Smart Economy

Top 10 smart technologies for Obama and Harper to consider for their infrastructure / cyberstructure / cognistructure program

Both US president elect Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Steven Harper have promised "New Deal" like infrastructure programs for the USA and Canada to spend their way out of a depression / recession (pick one). A new term is needed to describe this type of new intelligence-infused infrastructure. I call it the cognistructure-an infrastructure that thinks for itself.

Here's my list of top 10 smart technologies that both Olbama and Harper should have their eye on and on their planning radar screens; (Niche applications 10-6, more ubiquitous applications 5-1)

10. Smart home fabrication (supersized 3D printer that prints your home on site) to improve construction efficiency and effectiveness and waste reduction in conventional house building (but there is little chance of seeing North American building codes reformed any time soon)

9. Smart sensors in bridges, levees, roads, buildings, vehicles, satellites  etc (smart dust) to provide a dynamic sense and respond environment- eco cities-earth with a fast track  nervous system

8. Move toward the electrification of transportation (GM, Ford, Chysler shifts production to electric cars and trucks)and smart road networks (ie smart retractable speed bumps, movable road mediums that adjust to traffic flow and congestion)

7.Biomimicry -- designing systems, objects and surfaces  based on natural biological models

6. Smart "emergent and self-organizing" traffic congestion systems that deal with natural complexity in unconventional ways

5.Infrastructure / congnistructure for Smart cities, that address and enforce  "system resilience" and mitigates the consequences future potential catastrophies (climate change, severe weather, man-made disasters, riots, etc)

4.Modermizing the electrical grid to accept consumer and commercial inputs from alternate energy and reducing power loss during distribution ( via super conductors and nanowires)

3.Adoption of smart alternate energy technologies (wind, water and sun) that approach price parity with gas, coal, nuclear and electricity. Move toward distributed and diversified energy production vs centralised energy production.

2. Energy harvesting- various smart technologies that convert latent heat, all light spectra and mechanical vibration into electricity. Objects that create their own energy

1. Internet of things (IofT) (or ObjectNet or O-Net) & the Internet of Services (IofS) or S-Net -Intelligent objects, systems and environments have their own unique IP address and are connected together, just like web pages are linked on the web today.

© 2005-2008

Walter Derzko

Expert, Consultant and Guest Speaker on emerging Smart Technologies, Strategic Planning, Business Development, Lateral Creative Thinking and author of an upcoming book on the Smart Economy "

To explore the opportunities and threats of any new smart technology in your industry - Contact Me

.....Strategy without action is a day-dream; action without strategy is a nightmare"

- old Japanese proverb

P. S. if this is your first visit to my blog, please go to our Welcome page

Smart Sustainability Showcase for Toronto and Canada

From: Walter Derzko

Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 12:19 AM

To: undisclosed list

Subject: re Smart Sustainability ShowCase for Toronto and Canada.

Importance: High

Dear Colleagues

I’d like to plant an idea with you – after speaking with a number of designers and vendors, I’m exploring the idea for a sustainability showcase that would feature theme based exhibits with smart technologies from Canadian and international sources-the best from Ontario, nationally and from around the world.

The launch would be 2010, The timing for this seems right.  The target audience would be Canadian business, consumers and school children

I’m writing a book on smart technologies and this would be a logical extension of the concept.

Two years ago I talked to Samantha Sannella and Poala Polletto at the Design Exchange (DX) in Toronto and with several people at the Ont Science Center.  Both groups expressed interest but said that we would need to find sponsors for the project

My business model for this would be three pronged -vendor based revenue, corporate based sponsor revenue and municipality based sponsorship ie city of Toronto or Mississauga and possibly the province of Ontario who may wish to promote sustainable manufacturing.

This concept would be a Canadian, in fact a North American first.

I have a list of 150 potential vendors, and designers from around the world who are working on smart technologies that we can start to approach.

The exhibits would be theme based, --the sustainable kitchen, the sustainable office, the sustainable retail shelf, the sustainable workspace, the sustainable community, the sustainable city etc and would be updated with new technologies every 3-5 years and have a 1-5 year forward focus. (what's commercially available now or in the very near future.

For other exhibits, there can be a regional or national focus ie smart sustainable technology from the UK, Finland, Germany (Fraunhofer Inst), China, Ukraine, Russia, or Singapore, Hong Kong etc

Corporate sponsors might include: Walmart, Rona, Home Deport, Canadian Tire, Loblaws, Sears, Imperial Oil, the banks (RBC, TD, RBC BMO) etc.

The Sustainability Showcase could be housed in a physical location, or it could tour from location to location around the city or province or be mobile ( on a bus the way the Japanese and Korean do- a display bus turned into a demo center that tours from school to school or to fairs and exhibitions.

OCAD students and staff and Beal senior fellows could play a hand in designing exhibit spaces and sourcing new vendors and sustainable technologies.

Several other revenue opportunities could spin off from this as well

Here’s just a few examples of what can be showcased

1) Environmentally sensible packaging such as Mercury-Absorbant NanoSponge packaging for broken compact fluorescent lamps (CFL's) http://smarteconomy.typepad.com/smart_economy/2008/06/mercury-absorba.html

2) Concrete Wood (from the example I mentioned June 2 at OCAD, when Bob Logan was bemoaning the lack of durability of pressboard shelving from Ikea.  See Concrete Wood from lodgepole pine trees destroyed by pine beetles (kills two birds with one stone) http://smarteconomy.typepad.com/smart_economy/2007/11/concrete-wood.html

3) End of Traditional Heating and Air conditioning Thin-film version of Active Building Envelope (ABE) systems could make conventional air conditioning and heating equipment obsolete http://smarteconomy.typepad.com/smart_economy/2006/07/thinfilm_versio.html

4) OLEDs New High efficiency flat light source OLEDs > Almost any surface in a home, whether flat or curved, could become a light source: walls, curtains, ceilings, cabinets, shelves or tables.  Http://smarteconomy.typepad.com/smart_economy/2006/04/new_high_effici.html

Lots more like these

For anyone who is interested in exploring the idea of a Smart Sustainability Showcase for Toronto, we are having a meeting on Tuesday July 22 at 11 am at the Ontario College of Art & Design (OCAD), Beal Institute for Strategic Creativity, room 600, 6th floor , 100 McCaul St, Toronto just south of the Ont Art Gallery.

Please RSVP, so we know how many people are coming

I have had some positive feedback from several organizations, & I’d like to push the concept forward

I'm sending this nationally and internationally in  case you are aware of any designers, vendors, manufacturers or research centers who have interesting cutting edge smart sustainable technology to showcase.

Contact me by email

----Walter  Derzko; Senior Fellow Beal Institute for Strategic Creativity, OCAD 

© 2005-2008 Walter Derzko -"Changing the world, one idea at a time"©

Expert, Consultant, Keynote Speaker and Lecturer on Emerging Smart Technologies, Innovation, Entrepreneurship, Strategic Foresight, Business Development, Lateral Creative Thinking and author of an upcoming book on the Smart Economy

The Smart Technology Blog: The Smart Economy -- Read, enjoy, explore, speculate, comment !!

To arrange for an in house presentation or briefing on smart technology see here

To explore the opportunities and threats of any new smart technology in your industry - Contact Me or explore how we can work together

Predicting the impacts of any new technology

"The telephone is a fantastic invention & I'm sure every city will get one."

The above quote seems funny, even childish in hindsight, but illustrates the difficulty in anticipating the consequences and impacts of a new-to-the-world  technology and its range of applications.

The Swedish Technology Foresight Project  did a "technology hindsight" study looking back at earlier attempts at predicting technology futures called Technisk Baksyn (Technology Hindsight)

From the above study and from some of my own insights with clients, some of the common sources of technology foresight errors and miscalculations include:

• The early hype error. In the stort term, marketers, promoters and eager inventors  seem to overestimate the impacts of any new technology and in the long term underestimate such impacts and consequences (see the Gartner Hype curves)
• The replacement hype error-the belief that new technology will  replace the existing incumbent technology & that this will happen relatively fast. In reality competing technologies often coexist over a long period of time (i.e. Radio & TV)
• The enhancement error-The belief that new technology will only solve old problems & supplement existing technological systems. Instead new technologies, especially platform or core technologies often lay the groundwork for entirely new systems and new resulting systemic problems.  (ie the electric motor for the railway, the car for the roadway infrastructure, the PC for the Internet, nanotech & biotech  for our bodies "intra-structure" (the Human Genome project, the HapMap & SNP's), the impacts of which we do not fully understand yet.
• The panacea error-The mistaken belief that new technology will function as a panacea for various social problems
• The patterning and sense-making error-The difficulty of seeing new important links between seemingly unrelated and different fields of technology, especially in cases where this novel combination of fields is precisely what will offer major accelerated development opportunities
• The social impacts error-Often people who have tried to predict the future have become bogged down in the actual technology and neglected the economic and social aspects.
• The prisoners of our times error-That without realizing it, people tend to be prisoners of the spirit of their times ( Zeitgeist), erroneously believing that the big issues of today will also be the big issues of tomorrow
• The decision criteria error-The belief that only rational economic considerations are the only factors behind that choice of one technology over another. However, for many people, seemingly irrational considerations determine such choices
• The information gap error-The information on which science and technology (S&T) foresight studies are based on is often insufficient. Technology development is not linear, transparent or fully predictable, with surprise development coming out of left field such as the secret work that is done in the military or a new startup working in stealth  mode before it goes public with a breakthrough. Entrepreneurs have to deal with many unknowns -complexity, uncertainty, equivocality, ambiguity, the trap of dichotomous thinking or dichotomy, contradiction or paradox and infoglut.

From the above, the only thing we can predict for sure is that unexected things will happen

Marshal McLuhan was the "master" in predicting the social impacts of new technologogy (in his case the media) with deadly accuracy. Marshal would ask himself 4 simple questions, which he called the tetrad, to explore the impacts and consequences of any new technology, that he didn't fully understand yet. 1) What does the technology enhance?  2) What does the technology make obsolete?  3) What does the technology retrieve that had been obsolesced earlier?  4) What does the technology flip into when pushed to extremes? 

Entrepreneurs can learn how to use this 'tetrad" tool and as well as many other tools that help develop entrepreneurial and S&T insight and foresight.

Source: Certificate in Innovation and Entrepreneurship, University of Toronto, SCS see here

Technology solution availability is not enough-you have to implement. The Poor Record of Government Promises 07-177

Governments around the world promise many items during elections or at key international events, but these are quickly forgotten by voters.

According to a Press Release issued by the G8 Research Group:

THE VERDICT IS IN ON ST. PETERSBURG: G8 HAS A LONG WAY TO GO

Researchers Release Comprehensive Review of G8 Performance

KÜHLUNGSBORN, GERMANY - As German Chancellor Angela Merkel opens the 2007 G8 Summit in Heiligendamm, a new report suggests that G8 countries have a long way to go to meet their 2006 commitments made at St. Petersburg.  The G8 has complied with only 46% of its priority promises since the summit last July.  While this is an average performance for the G8 over the past 10 years, the G8 has not scored this poorly since the 2002 Kananaskis Summit, with its 33% score.  The G8 Research Group's annual Compliance Report, released today on the G8 Information Centre website , assesses G8 members' compliance with selected priority commitments from the 2006 St. Petersburg Summit, including energy security and support for African peacekeeping.  The report is the product of analysis conducted by the G8 Research Group at the University of Toronto and Moscow's State University Higher School of Economics.

The environment and Africa are set to top the G8 agenda at Heiligendamm and the G8's record on these issues over the past year has been mixed. 

The G8 fulfilled fewer than half of its commitments to develop national energy efficiency action plans and clean public transport.  While the St. Petersburg Summit offered little in the way of ambitious climate change initiatives, G8 countries easily complied with 89% of the promises they did make.  At the same time, compliance was high with St. Petersburg commitments on debt relief for Africa and support for renewable energy technologies in developing countries, both of which had 89% compliance scores.

• The United States, the United Kingdom and Canada have the highest compliance at 60%. 
• Current Host Germany is slightly behind at 55%,
• Former Host Russia achieved only 45%, despite all the grandiose promises from Putin. 
• France and Japan scored 40%, and
• Italy again came in last place at only 5%. 

All G8 countries kept fewer of their promises than they did after the 2005 Gleneagles Summit, except for the Russian Federation, which, as host of its first regular summit in 2006, improved its average compliance score by about 25%, (....starting from a low compliance baseline however)

"In the three areas of focus at the St. Petersburg Summit -- energy security, health and education -- the G8 countries only register 69%, 41% and 33% compliance, respectively," said Laura Sunderland, senior researcher with the G8 Research Group.  "Particularly since Germany assumed the G8 presidency in January, G8 members have increased compliance with half of their commitments."

The full text of the report and a summary are now available free of charge on the G8 Information Centre website .

The G8 Research Group's mission is to serve as the world's leading independent source of information and research on the G8 and its institutions.  Founded in 1987 and based at the University of Toronto, it is an international network of scholars, professionals and students interested in the activities of the G8.  For more information, please visit here.

© 2005-2007

Walter Derzko -"Changing the world, one idea at a time"©

Expert, Consultant and Keynote Speaker on Emerging Smart Technologies, Innovation, Strategic Foresight, Business Development, Lateral Creative Thinking and author of an upcoming book on the Smart Economy "

The Smart Technology Blog: The Smart Economy -- Read, enjoy, explore, speculate, comment !!

To arrange for an in house presentation or briefing on smart technology see here

To explore the opportunities and threats of any new smart technology in your industry - Contact Me or explore how we can work together

• ".....Strategy without action is a day-dream; action without strategy is a nightmare"-old Japanese proverb
• ".......Ours is the age that is proud of machines that think and suspicious of men who try to." -- H. Mumford Jones
• ".......Without changing our patterns of thought, we will not be able to solve the problems we created with our current pattern of thought."  --A. Einstein
• ".......Change is difficult, but complacency and stagnation are surefire showstoppers..." --Walter Derzko

• ".......Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."  -- Margaret Mead

• ".......Small minds discuss people; Average minds discuss events; Great minds discuss ideas; --Anon

P. S. if this is your first visit to my blog, please go to our Welcome page

UK Government publishes Strategic Horizon Scans

The Horizon Scanning Centre has commissioned two complementary scans looking ahead up to 50 years : the Sigma Scan and the Delta Scan.

Initial versions of both scans have been published by the contractors who developed them : Sigma Scan by Outsights - Ipsos MORI and Delta Scan  by the Institute for the Future (IFTF).

The Sigma Scan is a broad synthesis of some of the world's best Horizon Scanning sources. It covers future issues and trends across the full public policy agenda. It is drawn from a range of sources including think tanks, academic publications, mainstream media, corporate foresight, expert/strategic thinkers, government sources, alternative journals, charities/NGOs, blogs, minority communities, and futurists.

The Delta Scan is an overview of future science and technology issues and trends, with contributions by over 200 science and technology experts from the worlds of government, business, academia and communication in the UKand US.

Develeped over 2005 and 2006 by a team of consultants and futurists,  the Scanning Framework has some novel methodologies and catagories. Each main issue is described as an Issue paper.

The main text of the Issue Papers themselves is divided into a number of different sections:


Headline: Headlines provide a brief description of the future eventuality discussed a pithy note on the main themes contained within the paper.


Keywords: Keywords summarise the coverage of the issue and suggest related issues, domains or topics.


Summary: The summary provides first an Abstract of the Issue (delimited by asterisks) for a quick overview of the whole paper, followed by a description of the trend, event or theme and the debates it raises. This is generally a presentation of the data/evidence in this field, linked where necessary to sources (with no fixed view on likely outcomes).


Implications: this contains a range of possible outcomes that could flow from the Issue as described in the Summary. These incorporate a number of factors where appropriate, including social values, habitat/environment, new technologies, knock-on and perverse effects. Early Indicators: This aspect of the Paper suggests possible early warning signs and precursors that should be looked for to indicate that the Issue may indeed be developing as described in the Paper.

Drivers and Inhibitors: Factors, people, institutions or events which will either fuel (Drivers) or act as a barrier (Inhibitors) to the emergence of this Issue.


Parallels and Precedents: Historical, international or cross-cultural examples of
somewhat similar instances which may shed some light either on the evolution of the Issue or the likely success of different strategies in response.


Sources: The list of sources consulted in writing the Paper, with web links, documents and location information where applicable.


Related links: a list of websites that may be of further interest to the reader relating to the topic


Sigma Scan basics: Issue Markers

Each issue has been further labelled with a number of Markers, which provide highly indicative (i.e. not predictive) information about the possible likelihood, impact,
distribution, severity and development time of each Issue:


Impact: This marker is designed to reflect the potential of this issue to create pervasive and/or serious change in the world at large: a development which in cultural, technological, environmental, economic or political terms alters the way we live or perceive the world. Impact is divided into:

• ****Extreme: Intense, deep-seated, pervasive or long-lasting in its effects. An event/development which profoundly affects the planet for example, an asteroid strike.
• ***High: A great event in human history, something that shapes human history and leaves longstanding cultural residues for example, the moon landings, the establishment of the United Nations, a major pandemic.
• **Medium: A defining aspect of a particular generation or nation's experience of the world. An important footnote in world history, such as the implementation of the Euro, the fall of the Berlin Wall.
• *Low: A development whose scope to instigate change is subtle or in some way restrained by conditions, medium, force, locality or likely responses. Something that captures the news agenda for months or years, but eventually fades into the cultural memory for example, the cultural changes of the 1960s.
• ?Unknown: There is no consensus within the literature about how best to interpret this issue.

Likelihood: The likelihood that this issue will evolve to become a central theme/development - in some way - in future society within its projected life span. The likelihood markers are:

• ***High: 75+% confidence that the events discussed will come to pass.
• **Medium: An equivocal 50/50 call.
• *Low: 25% or less probability.
• ?Unknown: No consensus about the likelihood.
  
  

Controversy: The level of consensus amongst experts, commentators and other observers holds that the Issue will unfold in the way described in the Paper and/or assume a greater significance in acting as an instigator of change. The controversy markers are:

• ***High: Very few experts pay the issue serious attention, and there is very little consensus about the extent to which this issue is likely to emerge. There is very little known evidence for this issue, and what there is highly unconventional, or propounded by alternative sources.
• **Medium: Whilst there is some kind of conventional consensus, futurists and/or alternative sources dispute whether this issue is likely to be a central development in future. Evidence is somewhat equivocal or open to scrutiny, even within expert audiences.
• *Low: The majority of experts, as well as a large volume of authoritative evidence, point to this issue emerging as a central theme over the next 50 years.
• ?Unknown: No known consensus on how to apply this marker.

When: The expected timeframe for this issue to influence C.21st life to the degree ascribed to it under "Impact". Divided into:

• 0-2 years: This impact of this issue is already being felt or will be in the immediate future
• 3-10 years: Likely to be under way but perhaps not well distributed. Wider effects felt over the near horizon
• 11-20 years: Mid horizon effects
• 21-50 years: Mid to far horizon effects
• 50+ years: Far horizon effects ?Unknown: High level of uncertainty as to when this impact could be felt

Where: The geographical spread of the Issues impact. Divided into:

• Domestic/national Largely restricted to particular nation states (e.g. UK)
• Regional Largely restricted to major global regions/continental areas (e.g. EU, Latin America)
• Global Potential to be experienced anywhere/everywhere on a global scale
• ?Unknown

How fast: How quickly the events and potential impacts described in the Paper could be
experienced:

• Instant in a matter of moments
• Days over the course of days
• Months over months
• Years over years
• Unknown

Sigma Scan basics: Issue Genres


As well as the markers, each paper is also classified into a number of different Genres. This is identified at the start of the Summary in capital letters and is supplied as an at-a-glance way for users to decide what sort of critical thinking they should apply to their reading of the paper. (e.g. in the same way that we would apply different critical faculties for reading a work of science fiction than we would for reading todays
newspaper).

Weak signal: A primarily descriptive Paper attempting to shed light on a relatively little known, weakly felt or poorly distributed phenomenon a possible baby trend at the relative margins of current knowledge. The Implications of this style of paper tend to be limited to explaining what is already starting to happen, and the Drivers / Inhibitors are important in deciding whether it will grow into a Key Driver or dwindle into nothing. The aim of Weak Signal papers is to inform readers about trends or
potential events that might slip under the radar.

Forecast: An Issue for which there is a relatively high degree of certainty, at least in terms of its likely presence as a force for change, based as it is on robust quantitative data and relatively stable variables. Forecast papers are based upon well-grounded and
authoritative sources, drawing on models or statistics to draw conclusions.

Key driver: These Papers describe a relatively more mainstream and better-known trend or development. Something that would probably on the radar of most policymakers or strategy thinkers. Key Driver papers provide a top-level review of the trend for the uninitiated, and aim to stretch the more informed reader with some wider Implications Parallels / Precedents beyond the usual inferences and certainties.

Scenario: A Paper which takes as its evidence base published scenario work from other sources. It therefore discusses the range of uncertainties and drivers that have been discussed in developing these scenarios and compares the assumptions in them. Rather than describing a possible driver of future change, it therefore examines the feasibility and possible implications of a particular hypothetical future.

Wildcard: An Issue with the potential to emerge unexpectedly but with potentially major impacts. Often, these papers deal with a radical discontinuity, as compared to other, more continuous and/or gradual trends.

Happy 1st Birthday to the Smart Economy Blog; Announcing a new Web site, Monthly workshops and webinars

Today marks the 1st anniversary of the Smart Economy Blog. We've received many encouraging feedback & emails from our readers over the past year and good suggestions from positive-focused critics for future improvements.

• According to Pingpoat, The Smart Economy Blog is worth  is $1011.17!  per day
• Inbound links: 1085
• Technorati rank: 34,021

So today, I'm announcing a series of new "smart" initiatives that we will be kicking off in October 2006.

The Smart Economy is growing exponentially and so are we, right along with it.

Smart Economy Learning Series-monthly workshops in Toronto

Starting in October 2006, we will be launching a monthly series of one-day workshops on topics that our blog readers say interest them. These include:

• Latest Tools for Advanced Environmental Scanning, Managing Information Overload and Sense-making ( October 12, 2006, BCE Place Toronto) email me asking for a registration form
• Lateral thinking in business  (Date TBA)
• Developing foresight in your business or industry  (Date TBA)
• Resolving conflicts and disputes using lateral thinking (Date TBA)
• The Opportunity Clinic --Scanning your business environment for Opportunities(Date TBA)
• The Idea Lab --Designing smart products and services that will drive business development forward (Date TBA)
• Introduction to Business Development --Tracking emerging technologies as threats or opportunities for your business (Date TBA)
• Technology Assessment for Investment Professionals & High Tech Startups (Date TBA)
• Building a Busines Case for Smart Devices, objects and services (Date TBA)
• Designing winning business modles for Smart Technologies (Date TBA)

Register today, since space will be limited. Past workshops have sold out quickly.

The Smart Economy Web Page

We are finally in the last stages of planning and constructing our new web site for the Smart Economy. Watch out for launch date soon.

The Smart Economy Webinar Series.

Also starting in October 2006, we will host a monthly opportunity for our blog readers to phone in and participate in a "live seminar" which will include power-point slides and a Q&A session, all from the comfort of your PC or laptop. It will be on some current topic related to the smart economy and some rising smart technology that will be coming into prominence soon. This will be a subscription based series.... We will try to keep the price reasonable so that everyone can participate. Subscription information & schedule will be out soon. Watch for announcements.

Thanks again for all your ideas and keep the feedback coming in.

© 2005-2006

Walter Derzko

Expert, Consultant and Keynote Speaker on Emerging Smart Technologies, Innovation, Strategic Foresight,, Business Development, Lateral Creative Thinking and author of an upcoming book on the Smart Economy "

To arrange for an in house presentation on smart technology see here

To explore the opportunities and threats of any new smart technology in your industry - Contact Me or explore how we can work together

.....Strategy without action is a day-dream; action without strategy is a nightmare"- old Japanese proverb

.......Ours is the age that is proud of machines that think and suspicious of men who try to. - H. Mumford Jones

"Without changing our patterns of thought, we will not be able to solve the problems we created with our current pattern of thought."  A. Einstein

P. S. if this is your first visit to my blog, please go to our Welcome page

Looking for Feedback on the Smart Economy Blog

Today is a bit of an anniversary for the Smart Economy. Since I started on this blog last Fall (Sept 15th, 2005 to be exact), I've posted 500 entries (this is # 501). We've received over 100 comments online and many more private direct emails. Our daily traffic is growing steadily month by month, as word spreads about The Smart Economy. Many other influential and popular web sites, trend syndication services and blogs now link back to us.

• According to Pingpoat, The Smart Economy Blog is worth is $1011.17!  Per day
• Inbound links: 1085
• Technorati rank: 34,021

I'd like to hear feedback from you --- our blog readers. How can we improve this site?

• what do you enjoy reading about smart technologies?
• what else would you like to see?
• what don't you like? what annoys you?
• what suggestions do you have for future topics?
• what  would you like to see more coverage of?
• do you use RSS? would you subscribe to a Smart Economy RSS  news feed?
• would you like to hear news about the smart economy on your Mp3 player?
• would you like a one-stop-shop to purchase smart technologies?
• would you find road maps for smart technologies useful for your worK?
• would you subscribe to a monthly online seminar (webinar) on smart technology?
• would you find workshops on smart technology topics useful?
• how do you use our information? investment decisions? strategic decisions? alliance decisions? other?

Post your replies or comments in the comments box below or send me a private email

I look forward to hearing from you.

Enjoy the rest of 2006 and 2007 and I hope to see you back here on a regular basis.

All the best !!

Walter Derzko

Technology Predictions by Ray Kursweil

Kurzweil keynote

Ray Kurzweil presented his vision of rapidly accelerating technological developments in a keynote speech at the WFS conference in Toronto two weeks ago.  His talk was a recap of his most recent book, The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology.

Here are some of the highlights that I noted:

Re Innovation

Paraphrasing

….The key to success is timing….Most inventors will build exactly what they say they will build, but most of those projects will fail because of timing.  Not all the enabling factors will be in place to be successful."

Re Technology S-Curves

Kursweil's Technology S Curves for 2010 or 2015 follow predictable trajectories, due to the dynamics of complex systems.

"If we can't predict a single project, how can be predict the overall impact of a technology?  These kinds of measurements of IT follow very predictable trajectories. And you might wonder?  How can that be, when they are really dependent on millions of people, thousands of projects, each of which is completely unpredictable."

We see that a lot in the dynamics of complex systems.  Complex systems are made up of lots of chaotic elements, each element is completely random and unpredictable, yet the properties of the overall system take on certain properties that are highly predictable."

Specific projects are hard to predict, but ask me what the cost of MIPS of computing might be in 2010, or what the cost to sequence a DNA base pair in 2012 will be or the spatial resolution of brain scanning in 2014, I can give you a figure that's likely to be accurate.  A side benefit of these models is that we can anticipate not just 2 ,3 4 years from now, but 10 years from now, 20 years from now.  And we can actually build technology with the capabilities of 2020 and 2030, not in actuality, but we can imagine what the world will be like and what the impact will be, by envisioning what's feasible in those future technologies."

Kursweil makes a good case in how pervasive this exponential growth is, how predictable it is, and how smooth it is in so many different fields and surprisingly, uninterrupted and undisturbed by world events, such as world wars or other calamities etc ( shows a number of S-Curves from his book)

re Technology and Biological evolution

-Paradigm shifts are doubling in frequency

-IT evolution is accelerating and so is Biological evolution --Law of accelerated Returns

....By 2013

-Computers with the power to simulate the human brain should arrive around 2013.

-Simulations will eventually surpass animal models (i.e. lab mice, etc.) for medical research and drug discovery.

-You will be able to download instructions from the Internet to reprogram artificial white blood cells in your body to combat specific diseases.

And by 2029:

-$1,000 dollars worth of computing power will equal 1,000 times the power of the human brain.

-We will have reverse engineered the brain.

-A computer will pass the Turing test. (Robo-sapien? --Walter Derzko)

-Nanobots will provide nonsurgical neural implants that will expand human intelligence and allow for full-immersion virtual reality from inside the nervous system.

Two Key Points

Immortality? Probably not;  Life Span extension..... More than Likely

With the expected rapid advances in  intelligence and stunning medical breakthroughs by 2020 —   Kurzweil predicts,  our lives will be lengthened by more than a year for every year we live.

Kurzweil does suggest that if baby boomers just hold on for another fifteen years or so (eat right, excerise, lead healthy lifestyle etc) , they’re looking at a lot more lifespan than we previously could predict. 

Re Perils of Technology

Kursweil asked the audience for their ideas: how can we solve the perils of emerging technologies --the downside of technology ..more of my thoughts on that in a future post (see Perils of Emerging Technologies)

For more WFS conf coverage  see The Practicle Futurist by Michaal Rogers

© 2005-2006

Walter Derzko

Expert, Consultant and Keynote Speaker on Emerging Smart Technologies, Innovation, Strategic Foresight,, Business Development, Lateral Creative Thinking and author of an upcoming book on the Smart Economy "

To arrange for an in house presentation on smart technology see here

To explore the opportunities and threats of any new smart technology in your industry - Contact Me or explore how we can work together

.....Strategy without action is a day-dream; action without strategy is a nightmare"- old Japanese proverb

.......Ours is the age that is proud of machines that think and suspicious of men who try to. - H. Mumford Jones

"Without changing our patterns of thought, we will not be able to solve the problems we created with our current pattern of thought."  A. Einstein

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Too many things are called "technology"

Too many things are called "technology"

During a recent debate on the Management of Innovation and New Technologies Network (MINT), participants listed various phenomena that scientists and engineers call technology.

Seven phenomena were discussed:

• Competence.  Technology is the competence embodied in the tools and skills of humankind.  Formally defined, technology is competence, created by people and expressed in devices, procedures and human skills.
• Computer hardware and software as well as certain communication devices like cell phones.  We see this meaning in the expression "the technology heavy NASDAQ".
• Engineering.  In the USA Schools of Engineering are frequently called Institutes of Technology.
• The system for extracting, refining and manufacturing materials.  This is an industry-specific, operational use of the word.
• An abstract field of knowledge dealing with technical matters.  The word technology is made up of two roots: "tekne" = technical matters, "ology" = knowledge of.
• Application of science.
• Knowledge usefully applied.

This striking diversity highlights a unique problem.  Not only are different phenomena all called technology, but also the differences are so great that the word technology cannot even serve as a legitimate generic collective.  To make sense of this diversity scientists and engineers using the word technology should specify each time what phenomenon they have in mind.

The Smart Economy blog focuses on the first, and the last two, the sixth and seventh phenomenon.

© 2005-2006

Walter Derzko

Expert, Consultant and Guest Speaker on emerging Smart Technologies, Strategic Planning, Business Development, Lateral Creative Thinking and author of an upcoming book on the Smart Economy "

To arrange for an inhouse presentation on smart technology see here

To explore the opportunities and threats of any new smart technology in your industry - Contact Me

.....Strategy without action is a day-dream; action without strategy is a nightmare"

- old Japanese proverb

P. S. if this is your first visit to my blog, please go to our Welcome page 

Essays on Nanotech Impacts

The Center for Responsible Nanotechnology (CRN) today announced the continuation of its first series of original essays in which industry experts predict profound impacts of nanotechnology on society. 

Eleven new articles by members of CRN's Global Task Force appear in the latest issue of the journal Nanotechnology Perceptions, published today, complementing the previous issue's collection.

Covering topics from commerce to criminology, from ethics to economics, and from our remote past to our distant future, this new collection illustrates the profound transformation that nanotechnology will have on every aspect of human society. 

Ray Kurzweil, renowned inventor, entrepreneur, and best-selling author, explained,

"As the pace of technological advancement rapidly accelerates, it becomes increasingly important to promote knowledgeable and insightful discussion of both promise and peril.  I'm very pleased to take part in this effort by including my own essay, and by hosting discussion of these essays on the 'MindX' discussion board at KurzweilAI.net."

Nanotechnology Perceptions is a peer-reviewed academic journal of the Collegium Basilea in Basel, Switzerland. 

"We jumped at the chance to publish the CRN Task Force essays," said Jeremy Ramsden, editor-in-chief of the journal.  "To us, these articles represent world-class thinking about some of the most important challenges that human society will ever face."

In August 2005, the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology, a non-profit research and advocacy organization, formed its Global Task Force to study the societal implications of molecular manufacturing, an advanced form of nanotechnology.  Bringing together a diverse group of world-class experts from multiple disciplines, CRN is spearheading an historic, collaborative effort to develop comprehensive recommendations for the safe and responsible use of this rapidly emerging technology.

"This outstanding compilation of 22 essays describes some of the major challenges posed by nanotechnology," said Mike Treder, executive director of CRN.  "However, the collection also makes it clear that we have only scratched the surface of the risks, challenges, and opportunities associated with molecular manufacturing." 

Like electricity or computers before it, nanotechnology will bring greatly improved efficiency and productivity in many areas of human endeavor.  In its mature form, known as molecular manufacturing, it will have significant impact on almost all industries and all parts of society.  Personal nanofactories may offer better built, longer lasting, cleaner, safer, and smarter products for the home, for communications, for medicine, for transportation, for agriculture, and for industry in general.

However, as a general-purpose technology, molecular manufacturing will be dual-use, meaning that in addition to its civilian applications, it will have military uses as well--making far more powerful weapons and tools of surveillance.  Thus, it represents not only wonderful benefits for humanity, but also grave risks.

"Ongoing work toward molecular manufacturing is advancing rapidly in several fields," said Chris Phoenix, CRN's director of research.  "These 22 essays examine many of the radical changes that molecular manufacturing will bring to society.  We hope this collection challenges our readers as much as it informs them.  Not much time is left to find wise solutions."

Most essays are available for publishing or reprint under Gnu Free Documentation License (GFDL).  The second group of essays are:

1. "Nanoethics and Technological Revolutions: A Pr?cis" - Nick Bostrom

2. "From The Enlightenment to N-Lightenment" - Michael Buerger

3. "What Price Freedom?"  - Robert A. Freitas Jr.*

4. "The (Needed) New Economics of Abundance" - Steve Burgess

5. "Economic Impact of the Personal Nanofactory" - Robert A. Freitas Jr.*

6. "Corporate Cornucopia: Examining the Special Implications of Commercial MNT Development" - Michael Vassar

7. "Molecular Manufacturing and the Developing World: Looking to Nanotechnology for Answers."  - Don Maclurcan

8. "Considering Military and Ethical Implications of Nanofactory-level Nanotechnology" - Brian Wang

9. "Molecular Manufacturing and the Need for Crime Science" - Deborah Osborne

10. "Safer Molecular Manufacturing Through Nanoblocks" - Tom Craver

11. "Are We Guardians, Or Are We Apes Designing Humans?"  - Douglas Mulhall

I'll be posting excerpts of these over the next week or so on the smart economy blog

The essays published in the previous issue of Nanotechnology Perceptions are:

1. "Nanotechnology Dangers and Defenses" - Ray Kurzweil

2. "Molecular Manufacturing: Too Dangerous to Allow?"  - Robert A. Freitas Jr.*

3. "Nano-Guns, Nano-Germs, and Nano-Steel" - Mike Treder

4. "Molecular Manufacturing and 21st Century Policing" - Tom Cowper

5. "The Need For Limits" - Chris Phoenix

6. "Globalization and Open Source Nano Economy" - Giulio Prisco

7. "Cultural Dominants and Differential MNT Uptake" - Damien Broderick

8. "Nanoethics and Human Enhancement" - Patrick Lin & Fritz Allhoff

9. "Strategic Sustainable Brain" - Natasha Vita-More

10. "Is AI Near a Takeoff Point?"  - J. Storrs Hall

11. "Singularities and Nightmares: The Range of Our Futures" - David Brin

* These essays are © Robert A. Freitas Jr., and are not released under GFDL.

© 2005-2006

Walter Derzko

Expert, Consultant and Guest Speaker on emerging Smart Technologies, Strategic Planning, Business Development, Lateral Creative Thinking and author of an upcoming book on the Smart Economy "

To arrange for an inhouse presentation on smart technology see here

To explore the opportunities and threats of any new smart technology in your industry - Contact Me

.....Strategy without action is a day-dream; action without strategy is a nightmare"

- old Japanese proverb

P. S. if this is your first visit to my blog, please go to our Welcome page