Philippedes, the Greek Messenger, sacrificed his life approximately 2,500 years ago while in the process of communicating a message between two cities, Marathon and Athens; today, the story of Marathon is a mere legend and we live in a global village. A teenage girl from a remote village in India, can now take courses offered online from most of the prestigious universities around the world, and connect with an investment firm willing to invest billions of dollars on a great idea – global cyber-space, a canvas for every voice, is at your fingertips now. While the developments in Information Technology within last two decades have been disrupting human lifestyle at a staggering rate, we can expect developments in Artificial Intelligence, Genetics and Nanotechnology to completely disrupt life as we know it and turn a whole new page for humanity in the near future.
Lifestyle
Speculating on the idea that there is enough food produced to eradicate global hunger and that with a few tweaks to the global economic model, most of the basic necessities of the population can be fulfilled, many economic leaders have expressed their opinion on a new world order. Some suggest a ‘Universal Basic Income’ where every citizen of the world is provided with an income that will be sufficient to fulfil their basic necessities. This idea itself could break down our social dynamics by eliminating the need to ‘work for a living’, and assume that people will only do what they like doing in their own time.
Day-to-day entailments that require our attention can be taken care of by Artificial Intelligence (AI). Wearing a wrist watch can collect vital data, such as heart rate, body temperature, ECG, sweat composition, and so on; by feeding such data into an AI algorithm, we will be able to have a personal AI doctor continuously monitoring our health, a personal AI nutritionist recommending what food we should order as we enter a restaurant, schedule spa appointments, order taxis for ourselves, and pretty much take care of anything else that takes our attention away from doing what we really love.
Each and every individual who makes up humanity has the ability to create their own imagination and the physical world around them. Unlike animals, humans often extend their creativity beyond the process of acquiring basic survival needs – composing music, painting, and dancing, to give a few examples. Engaging in such activities require one’s absolute attention, focus, and dedication. We can expect technological advances to provide us with an environment conducive to such a lifestyle and provide the basis for another period of renaissance in humanity.
Extended Human Experience
Communicating ‘reaching higher levels of human potential’ will foster personal growth and empower society to yield the unique benefits of being human. Those who aspire to deviate from a lifestyle that is principally based on feeding innate greed can now experience the unique pleasures of being human. To transcend the common idea of indulging the five senses and to engage in practices that enable perception and manipulation of subtler aspects of life requires time, dedication and perseverance only the social elite has been entitled to so far. Technological developments will present the whole of humanity with plenty of time and resources that enable exploration beyond the five senses. This will further differentiate humanity from other living creatures and allow us to focus on what we as humans are uniquely capable of.
Social Dynamics
Historically, social dogma on activities such as ‘putting food on the table’ to creating the ‘next global brand’, had been shaped predominantly by masculine forces due to physiological constraints, however, the technological advances in every sphere of life, over time, have now provided both the masculine and feminine forces a stage to work together in shaping a new world order that will highly regard environmental and social sustainability along with financial growth.
It has been almost 10 years since the general public was presented with the current level of IT infrastructure through smart phones and tablet computers. This added a new dimension in human life and began to disrupt existing social dynamics. Anyone born into this new reality, will become an adult within the next 10 years. They will naturally view the world differently – existing norms established over time, based on religion, politics and economy, will be challenged by the information presented to them on social media platforms and open ledgers such as Blockchain in the economic model. In 15 years, a significant part of the adult society will comprise of the new generation. They will drive innovation and redefine the society while the previous generations invest in and engage in infrastructure development.
Society at Risk
Perhaps, another revolution is at hand and it is safe to assume certain institutes and individuals will try to manipulate the population in order to yield maximum benefits from the situation. Educating the public on anticipated lifestyle disruptions has not kept up with the pace at which the technological advances are getting branded and communicated, and as a result, there is a significant risk of the majority of the population getting bewildered, misled, and being succumbed to devious agenda.
While our psychological state is highly volatile and rapidly evolving, human physique is also vulnerable to cutting edge technology and will be exposed. Based on developments in Genetics and Nanotechnology, a daily consumable could be created to manipulate human epigenetics and thereby control gene expression – this means that everything, from toothpaste to the water we drink, could be engineered to manipulate our physical state over time. We must not forget that timely adoption of policies during the Industrial Revolution could have minimised the damage done to humanity and environment.
It is imperative that the population be informed on anticipated social disruptions due to technological developments. Invention of cutting-edge tech-tools also requires a comprehensive policy framework and an educational campaign to safe-guard the society; if that kid from a rural village in India was brainwashed deviously or her potential billion dollar business idea was stolen – that would have been a ‘crime against humanity’. Initiating a public conversation will create awareness and aid in developing a comprehensive policy framework incorporating majority sentiment on relevant matters. Ultimately, a society capable of assimilating knowledge and able to express opinion constructively, will signify a ‘Liberal world’.
 Harith Soysa (harith.soysa@gmail.com)
