The future (of learning) will be telepathic and telekinetic

Inge de Waard

This is a powerpoint narration

Arthur C Clarke envisioned the future 50 years ago, so can we

He made a brilliant point: “if what I will say to you now will seem to be completely reasonable, I will have failed miserably. Only if what I tell you appears absolutely unbelievable, have you any chance of visualizing the future as it really will happen”.

So here I am, Ignatia, just another peer in the Cloud, putting on my time warp goggles to envision the future of humankind, with technology.

Why? Because #Plenk2010 pushed me into it!

My starting point: in 50 years time humans will be telepathic and

telekinetic

Why? Let me take you on my narrative powerpoint

journey into the future.

Humanity has only just reached puberty, our brain is still growing.

(Image taken from blogpost by Vicky Sormaala on Homo Interneticus)

We lack maturity (the environment can vouch for that), and an ethical mindset (global poverty for example).Our story of the human sapiens unfolds slowly, and although we call ourselves modern time and time again, it barely matches the state of human kind we will be in when we reach our complete evolution. We all are in this together. For “the problems in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them” – Albert Einstein

What is our future?

(image from Tensafefrogs)

The future is to become more human. And to become more human, we must learn more rapidly, understand more fully.

All of contemporary (educational) technology brings us closer to how a human works, AND it enhances our human state.

Innovations can bring us closer to our own human potential

(image from javier.reyesGomez)

Facebook’s and twitter’s success is not coincidental, it works because it expands our own humanness. This characteristic fits all contemporary innovations.

In order for human innovations to take off, we must understand the contemporary human.

So … what is human?

We sit around campfires

We tell stories: narration has always given us a deeper understanding. Storytelling will take us all along a learning journey.

And most importantly, when night falls, we DREAM. We let go of the world we know and we look towards the stars to share our wildest dreams.

Dreams are what makes us evolve, is what brings on the passion to come up and work persistently on new innovations.

We connect: networking is what we have always done, we need to

We share common interests, with others. Mentorship was always around and in this Web2.0 age neo-mentorship is gaining stamina once again. We follow our mentors, engage with them and learn (read/write web).

We know knowledge comes from connecting: we bond and therefore we are.

Personal characteristics will position us in a group. Only when we are all in this together, can we truly reach the diverse potential that is in us. The swarm theory does not filter out humans, it takes us all a step further because we have slightly different trades, yet are all human.

Learning is inherently human: from in the whomb we learn

Our learning mind does not need to be told what to do, we learn no matter what. Sugata Mitra discovered with his hole in the wall project, where small children taught themselves English and genetics from a stand-alone computer.

We socialize and learn from each other (peer-to-peer).

Learning comes with a preference, but it is these array of specialties, which again build our common human hive.

Learning happens naturally in networks (peers, mentors, …)

As all of the PLENK participants know, and explore.

Humans have networking limits

150 = the average limit of our active networking capacities

(image taken from Supnah’s blog)

Dunbar’s number drives us socially

Unfriending social network sites (e.g. Facebook) is needed for focusing reasons, we sometimes need to regroup ‘friends’ for increased comprehension.

Dunbar showed us that we – as humans – have a limited social capacity.

Friends are not always needed

Sometimes loose dots, outside of our network will do.

We look outside of our networked brain, and roam coincidental peers whose ideas connect with our temporary context or location (peer information on vacation).

And yes, they might only have ‘6 degrees of separation’ between them.

A big step forward occurs in the interdisciplinary realm

Great innovations arise from interdisciplinary cross-pollination. The Flemish school of painters, could only come of age, because painters started to work with glass/mirror makers (according to the Hockney-Falco thesis).

Tolerance, sharing of knowledge always adds to new ways of thinking and new era’s of enlightenment. We look across borders to learn (Spanish golden age).

All of these characteristics are human, we build upon them, but…

T

Contemporary innovations only increase our human capacities

Nothing we have build, even in contemporary (educational) technology, surpasses our inherent human characteristics. It only enables us to do things on an increased, bigger scale then we ever did.

So, do we really move from Web1.0, to Web2.0, to WebX.0?

Steve Wheeler doesn’t think so, and neither do I. The future is NOT another Web. The future is becoming fully evolved humans.

Let’s look at the latest group of technologies

The semantic web is opening up

Google results differ according to search history.

Artificial Intelligence is upon us

But it is not technology that is becoming smarter. As Jaron Lanier mentions in his book ‘you are not a gadget’, What the Turing test really tells us, … is that machine intelligence can only be known in a relative sense, in the eyes of a human beholder”. By the way read the book, mind boggling good!

Or quoting the fabulous Lady Ada Lovelace - the founder of scientific computing - while referencing to Babbage’s machine: “The Analytical Engine has no pretensions to originate anything. It can do whatever we know how to order it to perform

Augmented reality is unfolding

The real world is given labels by all of us. Our mental connected constructs are added to the real world. Mobile technology is reshaping the world’s context and the learner’s possibilities in all it’s aspects (interest, time, location).

We can explore virtual worlds.

Live data can be generated

Data that is generated can immediately put to use by all of us (GIS, live epidemic surveillance…). It can immediately be filtered and researched (see post from Christian Kreutz)

Cyborg anthropology is a reality

Human – machine interaction increases

Kevin Warwick controls his environment with an implanted chip.

Nanotechnology is a growing field

With 15,342 atoms, this parallel-shaft speed reducer gear is one of the largest nanomechanical devices ever modeled in atomic detail. LINK

It allows us to build small engines that penetrates the body to the level of cells.

Okay, I hear you say, but what about the future?

The future is … the evolved human brain

Research indicates that even the small occurrence of Web2.0 is changing our brain and how it functions. So it is logical to think that with the increased development of technology our brain will evolve even more.

The future will cut out the middleman: external tools will be reduced

Apple devices work, because they are intuitive, and they bring the user closer to the experience.

What does this mean? The future will allow us to do things more directly with less tools.

Mobile devices released us from location and time for learning. Augmented reality, nanotechnology and Artificial Intelligence will free us from our senses, and link the mind immediately to the goal it chooses to go for.

So yes, the future within 50 years is

telepathic and telekinetic

It is simple, just visualize and you will see

We will know where we are in the world, because we can tap into the livestream of our peers (e.g. foursquare galore)

We will travel the world, simply by locking into the extended Google Earth.

We will share our thoughts, simply by thinking them.

How can any of us add to this future?

Innovations never stand on their own, so connect to others: Stephen Downes connective intelligence (http://www.downes.ca/post/43456). Look around and then build your vision, follow it with passion.

Do not dig yourself in production work: take time off. Dreaming passionately is the source of any innovation. And dreams consist of theta waves, slow waves that only occur if you allow your conscious brain some time off. Take time off, it will increase your ideas.

Do not ponder on whether what you think is original, no invention was ever invented by only one person. Originality does not exist we all build on one another, but passionate accomplishment will brighten up any inventors life.

This powerpoint narration was brought to you by Ignatia / Inge de Waard

E-mail: idewaard@itg.be

Blog: ignatiawebs.blogspot.com

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