6 ms·

Among other things, I would judge how modern a community is by what their solid waste disposal facilities look like. All those plastic toys, furniture, building

Among other things, I would judge how modern a community is by what their solid waste disposal facilities look like. All those plastic toys, furniture, building material, packaging, etc, being pressed into a mound! Or, head down to the cancer treatment facility, and imagine what Dr. McCoy would have to say.

ysavir 10y ago
You didn't read the article, did you?
melling 10y ago
Imagine what people who grew up watching Dr. McCoy would say. This isn't the future we were expecting. If you were born 100 years ago, you might think the world has changed dramatically. However, if you were born 50 years ago, the future has been slow to arrive.
- bbctol 10y ago
  Interestingly, I think technological progress really has been faster over the last 50 years than the 50 before that (although it's decidedly close.) But the progress of the first half of the 20th century so spurred our hopes for rapidly accelerating futurism that even the fast pace of computing, transportation, and communication tech development seems dull if it doesn't get us to space.
- digi_owl 10y ago
  Technology seems to follow either a sigmoid or a bell curve. And invariably during the climb to the plateau, the humans living at the time envision the climb to go on forever. So when people looked at the rapid growth of computing power as transistors and ICs replaced radio valves, they envisioned the computing power hitting the point where it would rival neurons. But now we are reaching the plateau, and it has come far short of the early visions.
  - romaniv 10y ago
    50 years ago was 1966. Judging by many SF novels from that time, people were actually rather pessimistic about computing power we would have right now. Almost universally, authors predicted some progress, but still thought computers would be expensive, large and not as powerful as what we have now. On the other hand, they were very optimistic about space travel, AI algorithms, robotics, energy prodution/storage tech, personal transportation and the state of industrial engineering.
- ctdonath 10y ago
  I was born nearly 50 years ago. The only reason it may seem "slow to arrive" is that the dramatic visuals are absent, and that some of the expected technology proved a lot more boring/problematic than expected. Instead of rockets taking the staggeringly long time to reach staggeringly boring destinations (Moon & Mars are dead rocks), we've brought most of human knowledge & communications from racked hidden ink-on-paper to instant access anywhere on the planet via a pocket wireless supercomputer - something so amazing that most people spend much of their time staring at it (mostly for porn & cat videos...ARGH!). 5-minute food is the norm. Electric cars are on track for massive market penetration. Nearly-free worldwide-coverage videophones are available (just nobody actually wants to be seen). A lifetime of cinema, much in 3D, is available in your living room for an hour's pay per month. A couple days' wage can fly you to the other side of the planet in a few hours. 72F indoor temperature is so ubiquitous it's practically illegal to not have it. Thousands of books are trivially stored on a $35 e-reader weighing ounces. Heck, as an middle-class kid growing up back then, we had wood-fired heat (no A/C), well water, grew half our own food, walked miles to town, and 4-digit phone numbers. Home computers didn't exist early on, the closest being hobby kids with maybe* hundreds of bytes of storage; when "personal computers" finally appeared (Apple II and IBM PC) they were, well, paltry. I don't remember a milkman delivering, but do recall returnable glass bottles. We could have rockets and Moon bases etc as the norm, but when we got to the Moon early on we realized it really wasn't that interesting. Infinite cat videos in your pocket - that's what people really wanted.
  - ido 10y ago
    well water, grew half our own food, walked miles to town This is simply due to growing up in the country side though, isn't it? Nobody living in any at least semi-major western city in the late 60s would have had these experiences.
    - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
      Half of America lived in the country in the 60's.
      - 10y ago
- cgriswald 10y ago
  I find this a really odd statement. No, it's not the future we were expecting (when is it ever?). But slow? I was born 40 years ago and am constantly bombarded with the fact that we live in the future. 50 years ago, the first super computer was built that could do 3 MegaFLOPs. No one had a home computer. People used land-line rotary phones to make audio calls to their friends. Sputnik had been launched and men had been to space. Today, we all walk around with GigaFLOPs computers in our pockets that can make video calls and talk to billions of other computers around the world, all over the air—and we think nothing of it. There are people living in space semi-permanantly, we've sent probes to every major body in the solar system (and some minor ones) and there is so much stuff in orbit that it's become a potential hazard. That seems like a ton in 50 years, and that's just in two areas.
  - nkoren 10y ago
    I was also born 40 years ago. People were routinely walking on the moon before we were born. Nobody has done so since. 50 years ago, NASA's baseline plan called for a permanent settlement on the moon by 1978, and a permanent settlement on Mars by 1986. That was the working assumption -- not of a few wild-eyed futurists, but of tens of thousands of ordinary bureaucrats -- during the ramp-up of the Apollo program. So yes, that future has been very, very slow to arrive. And yes, we're all carrying gigaflops computers around, which is massively cool but also, 40 years ago, somewhat expected.[1] My feeling is that in the last 10 years -- and particularly in the last 5, as the AI winter has decisively ended and the private spaceflight reusability efforts have ramped up -- things have genuinely been accelerating. But prior to that, the 70s, 80s, and 90s were relatively stalled decades, compared to the much more fundamental breakthroughs of the three decades before. 1: http://www.cnet.com/uk/news/samsung-says-2001-a-space-odyssey-invented-the-tablet-not-apple/ http://www.cnet.com/uk/news/samsung-says-2001-a-space-odysse...
    - throwanem 10y ago
      Before that was NASA's plan, it was Dr. von Braun's. He was a brilliant man and a very persuasive one, but he never would've had a chance to send even a few manned capsules to the moon if not for the fact that his adoptive country required a rocket capable of serving as an intercontinental weapon, and a conclusive demonstration of superiority over a geopolitical rival. Once those goals were achieved, and in the absence of Dr. von Braun's influence, no one with the power or money to advance his true goals remained any longer interested in doing so.
- hx87 10y ago
  > However, if you were born 50 years ago, the future has been slow to arrive. I'm guess you've never lived in a world where almost all the information contained therein was in the form of paper documents, and have had to search for information in those documents?
  - melling 10y ago
    Considering that I'm 50 years old, it's safe to assume that I have. A lot of people are assuming that because we have made progress that means it has been fast. Yes, Moore's Law was great but most technology doesn't follow that curve.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
pklausler 10y ago
In my travels, I've learned to judge modernity by how well a society educates its little girls.

ysavir 10y ago

You didn't read the article, did you?

melling 10y ago

Imagine what people who grew up watching Dr. McCoy would say. This isn't the future we were expecting. If you were born 100 years ago, you might think the world has changed dramatically. However, if you were born 50 years ago, the future has been slow to arrive.

bbctol 10y ago
Interestingly, I think technological progress really has been faster over the last 50 years than the 50 before that (although it's decidedly close.) But the progress of the first half of the 20th century so spurred our hopes for rapidly accelerating futurism that even the fast pace of computing, transportation, and communication tech development seems dull if it doesn't get us to space.
digi_owl 10y ago
Technology seems to follow either a sigmoid or a bell curve. And invariably during the climb to the plateau, the humans living at the time envision the climb to go on forever. So when people looked at the rapid growth of computing power as transistors and ICs replaced radio valves, they envisioned the computing power hitting the point where it would rival neurons. But now we are reaching the plateau, and it has come far short of the early visions.
- romaniv 10y ago
  50 years ago was 1966. Judging by many SF novels from that time, people were actually rather pessimistic about computing power we would have right now. Almost universally, authors predicted some progress, but still thought computers would be expensive, large and not as powerful as what we have now. On the other hand, they were very optimistic about space travel, AI algorithms, robotics, energy prodution/storage tech, personal transportation and the state of industrial engineering.
ctdonath 10y ago
I was born nearly 50 years ago. The only reason it may seem "slow to arrive" is that the dramatic visuals are absent, and that some of the expected technology proved a lot more boring/problematic than expected. Instead of rockets taking the staggeringly long time to reach staggeringly boring destinations (Moon & Mars are dead rocks), we've brought most of human knowledge & communications from racked hidden ink-on-paper to instant access anywhere on the planet via a pocket wireless supercomputer - something so amazing that most people spend much of their time staring at it (mostly for porn & cat videos...ARGH!). 5-minute food is the norm. Electric cars are on track for massive market penetration. Nearly-free worldwide-coverage videophones are available (just nobody actually wants to be seen). A lifetime of cinema, much in 3D, is available in your living room for an hour's pay per month. A couple days' wage can fly you to the other side of the planet in a few hours. 72F indoor temperature is so ubiquitous it's practically illegal to not have it. Thousands of books are trivially stored on a $35 e-reader weighing ounces. Heck, as an middle-class kid growing up back then, we had wood-fired heat (no A/C), well water, grew half our own food, walked miles to town, and 4-digit phone numbers. Home computers didn't exist early on, the closest being hobby kids with maybe* hundreds of bytes of storage; when "personal computers" finally appeared (Apple II and IBM PC) they were, well, paltry. I don't remember a milkman delivering, but do recall returnable glass bottles. We could have rockets and Moon bases etc as the norm, but when we got to the Moon early on we realized it really wasn't that interesting. Infinite cat videos in your pocket - that's what people really wanted.
- ido 10y ago
  well water, grew half our own food, walked miles to town This is simply due to growing up in the country side though, isn't it? Nobody living in any at least semi-major western city in the late 60s would have had these experiences.
  - JoeAltmaier 10y ago
    Half of America lived in the country in the 60's.
    - 10y ago
cgriswald 10y ago
I find this a really odd statement. No, it's not the future we were expecting (when is it ever?). But slow? I was born 40 years ago and am constantly bombarded with the fact that we live in the future. 50 years ago, the first super computer was built that could do 3 MegaFLOPs. No one had a home computer. People used land-line rotary phones to make audio calls to their friends. Sputnik had been launched and men had been to space. Today, we all walk around with GigaFLOPs computers in our pockets that can make video calls and talk to billions of other computers around the world, all over the air—and we think nothing of it. There are people living in space semi-permanantly, we've sent probes to every major body in the solar system (and some minor ones) and there is so much stuff in orbit that it's become a potential hazard. That seems like a ton in 50 years, and that's just in two areas.
- nkoren 10y ago
  I was also born 40 years ago. People were routinely walking on the moon before we were born. Nobody has done so since. 50 years ago, NASA's baseline plan called for a permanent settlement on the moon by 1978, and a permanent settlement on Mars by 1986. That was the working assumption -- not of a few wild-eyed futurists, but of tens of thousands of ordinary bureaucrats -- during the ramp-up of the Apollo program. So yes, that future has been very, very slow to arrive. And yes, we're all carrying gigaflops computers around, which is massively cool but also, 40 years ago, somewhat expected.[1] My feeling is that in the last 10 years -- and particularly in the last 5, as the AI winter has decisively ended and the private spaceflight reusability efforts have ramped up -- things have genuinely been accelerating. But prior to that, the 70s, 80s, and 90s were relatively stalled decades, compared to the much more fundamental breakthroughs of the three decades before. 1: http://www.cnet.com/uk/news/samsung-says-2001-a-space-odyssey-invented-the-tablet-not-apple/ http://www.cnet.com/uk/news/samsung-says-2001-a-space-odysse...
  - throwanem 10y ago
    Before that was NASA's plan, it was Dr. von Braun's. He was a brilliant man and a very persuasive one, but he never would've had a chance to send even a few manned capsules to the moon if not for the fact that his adoptive country required a rocket capable of serving as an intercontinental weapon, and a conclusive demonstration of superiority over a geopolitical rival. Once those goals were achieved, and in the absence of Dr. von Braun's influence, no one with the power or money to advance his true goals remained any longer interested in doing so.
hx87 10y ago
> However, if you were born 50 years ago, the future has been slow to arrive. I'm guess you've never lived in a world where almost all the information contained therein was in the form of paper documents, and have had to search for information in those documents?
- melling 10y ago
  Considering that I'm 50 years old, it's safe to assume that I have. A lot of people are assuming that because we have made progress that means it has been fast. Yes, Moore's Law was great but most technology doesn't follow that curve.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

pklausler 10y ago

In my travels, I've learned to judge modernity by how well a society educates its little girls.