to the recent sequencing of the human genome, which has provided us with a greater understanding of the workings of individuals, rather than just a generality.
"An important way of exploiting such information would be the development of methods that allow doctors to forecast the benefits and side effects of potential treatments or cures," they wrote in their report.
Kurzweil, the seeming representative of the group, said that "Within one to two decades, we will be in a position to stop and reverse the progression of disease and ageing, resulting in dramatic gains in health and longevity."
While the panel did not rank what challenge was greater or lesser, we the public are able to at EngineeringChallenges.org.
Joshua Hill, a Geek’s-Geek from Melbourne, Australia, Josh is an aspiring author with dreams of publishing his epic fantasy, currently in the works, sometime in the next 5 years. A techie, nerd, sci-fi nut and bookworm.
