What the future looks like : scientists predict the next great discoveries and reveal how today's breakthroughs are shaping our world

What the future looks like Scientists predict the next great discoveries and reveal how today's breakthroughs are shaping our world

Book - 2018

"Science fact, not science fiction, on the cutting-edge developments that are already changing the course of our future. Every day, scientists conduct pioneering experiments with the potential to transform how we live. Yet it isn't every you hear from the scientists themselves! Now, award-winning author Jim Al-Khalili and his team of top-notch experts explain how today's earthshaking discoveries will shape our world tomorrow--and beyond. The scientists in the pages are interested only in the truth-- reality-based and speculation-free. The future they conjure is by turns tantalizing and sobering: There's plenty to look forward to, but also plenty to dread. And undoubtedly the best way to for us to face tomorrow's gre...atest challenges is to learn what the future looks like-- today"--From back cover.

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Subjects
Science > Forecasting.
Technological forecasting.
Published
New York : The Experiment, LLC 2018.
Language
English
Other Authors
Philip Ball, 1962- (-), Gaia Vince, Julia Slingo, 1950-, Adam Kucharski, Aarathi Prasad, Adam Rutherford, Mark (Mark Alan) Walker, Naomi Climer, Alan Woodward, Margaret A. Boden, Winfried K. Hensinger, Anna Ploszajski, Jeff Hardy, John Miles, Noel Sharkey, Louisa Preston, Lewis Dartnell, Jim Al-Khalili, 1962-
Item Description
Originally published as: What's next? / edited by Jim Al-Khalili (London : Profile Books, 2017).
Physical Description
240 pages ; 21 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN
9781615194704
  • Introduction
  • The Future Of Our Planet: Demographics, conservation, and climate change
  • 1. Demographics
  • 2. The biosphere
  • 3. Climate change
  • The Future Of Us: Medicine, genetics, and transhumanism
  • 4. The future of medicine
  • 5. Genomics and genetic engineering
  • 6. Synthetic biology
  • 7. Transhumanism
  • The Future Online: AI, quantum computing, and the internet
  • 8. The Cloud and "Internet of Things"
  • 9. Cybersecurity
  • 10. Artificial intelligence
  • 11. Quantum computing
  • Making The Future: Engineering, transportation, and energy
  • 12. Smart materials
  • 13. Energy
  • 14. Transportation
  • 15. Robotics
  • The Far Future: Time travel, the apocalypse, and living in space
  • 16. Interstellar travel and colonizing the solar system
  • 17. Apocalypse
  • 18. Teleportation and time travel
  • Further reading
  • About the authors
  • Index
Review by Choice Review

Postulations about the future are often left to the realm of science fiction, but this multi-authored book grounds its predictions on factual developments and attempts to be objective. The contributors are British, but the predictions and impacts are global. Eighteen chapters are grouped into five sections: the first of these tackles the Earth and environment, discussing demographics, the biosphere, and climate change. Next is a discussion of future developments in the health sciences, including genomics, genetic engineering, and synthetic biology. Subsequent sections explore developments in computing and artificial intelligence and in engineering and manufacturing. The final section, "The Far Future," examines the most theoretical futuristic concepts: interstellar travel, colonization of the solar system, time travel and teleportation, and the apocalypse. Rationales are discussed for progressing along these futures, including ethics concerns and "could we/should we" arguments, which are particularly insightful in the medicine, genetic engineering, and synthetic biology chapters. Most of the chapters are interrelated, including the bio-related chapters as well as energy and transportation. Further reading and author biographies round out the book, which contains far more fascinating information than can be covered in this review. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers. --Robert Edward Buntrock, independent scholar

Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review

The future will be better if we plan and prepare for technological development and environmental change. To that end, British physicist Al-Khalili has collected essays from 18 science experts (including himself) to predict what may happen to our earth and its people. The contributions range widely on the optimism-pessimism scale, predicting an inevitable mix of events (global warming, population explosion, epidemics) and creative technological responses to mitigate or reverse adverse developments. The gloomiest essay ranks which of five catastrophes will trigger our apocalypse. More optimistic essays reassure that driverless cars, new materials, big data, genetically modified foods, carbon storage, and unanticipated inventions will contribute to a higher quality of life. A point often made is that science is neither good nor evil it's what people do with technology that determines whether we prosper. Reasonable knowledge of current affairs will help readers weigh this book's ideas, but advanced knowledge of science is not needed. A good addition to public libraries.--Roche, Rick Copyright 2018 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Library Journal Review

This collection of essays edited by quantum physicist Al-Khalili (Paradox: The Nine Greatest Enigmas in Physics) focuses on domain futurology; where discoveries in rapidly changing industries appear to be taking us. The contributors consider both the promises and perils of new discoveries in their respective fields, from biology to energy, demography to genomics. The increasing overlap among these fields, and the complexity and rate of change within them, make accurate long-term predictions extremely difficult. Several chapters, such as those on cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, and transport are intensely topical and describe environments that have recently exploded into the public consciousness following various technological synergies. Other chapters, such as those on climate change and apocalypses, explore preexisting existential threats that are no less worthy of coverage despite their greater familiarity. VERDICT The focus on sincere, factual presentation of current and future possibilities by leading experts is particularly welcome in this era of fake news and anti-science rhetoric. Younger readers surveying career options in the sciences will find much inspiration here, while the most widely read science generalists will be sure to learn something new.-Ricardo Laskaris, York Univ. Lib., Toronto © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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