We’ve covered quite a bit on transhumanism, new technologies, and the singularity on Meme Therapy over the past few months. I decided to add another contrarian view to the mix and I found it in Bob Seidensticker author of Future Hype: The Myths of Technological Change. As you can geuss by the title Bob hasn’t scheduled his mind upload yet but he’s no stranger to computers having worked in the industry for several years most recently as a program manager at Microsoft.

MT Can you tell our readers a little bit about Future Hype?

Bob Conventional wisdom says that technology change is exponential, giving us an ever-growing number of exciting new products. According to this view, we live in an unprecedented golden age of technological expansion. But this is not so. Today’s achievements are not unprecedented. Technology change is not exponential. The Next Big Thing is not inevitable. And the PC and Internet are no more important than any major invention of the past.

We’ve been deceived about technology change. As a result, we ignore how much it really costs. Future Hype explodes the myths, highlights those costs, and shows how to be a smarter technology consumer. Only by seeing technology correctly can we hope to use it correctly.

The book looks at nine High Tech Myths (including those mentioned above). It also spends a fair amount of time exploring the history of technology. We falsely imagine that much of what we experience with technology is new. In fact, there’s a long history of technology’s encroachment on our privacy (before today’s NSA phone tapping), stock frenzies (before our recent Internet Bubble), ethics (before stem cell research), and so on.

MT What kind of research and/or prep work did you go through before writing Future Hype?

Bob While at Microsoft, I researched the history of some consumer electronics products, and I was often surprised at how substantial that history was. For example, we think of videocassette recorders arising out of the Beta vs. VHS format battle beginning in the late 1970s. But the first videotape demonstration was decades before that. And many people think that the Internet began in the early 1990s, though it actually started in 1969.

It was also at Microsoft that I more clearly saw things from the user’s side. As a programmer, I’d always needed to develop with a user in mind, of course, but I moved into program management at Microsoft and had to champion the user’s side of things. “Cool” wasn’t enough anymore — products needed to satisfy tangible user needs. Designing something so that the eventual user gets value out of it is not a revolutionary concept, I admit, though it’s often an important realization for engineers like me.

Since leaving Microsoft, I’ve worked on this book for about 7 years(concurrent with a few other things). Once I had the realization that the everything-is-exponential view was wrong, I trolled everything I read or heard for stories and data that would illustrate how technology change actually works.

MT A lot of people in the computer industry seem convinced that we’ll all be godlike beings spreading through the galaxy at the speed of light in 20 years time. Do you get any flack from those types for holding the contrarian view?

Bob I’ve spoken on this topic at Microsoft and got a pretty good reception. I’ve also jumped into the Shock Level 4 discussion at sl4.org. That was a much tougher crowd, though I was received politely even there.

For me, it’s like someone is claiming that the sky is purple. It’s such a disconnect with reality that I have to jump in and comment. The problem, of course, is that the singularity-is-near Kurzweilians seem to feel the same way on the flip side of the issue.

At a tamer level, I’ve done a fair amount of speaking on the topic of technology change, mostly in the Seattle area. I often get one or two people afterwards who say they disagree and then outline how technology has dramatically changed their life or their company or their industry. And of course, I agree! I’m not saying that change doesn’t exist, just that change doesn’t increase exponentially.

The resistance that I occasionally get can be difficult, but there’d be no point in telling people what they already knew to be true.

MT Do you think the transhumanists are engaged in fruitful discussion/meditation on the impact of future technologies? Or is it all just a mite premature?

Bob Yes and yes. It’s great that transhumanists (and related species) are pushing the envelope. When Ray Kurzweil says that we’ll have computers that can pass the Turing Test (that is, be conversationally indistinguishable from a human) by 2029, I applaud his contribution to the debate. On the other hand, I think he hasn’t learned from the many failed artificial intelligence (AI) predictions over the past 50 years. Consider the number of overoptimistic AI predictions (from the 1950’s: “A computer will be the world chess champ in 10 years” or from 1968: “HAL from ‘2001′ is actually likely by the year 2001″). Now consider the other side — the _under_optimistic AI predictions (are there any?), where we were blindsided by how fast or important some new AI feature appeared. Let’s learn from this and realize how tenuous future predictions are. The fact is that most predictions are wrong and most new products fail. Forbes magazine had some good advice: “When you get the urge to predict the future, better lie down until the feeling goes away.” We consumers of these predictions can enjoy them and sometimes even learn from them, but we must be remain very skeptical.

MT Is the idea of accelerating change confined to us nerdy types or is it prevalent in the cultural mainstream as well?

Bob I think it’s pretty widespread. One thing that kept me motivated during the writing of the book was reading the occasional article that began, “We all know that technology change is accelerating…” and then discussed some quick-moving technology of the moment. Of course, the author lost me on the first sentence. Part of my concern is for society’s technology laggards. I sense that many seniors and other people typically not eager to adopt new technology are feeling left behind or stressed. Ads and experts tell them to join the 21st century — buy a computer, use email, surf the net, make a web site. They are told that the carousel is spinning faster and faster — in other words, if you are having a hard time keeping up now, just wait a few years! Alvin Toffler in Future Shock said, “In the three short decades between now [1970] and the turn of the millennium, millions of ordinary, psychologically normal people will face an abrupt collision with the future.” Is this the way technology change really works? I say no. And I say that it’s irresponsible to harass the late adopters by saying that it is.

I also think that to tell seniors that today’s technology eclipses anything that they ever had to deal with ignores the simple facts of technology in the 20th century. People who are 75 today have seen the introduction of television and then color television, have seen small airlines using propeller planes eventually use 747s and make international travel commonplace, and have seen the explosive and constructive use of nuclear power. They were alive when the Empire State Building was built, as well as the Hoover Dam and Golden Gate Bridge. They saw electricity
and telephone service and cars go from being moderately widespread luxuries to everyday essentials. They saw a man walk on the moon. Does all that and more vanish into insignificance next to the PC and Internet? I don’t think so.

Related

The Future Hype website (link)

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