If it ever does die completely, it won't be because of iOS. Right now, the dock basically serves two UI purposes: "here's a list of apps you want to be able to

If it ever does die completely, it won't be because of iOS. Right now, the dock basically serves two UI purposes: "here's a list of apps you want to be able to access quickly, viewable at the edge of your screen", and "here's a list of apps you're currently running, also at the edge of your screen". On OS X, these are currently combined into the same UI widget. On iOS, they both exist, but as two separate entities: the docked app icons at the bottom of each springboard page serve the first purpose, and the list of recently-used apps in the double-tap multitask bar the latter. The interface has changed slightly due to the fundamental difference in the multitasking paradigms between the two OSes, but I don't think it's a stretch to say that the iOS UI has something that is clearly related to the OS X dock, both in form and in function.