Future Today #105 - Imagination. Prediction. Quantum. Gen AI

Welcome to Future Today!?A newsletter for those curious about social innovation, disruptive technologies and futures studies. In it I share weekly articles, reports and interesting links, and recommendations of books, movies, series, events and courses.

?? Last week I didn't publish the newsletter because I was visiting CERN, a super inspiring experience! You can listen to it in the Heavy Mental episode (only in Spanish)

?? Where Imagination Lives in Your Brain . In recent years scientists have discovered another essential deficit that burdens people with hippocampal amnesia: they can’t envision the range of possibilities that must be considered to make future plans. Studies of neural activity in rats have since come along to support the idea that the hippocampus plays a central role in imagination.

?? Technology over the long run . Zoom out to see how dramatically the world can change within a lifetime. It is easy to underestimate how much the world can change within a lifetime. Bringing to mind how dramatically the world has changed can help us see how different the world could be in a few years or decades.

?? A True Paradise: WHERE WE ARE HEADING - Kevin Anderson . Climate scientist Kevin Anderson warns that continuing on our current path could result in a 3-4°C temperature rise by the end of the century, a catastrophic outcome to be avoided at all costs. He cautions against believing the political rhetoric about progress in the fight against climate change and calls on us to push for bold policy changes.

?? Predictive Models Can Lose the Plot. Here’s How to Keep Them on Track . Algorithmic inertia can result in guidance that leads businesses astray. Organizations are increasingly turning to sophisticated data analytics algorithms to support real-time decision-making in dynamic environments. However, these organizational efforts often fail — sometimes with spectacular consequences.

??? New technique in error-prone quantum computing makes classical computers sweat . Despite steady improvements in quantum computers, they’re still noisy and error prone, which leads to questionable or wrong answers. Scientists predict that they won’t truly outcompete today’s “classical” supercomputers for at least five or 10 years, until researchers can adequately correct the errors that bedevil entangled quantum bits, or qubits.

Recommended book: Brave New World (1932) - Aldous Huxley // Recommended tv series: Star Trek Discovery?(2017 - 2024) - Bryan Fuller

?? The economic potential of generative AI . The next productivity frontier. Generative AI is poised to unleash the next wave of productivity. We take a first look at where business value could accrue and the potential impacts on the workforce.

?? Paths to the future we want: Using Speculative Design and Future Cones to change paths . Recently, I’ve had multiple conversations about how designers can help people better consider the long-term impact of the decisions they’re making today, and how you can develop and nurture solutions that can have a longer-term impact. I’ve found and developed some useful tools that might help navigate these sometimes complicated and ambiguous topics.

?? How AI could plan your meals and monitor your nutrition . It’s 2040 and you’re hungry. You really want a nice bowl of creamy pasta. Your AI personal assistant has other ideas. It notes that you already had a big breakfast and on your last visit to the lavatory your urine metabolites were worrying.

?? Google DeepMind’s CEO Says Its Next Algorithm Will Eclipse ChatGPT . DeepMind’s Gemini, which is still in development, is a large language model that works with text and is similar in nature to GPT-4, which powers ChatGPT. But Hassabis says his team will combine that technology with techniques used in AlphaGo, aiming to give the system new capabilities such as planning or the ability to solve problems.

?? Products of Place . How can AI assist designers to make more sustainable products using abundant local materials?Products of Place visualises a speculative near-future where an AI-powered design process generates products with materials that are locally abundant and specific to place.

Asking ChatGPT

?????What is antimatter and does it really exist?

?? Antimatter is a form of matter that is the opposite of normal matter. It is composed of antiparticles, which are counterparts of the matter particles we know, such as protons, neutrons and electrons. For example, the antiproton is a negatively charged antiparticle, which is the counterpart of the positively charged proton. Similarly, the positron is a positively charged antiparticle, the counterpart of the negatively charged electron.

When matter and antimatter particles meet, they can annihilate each other and produce energy according to Einstein's famous equation, E=mc^2. This means that the mass of the particles is completely converted into energy.

And yes, antimatter really exists. Physicists have been able to create antimatter in the laboratory. For example, at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research), scientists have created and stored antihydrogen atoms.

However, antimatter is very scarce in the universe as we know it. This is a mystery because current theories of the universe suggest that equal amounts of matter and antimatter should have been created at the Big Bang. This is what is known as the baryogenesis problem. Scientists are working on theories and experiments to solve this mystery.

?????What can antimatter be used for in the future?

?? Antimatter has enormous potential for various applications because of the immense amount of energy it releases when it annihilates with matter. Here are some possibilities:

• Rocket propulsion: Given the amount of energy that antimatter can release, an antimatter-powered spacecraft could, in theory, reach speeds approaching the speed of light. This would allow interstellar travel on timescales that are beyond what any other technology can currently offer.
• Energy: Antimatter has a much higher energy yield than any energy source we know of today. One gram of antimatter contains approximately the same amount of energy as 25 million liters of oil.
• Medicine: Today, positrons (the antiparticle of the electron) are already used in positron emission tomography (PET), a medical imaging technique.

However, it should be noted that while the potential is enormous, so are the challenges. First, antimatter is extremely difficult and expensive to produce. Currently, we are only able to produce small amounts in large particle accelerators, and the cost is astronomical. Secondly, storing antimatter is a great challenge, as it has to be completely isolated from any contact with normal matter to avoid annihilation.

In addition, the use of antimatter raises significant safety and ethical concerns, especially in relation to its potential military use, given its extremely high energy yield. So while the possibilities are exciting, the associated risks and challenges must also be taken into account.

We are analog beings living in a digital world, facing a quantum future - Neil Turok

If you liked it... Share it! Don't be shy! And subscribe! If you want to get in touch with me, ping me at?[email protected].?See you next weeks! ??

???Read the newsletter in Spanish