The third course of the specialization CREATING INNOVATION will teach you what is at the core of all innovations that solve complex problems and how to foster methods to make big breakthroughs possible. It advances your knowledge of your own field by teaching you to look at it in new ways. CREATING INNOVATION is constructed in the following way: Week I. “What is Innovation?” – What lies at the core of all innovations. Week II. “The Evolution of Human Creativity” – How humans developed the ability to innovate and think creatively. Week III. “Innovation in a Complex Global Network” – How innovations emerge from human networks. Week IV. “Planning Innovation” – How organisations seek out and create the right conditions for new breakthroughs. Week V. “Market Innovation” – What makes innovations more likely to emerge in a market setting. Week VI. “Innovation in the Anthropocene” – How innovations are crucial to meet the problems of the 21st century.
Science and the Future of Innovation
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Из курса от партнера Macquarie University
Creating Innovation
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Innovation in the Anthropocene
In this module, we will look at the future of innovation and how we may cope with the complex problems that arise out of the Anthropocene.
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David BakerAssociate Lecturer
Big History Institute
David ChristianProfessor
Big History Institute
Shawn RossAssociate Professor
Big History Institute
The big question for this segment is,
what role will science play in the innovations of the next few decades?
[MUSIC]
I approached this segment with some trepidation.
If this were being filmed in 1960, I might be full of bright and
bubbly predictions about the year 2000.
Involving flying cars, household robots, and
some nonsense involving nuclear reactor car engines.
And of course, the ubiquitous jet pack.
Futurism is part art, part science and
part battle with embarrassment and hindsight.
The pace of scientific innovation has been going at a breakneck speed
since the start of the industrial revolution 250 years ago.
A pace that dwarfs all the major technological changes of
the past 10,000 years.
And borrowing some man made or natural disaster, the pace of
innovation is likely to continue to be impressive in the years to come.
But often, the pace of innovation does not go as quickly as you might predict.
And often, it veers of in directions you could not possibly anticipate
a few decades earlier.
With that in mind, let us look at some likely innovations
spurred on by science in the next 50 years.
But we shall bear in mind,
that due to the numerous obstructions that can be thrown up in our way, that this
list of innovations might be extended to the end of the century or beyond.
One likely innovation in the coming years is instant translation.
The ability to speak into your phone and have your words instantly translated to
the language of the person at the other end.
In the field of nanotechnology,
it is possible we will see the use of microscopic particles to deliver
chemotherapy directly to cancerous cells in the body.
Rather than carpet bombing the healthy cells around them,
straining the health of a cancer patient.
Also in nanotechnology,
we may see computer chips be replaced with a sort of gel containing nanoparticles.
This would allow for
even the most complex super computers to be no bigger than a tennis ball.
What this will mean is even household computers
will have a lot of more calculating power.
It may also be used for running programs for robots,
designed to do highly complex manual task and also permit for highly mobile AI.
Speaking of artificial intelligence, it is possible in the next 50 to a 100 years,
we shall see AI taking over more and
more areas of the labor market previously handled by humans.
You could see AI pushing shopping carts back into position at the grocery store,
or even the carts pushing themselves.
Machines engaged in building construction and even filling basic health care and
nursing positions in hospitals.
More alarmingly, numerous military chiefs have predicted that combat roles will
increasingly be performed by on the ground automated forces and,
of course, unmanned aircraft.
In the field of transport,
more electric charging stations on intercity highways may mark a final shift
from the combustion engine to the electric one, even for long distance shipping.
Also possible by the end of the century is for
self-driving cars to become more common, if not the majority mode of transport, and
affordable for the average person.
Self-driving cars, properly programmed, could safely close the gaps between cars
on the road that humans have to leave for their own safety.
Improving traffic congestion and using more than the estimated 5 to 10% of
the space on the road we humans currently use at any given time.
In the field of health, genome sequencing might be able to track mutations in
viruses and bacteria, and quickly halt epidemics faster than ever before.
Potentially, saving millions of lives.
It is also possible, in the next 50 to 100 years,
we may achieve a fully functional bionic limb that is controlled by the brain.
And even produce entire exoskeletons to enhance people's mobility in old age, or
even enable mobility where there was none before.
By the end of the century, we may even have mapped in entirety, the human brain,
and begun treatment of serious neurological diseases.
With the combination of all advances in the medical field that are projected,
a number of experts are saying it is likely we shall see some humans live to
150 years old before this century is out.
3D printing could revolutionize pretty much every method of manufacturing
known to man.
There may come a time when we can print a new car engine
in the comfort of our own homes.
3D printing potentially marks the ability to manufacture anything domestically, so
long as we have the right raw materials.
Print things that are plastic, rubber, metal, cloth, or even print a cake.
Once the price is low enough, the technology sophisticated enough,
the domestic 3D printer could potentially revolutionize our homes and
our lives in the same way the domestic computer did 20 years ago.
Genetically modified bacteria is also a science that looms large in our future.
We are already piloting bacteria that will naturally produce oil,
rather than having to depend on drilling.
Bacteria is also being used to produce a high yield crop that gives us
our basic nutrients.
100,000 times more efficient than in modern rice or wheat crops, using less
land and providing a food resource that could be sent to starving populations.
On that score, there are designs being laid down for farms based in skyscrapers
to meet the growing demand for food and compensating for a shortage of land.
In essence, do with crops what we did with people in urban areas over a century ago.
We may also be looking at the transition in the next 50 to 100 years
to solar thermal energy and hydrogen fuels.
For which the technology is currently available, but
still makes up only a tiny sliver of the energy market.
And there are even serious moves to fire up nuclear fusion reactors by mid-century.
Providing us with an almost limitless amount of energy
that would represent a major revolution in history
as significant as the origin of agriculture or advent of industry.
In terms of air travel, it may finally become economically viable to produce and
use supersonic aircraft with the tech already out there
to make rapid flights from Australia to London in four to six hours.
A common occurrence available to the average person.
Likewise, the trip into Earth's orbit that cost about $1 million a pop,
may become as affordable as an air flight is now.
In the next 50 to 100 years, it may be possible that we shall
even be making manned missions to Mars or even setting up a colony.
And we may also be sending probes to Proxima Centauri,
the solar system 4.2 light years away.
Using electric fields and solar sails, traveling at speeds approaching the speed
of light, making the journey in about 20 years.
Finally, we have been told for a number of years that we are fast approaching
the point where we shall be able to upload the consciousness of the brain.
Which is a sort of fleshy computer, to a computer
that does not biodegrade quite as quickly, allowing for transhumanism.
And the opportunity for our consciousness to live on for
more than just a century, but thousands and perhaps millions of years.
Some say this is possible in the next 50 to 100 years.
I personally would be fairly annoyed if I were amongst the last generation to die.
There's too much of the universe to see.
And on the off chance that this video is still on the Internet in 100 years so,
I do hope this list wasn't too ridiculous in hindsight.
And anyway, thinking about this sort of thing is fun,
and more, potentially inspiring about
how we can get involved to bring some of
these wild predictions into reality.
[MUSIC]
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