The Future And You
Ideas and opinion about the future based on verifiable facts of today.
 
The Future And You--April 29, 2015

Robert J. Sawyer--Part 3. Topics: Microsoft's new HoloLens eyeglass computer which beats Google glass by providing a head up display over your entire field-of-view; the latest DARPA Robot Challenge showed us that robots are still amazingly slow, clumsy and bumbling; why the future popularity of sex robots is perfectly reasonable; making the case for human augmentation; why human augmentation will probably, over time, alter an individual's personality; benefits of the new laser-based carbon-dioxide scrubber for space travel; ideas on how to increase fairness in the judicial system; and the idea that if there had been as many smartphone video cameras during the civil rights movement as there are today, it probably would have proceeded a lot more rapidly and a lot less violently.

Robert J. Sawyer is one of only eight writers in history — and the only Canadian — to win all three of the world’s top Science Fiction awards for best novel of the year: the Hugo, the Nebula, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. (The full list of includes: Frederik Pohl, David Brin, Joe Haldeman, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Robert J. Sawyer, Arthur C. Clarke, Connie Willis, Paolo Bacigalupi.) Robert J. Sawyer  is also an award-winning scriptwriter and an in-demand keynote speaker.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the April 29, 2015 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 43 minutes] This interview was recorded using Skype on March 22, 2015.

Stephen Euin Cobb has interviewed over 350 people for his work as an author, futurist, magazine writer and award-winning podcaster. A contributing editor for Space and Time Magazine; he has also been a regular contributor for Robot, H+, Grim Couture and Port Iris magazines; and he spent three years as a columnist and contributing editor for Jim Baen's Universe Magazine. For the last nine years he has produced a weekly podcast, The Future And You, which explores (through interviews, panel discussions and commentary) all the ways the future will be different from today. He is an artist, essayist, game designer, transhumanist, and is on the Advisory Board of The Lifeboat Foundation. Stephen is the author of an ebook about the future entitledIndistinguishable from Magic: Predictions of Revolutionary Future Science.

Direct download: TFAY_2015_4_29.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 11:28pm EDT

The Future And You--April 22, 2015

Robert J. Sawyer--Part 2. Topics: indicators we might see if the Internet were to wake up and become conscious as an artificial intelligence; clever things such a web-mind might do to make the world a better place; why Artificial Intelligence or Artificial Super Intelligence is not likely to be dangerous; why it is likely that we will develop artificial intelligence; the future of 3-D printers of ordinary stuff, and of organs for transplant; features of a post-scarcity world; epigenetics; the astounding wealth of knowledge we all have at our keyboards; the free audio books available for download from LibriVox; the Neanderthal Genome Project; and the ethical problems with cloning a neanderthal.

Robert J. Sawyer is one of only eight writers in history — and the only Canadian — to win all three of the world’s top Science Fiction awards for best novel of the year: the Hugo, the Nebula, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. (The full list of includes: Frederik Pohl, David Brin, Joe Haldeman, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Robert J. Sawyer, Arthur C. Clarke, Connie Willis, Paolo Bacigalupi.) Robert J. Sawyer  is also an award-winning scriptwriter and an in-demand keynote speaker.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the April 22, 2015 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 38 minutes] This interview was recorded using Skype on March 22, 2015.

Stephen Euin Cobb has interviewed over 350 people for his work as an author, futurist, magazine writer and award-winning podcaster. A contributing editor for Space and Time Magazine; he has also been a regular contributor for Robot, H+, Grim Couture and Port Iris magazines; and he spent three years as a columnist and contributing editor for Jim Baen's Universe Magazine. For the last nine years he has produced a weekly podcast, The Future And You, which explores (through interviews, panel discussions and commentary) all the ways the future will be different from today. He is an artist, essayist, game designer, transhumanist, and is on the Advisory Board of The Lifeboat Foundation. Stephen is the author of an ebook about the future entitledIndistinguishable from Magic: Predictions of Revolutionary Future Science.

Direct download: TFAY_2015_4_22.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 11:50pm EDT

The Future And You--April 15, 2015

Robert J. Sawyer (the award-winning author and science enthusiast) discusses: radical life extension; how mind uploading might be misused in horrific ways; his critique of the methods used by the SETI project in their search for extraterrestrial civilizations; the most reasonable answers to the the Fermi Paradox; and his expectations concerning quantum computers, and why the NSA is buying them.

Robert J. Sawyer is one of only eight writers in history — and the only Canadian — to win all three of the world’s top Science Fiction awards for best novel of the year: the Hugo, the Nebula, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. (The full list of includes: Frederik Pohl, David Brin, Joe Haldeman, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Robert J. Sawyer, Arthur C. Clarke, Connie Willis, Paolo Bacigalupi.) Robert J. Sawyer  is also an award-winning scriptwriter and an in-demand keynote speaker.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the April 15, 2015 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 37 minutes] This interview was recorded using Skype on March 22, 2015.

Stephen Euin Cobb has interviewed over 350 people for his work as an author, futurist, magazine writer and award-winning podcaster. A contributing editor for Space and Time Magazine; he has also been a regular contributor for Robot, H+, Grim Couture and Port Iris magazines; and he spent three years as a columnist and contributing editor for Jim Baen's Universe Magazine. For the last nine years he has produced a weekly podcast, The Future And You, which explores (through interviews, panel discussions and commentary) all the ways the future will be different from today. He is an artist, essayist, game designer, transhumanist, and is on the Advisory Board of The Lifeboat Foundation. Stephen is the author of an ebook about the future entitledIndistinguishable from Magic: Predictions of Revolutionary Future Science.

Direct download: TFAY_2015_4_15.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 11:54pm EDT

The Future And You--April 8, 2015

Nancy Kress--part 3. Topics: Cameras in intersections that photograph people violating traffic laws and then mail them a ticket, and the retro-reflecting plastic sheet that motorists can buy and mount on their license plate to make photographing it with a flash camera impossible. How laws are always one step behind technological innovations, such as custody laws for the baby with three genetic parents. Cameras in a pill that you can swallow, which may someday replace colonoscopies. 3D printing of organs for transplant. Global climate change. The Neanderthal Genome Project, and the ethical problems of creating and raising a Neanderthal child.

Nancy Kress is the author of thirty-two books, including twenty-five novels, four collections of short stories, and three books on how to write better. Her work has won five Nebulas, two Hugos, a Sturgeon, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. Most recent works are Yesterday's Kin(Tachyon, 2014) and the forthcoming Best of Nancy Kress (Subterranean, autumn, 2015). In addition to writing, she often teaches at various venues around the country and abroad; in 2008 she was the Picador visiting lecturer at the University of Leipzig in Germany.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the April 8, 2015 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 26 minutes] This interview was recorded using Skype on March 19, 2015.

Stephen Euin Cobb has interviewed over 350 people for his work as an author, futurist, magazine writer and award-winning podcaster. A contributing editor for Space and Time Magazine; he has also been a regular contributor for Robot, H+, Grim Couture and Port Iris magazines; and he spent three years as a columnist and contributing editor for Jim Baen's Universe Magazine. For the last nine years he has produced a weekly podcast, The Future And You, which explores (through interviews, panel discussions and commentary) all the ways the future will be different from today. He is an artist, essayist, game designer, transhumanist, and is on the Advisory Board of The Lifeboat Foundation. Stephen is the author of an ebook about the future entitledIndistinguishable from Magic: Predictions of Revolutionary Future Science.

Direct download: TFAY_2015_4_8.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 9:21pm EDT

The Future And You--April 1, 2015

Nancy Kress--part 2. Topics: Weaponized drones in the hands of terrorists; hobbyist drones flying near commercial airports; DARPA's project to mount tiny cameras on cockroaches; the future of controlled nuclear fusion; 3D Printing; some of the potential downsides of everyone in the world living forever; streaming TV shows and movies; her efforts to put up her backlist of books as ebooks; the new virtual-reality HoloLens from Microsoft.

Nancy Kress is theauthor of thirty-two books, including twenty-five novels, four collections of short stories, and three books on how to write better. Her work has won five Nebulas, two Hugos, a Sturgeon, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award. Most recent works are Yesterday's Kin(Tachyon, 2014) and the forthcoming Best of Nancy Kress(Subterranean, autumn, 2015). In addition to writing, she often teaches at various venues around the country and abroad; in 2008 she was the Picador visiting lecturer at the University of Leipzig in Germany.

Hosted by Stephen Euin Cobb, this is the April 1, 2015 episode of The Future And You. [Running time: 30 minutes] This interview was recorded using Skype on March 19, 2015.

Stephen Euin Cobb has interviewed over 350 people for his work as an author, futurist, magazine writer and award-winning podcaster. A contributing editor for Space and Time Magazine; he has also been a regular contributor for Robot, H+, Grim Couture and Port Iris magazines; and he spent three years as a columnist and contributing editor for Jim Baen's Universe Magazine. For the last nine years he has produced a weekly podcast, The Future And You, which explores (through interviews, panel discussions and commentary) all the ways the future will be different from today. He is an artist, essayist, game designer, transhumanist, and is on the Advisory Board of The Lifeboat Foundation. Stephen is the author of an ebook about the future entitledIndistinguishable from Magic: Predictions of Revolutionary Future Science.

Direct download: TFAY_2015_4_1.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 11:50pm EDT