Political Crossfire Forums

I'm going with 4

If humans continue to exist it will not be in the current social iteration. What we think of as "civilization" is a social disease.

I would like to see a small human population on a wild planet and I think it is likely to happen once we work things out amongst ourselves.

It won't be distributed equally for a long time, as the technology doesn't exist yet and it will be the domain of large corporations and governments for years after it is developed. It'll have to undergo the same process of miniaturization and efficiency as traditional computers.

When I say it'll change everything, I mean it. Computing tasks that take decades to complete now will be done in seconds or milliseconds. If you are asking how this will change politics... We won't know until it starts being used. Immortality may become possible once these computers figure out exactly how the body works. You would be able to surveil every person on the planet, construct a 3D model of the world with visual representations of their bodies, every building in the world etc. Forget particle accelerators - just build a simulation, a feat that is literally impossible now even with every computer in the world working on it all day, everyday, for decades. How will data security work? All our current security algorithms are based on multiplying prime numbers, which traditional computers take forever to do but a quantum computer could do instantaneously. Or how about a chip that gets implanted in your head that can read your thoughts and transfer them instantly to another person? What will that do to the concepts of privacy or secrecy?

If you are still having trouble grasping it, it is because you haven't realized just how utterly revolutionary it would be. Think about what normal computers have done to our society and our politics - now picture those computers having processing power that is as fast and intelligent as the human brain.

I think the biggest events in our lifetimes will be the growing economic inequality the environmental devastation and the unrest that ultimately manifests itself as a result.

immortality. or something close to it. i have a feeling death is just a few genetic tweaks away from being non-existent in so far as natural causes are concerned.

I don't know that infinite computer processing speed would really change much. At least, on the level we're talking about.

Think about it - our computers today have virtually infinite more processing power than anything back in the 50s. But, we have merely evolved slightly from then. I can send mail instantly now, whereas it took 4 days for a person to get it then. We had little processing power back then, but we still sent people and things into space. We build nuclear bombs without it.

But, the wealthiest among us living forever? Sea change.