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sn#005536 filedate 1971-11-08 generic text, type T, neo UTF8
00100 IS THERE ANYTHING USEFUL LEFT TO INVENT?
00200
00300
00400 There is a widespread idea that the possibility of improving
00500 human life qualitatively by invention has been exhausted. For
00600 example, Dennis Gabor, the inventor of holography, in his book
00700 "Innovations, Scientific, Technological, and Social" says as a
00800 preface to his list of future innovations, "In fact, the list below
00900 consists almost exclusively of improvements, not the first
01000 fulfillments of archetypal wishes such as the first telephone or the
01100 first flying machine was. This is due not merely to the lack of
01200 imagination of the author and his sources, but mainly to the
01300 exhaustion of primitive desires by past inventions. There remain some
01400 primitive wishes such as ESP (Extra-sensory perception, for direct
01500 communication from mind to mind), telekinetics (moving objects by
01600 wishing), the time machine, antigravitics, and super-photonic speed
01700 (breaking through the light velocity barrier), but on all present
01800 evidence these will remain in science fiction - until even SF becomes
01900 tired of them."
02000
02100 I expect to show in this article that Gabor and his sources
02200 do lack imagination, and that there is plenty of new technology
02300 possible that will make qualitative improvements in people's lives of
02400 at least the same magnitude as those of the last 100 years. The
02500 contrary impression comes from the fact that simple mechanical
02600 invention unassisted by computing exhausted its easy possibilities in
02700 the 1920's. Subsequent inventions have been harder and more
02800 expensive, and some problems have been unsolvable to mechanical
02900 invention. However, recent developments in science and technology
03000 provide a solid basis for a new wave of inventions that will meet
03100 real human needs and desires.
03200
03300 WHAT HUMAN NEEDS MIGHT INVENTION MEET?
03400
03500 1. Everyone would like to be assured of a comfortable income
03600 independent of whether he can or wants to work. The country is too
03700 poor now to assure this. The presently defined poverty level of
03800 $3400 per family is about 1/3 the average income of $10000 and it is
03900 too low for comfort. Perhaps $5000 might be enough, but this could
04000 not be offered independent of working because present society depends
04100 on the work of too many people whose incomes are so low that $5000
04200 without working would seem better. If we had an average of $25000 at
04300 present prices, we could afford $5000 without work. To do this
04400 requires cost reduction in service industries because the non-workers
04500 would require more services than the rest of society would be willing
04600 to supply.
04700
04800 The benefit of an assured income would be that a person could
04900 take his time about choosing a career, people who cannot stand jobs
05000 would not be driven to hustling and crime, and there would be a limit
05100 to the unattractiveness of the jobs people could be got to do.
05200
05300 2. Reduction of housework below the irritation level. The
05400 reduction of housework by mechanical inventions has made possible the
05500 nuclear family and the independent living of single people. People
05600 who can't get along with each other can now live apart. As a
05700 believer in human freedom, I count this good. Nevertheless, when
05800 people live together, housework produces stresses as anyone who has
05900 lived in a commune will tell you. The currently fashionable solution
06000 to this problem is for women to devote their lives to housework. Some
06100 of them would rather not do so.
06200
06300 3. Reduction of the age of achieving independence. Present
06400 society is based on keeping people under rather close discipline by
06500 parents and school until the age of 18. Lesser strings bind people
06600 for several years more. It may be possible to reduce the age of
06700 independence eventually to 15 without adverse effects. An obvious
06800 requirement for this is either to shorten the 12 years of school or
06900 make it more attractive. Another is simply the wealth to allow
07000 people to set up house younger.
07100
07200 4. Assurance of a socially useful job using one's talents.
07300
07400 5. The ability to obtain an object when one wants it. Thus I
07500 can't get a new chess set here at the lab in the next two minutes at
07600 2:30AM. I don't agree that it is unreasonable of me to want it.
07700
07800 6. The ability to get one of a technically feasible new
07900 object without someone deciding to mass produce it. Thus I can't get
08000 a temperature controlled suit I have invented, and it would be quite
08100 expensive to get a hi-fi cabinet built to my specifications.
08200
08300 7. The ability to get information quickly. I could have put
08400 one of my previous points more cogently if I could have got income
08500 statistics on demand.
08600
08700 8. The ability to change government policy if I have a good
08800 idea. I cannot find the precise rationale of the present policy, I
08900 can't objectively determine the effects of the alternate policy, and
09000 I have no way of getting the authorities to pay attention to my idea
09100 even if it is a good one. Yes, Virginia, technology can even help
09200 with this.
09300
09400 9. Children should be able to wander anywhere they want in
09500 perfect safety and retrievability.
09600
09700 10. We should be able to rebuild cities and families should
09800 be able to rebuild their dwellings when they no longer meet current
09900 needs.
10000
10100 I hope the reader will agree that these are non-trivial human
10200 wants and that our society would be qualitatively changed by
10300 realizing them. The list is certainly not exhaustive, and you could
10400 probably persuade me that some I have not thought of are amenable to
10500 technological solution and more important than some of the above. I
10600 have not included avoiding any kind of disasters in the above list,
10700 because that is a another subject.
10800
10900 HOW DO WE GET THERE FROM HERE?
11000
11100 The technological innovations discussed below are not in
11200 one-to-one correspondence with the above needs, i.e. there is not one
11300 gadget for each problem. This is because the innovations have to be
11400 looked at from the point of view of opportunity rather than need. In
11500 fact, we must work back and forth between problems, scientific laws,
11600 products, and systems.
11700
11800
11900 1. Inventions that merely increase the productivity of
12000 present activities are still very important. Thus, although
12100 agriculture now occupies only 5 percent of workers, they work harder
12200 than average; to give them good working conditions without increasing
12300 their number will require a large increase in productivity.
12400 Productivity of industrial labor has been the traditional focus of
12500 much engineering effort, although for historical reasons it has not
12600 been the subject of much academic engineering effort. Research in
12700 improving industrial productivity has been carried out by individual
12800 producers for their own benefit and by makers of machinery. This
12900 needs to be changed.
13000
13100 2. If the costs of construction could be reduced by a factor
13200 of three, we could rebuild our cities, and families could rebuild
13300 their houses. Productivity in construction has increased much more
13400 slowly than in manufacturing largely because buildings really have to
13500 be different from each other. Computers make it possible to go from
13600 the architects computer prepared plans for a building automatically
13700 to an automatic fabrication machine that makes sub-assemblies of the
13800 building and also to a "Heathkit" manual for putting the building
13900 together. Construction is another area in which the development has
14000 been done almost entirely by machine sellers and in connection with
14100 particular projects. This situation is changing now that HUD has the
14200 beginnings of a research and development program. The construction
14300 robot is also a possibility in the next twenty years.
14400
14500 3. The biggest area for increase in productivity is in
14600 services. Think of all those tall buildings in San Francisco and New
14700 York full of people passing each other papers. What do they all do?
14800 Is it really necessary, and can't most of it be replaced by
14900 computers? I certainly have no clear picture of the office industry
15000 as a whole, but it is clear that almost all the work involved in
15100 inter-firm transactions can be done computer-to-computer without
15200 human labor.
15300
15400 4. Whenever, it is proposed to increase productivity, the
15500 question of unemployment arises. The hard-boiled answer is that
15600 increases in productivity are always eventually absorbed in either an
15700 increase in goods and services or in an increase in leisure.
15800 Certainly, more than a ten-fold increase in productivity has already
15900 been absorbed in this country. This answer is inadequate, because
16000 even temporary unemployment produces considerable suffering and
16100 anxiety even when the direct hardship is mitigated. There are
16200 several policies that might contribute to a solution. In the first
16300 place, part of the cost of the conversion of an industry to a new
16400 technology that uses less labor is the readjustment of the displaced
16500 workers. The industry should buy the jobs at a price that reflects
16600 the age and length of service of the worker, the re-employment
16700 opportunities, and the bargaining strengths of the parties. For new
16800 workers, the government should see to it that there is an excess of
16900 jobs in each major area of qualifications. Part of such a scheme
17000 might be government financing of inventories as is practiced in
17100 agriculture as a means of smoothing out fluctuations. Certainly, the
17200 government must do more than simply juggle the money supply and the
17300 interest rate or even control wages and prices. All this is out of
17400 my line as a technologist, but somebody has to demand that the
17500 economists make their contribution too.
17600
17700 5. A major possibility is an automatic delivery system. The
17800 idea of such a system has been around for close to 100 years, but
17900 every generation has to examine its economic feasibility. I don't
18000 know whether it is feasible yet, but there is a good chance of it
18100 especially in connection with computer technology and reductions in
18200 construction costs.
18300
18400 Imagine the following: When you subscribe to the service
18500 workmen arrive and cut a hole in the wall under or next to a window
18600 and install a delivery port of the size you have agreed to pay for.
18700 On the outside wall of the building is installed a rail or possibly
18800 just a set of "handholds" which lead to a hole in the ground with an
18900 eight foot shield around it and a rain lid on top. The hole leads to
19000 a passage under the street with a rail attached to its ceiling
19100 attached to which carriers of different sizes can ride. When the
19200 appropriate numbers are dialed, checks are made by a computer for the
19300 sending and receiving ports not being full, a carrier comes to the
19400 sending port, is loaded, proceeds through the system, arrives at the
19500 receiving port and waits to be unloaded. The carrier is powered
19600 through the rail while under the street and is battery powered while
19700 climbing the building. This may not be the best scheme, but it will
19800 probably work. Whether it is economically feasible now, I don't
19900 know.
20000
20100 In connection with home computer consoles and automated money
20200 transfer, this will save great amounts of labor and will provide
20300 great direct benefits, for example: it will deliver the mail, it will
20400 permit the purchase of an article and its delivery in minutes at any
20500 time of the day or night, it will take the trash away, it will
20600 obviate the need to own many articles because they will be obtainable
20700 for rent in minutes, it will take objects away to be stored until
20800 wanted again, and it will enable people to share things they own in
20900 common.
21000
21100 6. Computer control of cars will have the following
21200 advantages: accidents will be reduced by at least a factor of 10
21300 before computer control of cars will even be acceptable; children and
21400 old people will not be dependent on others to drive them since skill
21500 will not be required; the capacity of highway systems will be
21600 increased without new construction, because cars will be able to go
21700 bumper to bumper on Bayshore at 80 miles per hour without danger; it
21800 will be possible to have the car park itself and come back when
21900 required; and it will be possible to send a car on an errand.
22000
22100 7. Computer control of manufacturing processes will make
22200 possible the economical construction of unique objects even going as
22300 far as a car built to individual specifications. Machine tools
22400 controlled by computer prepared tapes have already reduced the cost
22500 of one-of-a-kind machining. Computer aided design will make
22600 economical the design of a one-of-a-kind object with assurance that
22700 the object will serve its purpose without extensive testing. First
22800 steps have already been made in this direction.
22900
23000 8. Surveillance of streets by TV cameras that store what they
23100 see and make it viewable only in case of trouble will make the
23200 streets safe. (The problem at present is not so much that walking
23300 the streets reduces one's life expectancy, but that fear of robbers,
23400 muggers, and sex criminals reduces the freedom of women, children,
23500 and many men.) Elimination of money will eliminate much crime. (A
23600 robber will have to demand that his victim transfer $1,000 to account
23700 558304793!) Crime prevention technology must be implemented in such a
23800 way that civil rights are increased rather than reduced. Thus, the
23900 convenience of the police cannot be the only criterion.
24000
24100 9. The home computer console makes possible an information
24200 system with the following possibilities: all published matter in the
24300 world is immediately accessible; anyone can publish anything simply
24400 by declaring it publicly available; buyers can use programs to get
24500 best buys and negotiate with sellers obviating some of the effects of
24600 advertising; the rationales of government and other institutional
24700 policies can be made publicly available and updated.
24800
24900 Techniques that are being developed in connection with
25000 research in artificial intelligence to express in formal languages
25100 the kinds of assertions now made in natural language. When such
25200 systems are well understood it should be possible to express the
25300 presumptions of a policy and prove that the policy will achieve its
25400 goal avoiding undesired side-effects and with some figure of merit.
25500 When such rationalizations are available to everyone, anyone who
25600 understands the technique will have the opportunity to see if an
25700 altered policy will produce a better result and, if so, to propose
25800 it. Having a proof that a new policy is better will be a big step
25900 towards getting it adopted.
25905
25910 10. Quite soon we shall be able to have a national juke box
25915 using the Telephone Company's Picturephone circuits for a purpose
25920 they have not yet mentioned. Namely, a central file will have all
25925 published recorded music, and a subscriber will be able to dial any
25930 piece for immediate play.
26000
26100 The developments mentioned above differ greatly in their
26200 difficulty and in the length of time that may be required to overcome
26300 the difficulties. My intention is not to predict in the sense of
26400 futurology, but rather to point out that there are worthwhile goals
26500 that technology can contribute to. Thus, students who wish to
26600 contribute to the welfare of humanity will probably do more good by
26700 becoming engineers or scientists than by becoming lawyers or
26800 politicians.
26900
27000 In future articles, I hope to discuss whether the natural
27100 resources exist to support the even more technological civilization
27200 that I advocate, how we can put more effort into technology that will
27300 really benefit humanity, and also what has to be done to solve a few
27400 of the specific problems mentioned above.