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\chapter{4}{Is There Anything Useful Left to Invent?}

	There is a widespread idea that the possibility of  improving
human  life  qualitatively  by  invention has been exhausted.     For
example, Dennis Gabor,  the  inventor  of  holography,  in  his  book
``Innovations,  Scientific,  Technological,  and  Social'' says  as  a
preface to his list of future innovations, ``In fact, the  list  below
consists   almost   exclusively   of   improvements,  not  the  first
fulfillments of archetypal wishes such as the first telephone or  the
first  flying  machine  was.    This is due not merely to the lack of
imagination of  the  author  and  his  sources,  but  mainly  to  the
exhaustion of primitive desires by past inventions. There remain some
primitive wishes such as ESP (Extra-sensory  perception,  for  direct
communication  from  mind  to  mind), telekinetics (moving objects by
wishing), the time machine, antigravitics, and  super-photonic  speed
(breaking  through  the  light  velocity barrier), but on all present
evidence these will remain in science fiction - until even SF becomes
tired of them.''

	I  expect  to show in this article that Gabor and his sources
do lack imagination, and that  there  is  plenty  of  new  technology
possible that will make qualitative improvements in people's lives of
at least the same magnitude as those of the  last  100  years.    The
contrary  impression  comes  from  the  fact  that  simple mechanical
invention unassisted by computing exhausted its easy possibilities in
the  1920's.       Subsequent  inventions  have  been harder and more
expensive, and some  problems  have  been  unsolvable  to  mechanical
invention.    However,  recent developments in science and technology
provide a solid basis for a new wave of  inventions  that  will  meet
real human needs and desires.

\section{4.1}{What Human Needs Might Invention Meet?}

\item{1.}  Everyone would like to be assured of a comfortable  income
independent  of  whether he can or wants to work.  The country is too
poor now to assure this.  The  presently  defined  poverty  level  of
\$3400  per family is about 1/3 the average income of \$10000 and it is
too low for comfort.  Perhaps \$5000 might be enough, but  this  could
not be offered independent of working because present society depends
on the work of too many people whose incomes are so  low  that  \$5000
without working would seem better.  If we had an average of \$25000 at
present prices, we could afford \$5000 without work.      To  do  this
requires cost reduction in service industries because the non-workers
would require more services than the rest of society would be willing
to supply.

\noindent The benefit of an assured income would be that a person could
take his time about choosing a career, people who cannot  stand  jobs
would not be driven to hustling and crime, and there would be a limit
to the unattractiveness of the jobs people could be got to do.

\item{2.}  Reduction of housework below the irritation level.     The
reduction of housework by mechanical inventions has made possible the
nuclear family and the independent living of single people.    People
who  can't  get  along  with  each  other  can  now live apart.  As a
believer in human freedom, I count this good.     Nevertheless,  when
people  live  together, housework produces stresses as anyone who has
lived in a commune will tell you.  The currently fashionable solution
to this problem is for women to devote their lives to housework. Some
of them would rather not do so.

\item{3.}  Reduction of the age of achieving independence.    Present
society  is  based on keeping people under rather close discipline by
parents and school until the age of 18.  Lesser strings  bind  people
for  several  years  more.    It may be possible to reduce the age of
independence eventually to 15 without adverse effects.    An  obvious
requirement  for  this is either to shorten the 12 years of school or
make it more attractive.  Another  is  simply  the  wealth  to  allow
people to set up house younger.

\item{4.}  Assurance of a socially useful job using one's talents.

\item{5.}  The ability to obtain an object when one wants it.  Thus I
can't get a new chess set here at the lab in the next two minutes  at
2:30AM. I don't agree that it is unreasonable of me to want it.

\item{6.}  The  ability to get one of a technically feasible new
object without someone deciding to mass produce it.  Thus I can't get
a  temperature controlled suit I have invented, and it would be quite
expensive to get a hi-fi cabinet built to my specifications.

\item{7.} The ability to get information quickly.  I could have  put
one  of  my  previous points more cogently if I could have got income
statistics on demand.

\item{8.}  The ability to change government policy if I have  a  good
idea. I cannot find the precise rationale of the present policy, I
can't objectively determine the effects of the alternate policy,  and
I  have no way of getting the authorities to pay attention to my idea
even if it is a good one.  Yes, Virginia, technology  can  even  help
with this.

\item{9.}  Children should be able to wander anywhere they want in
perfect safety and retrievability.

\item{10.}  We should be able to rebuild cities and  families  should
be  able  to rebuild their dwellings when they no longer meet current
needs.

\noindent I hope the reader will agree that these are non-trivial human
wants  and  that  our  society  would  be  qualitatively  changed  by
realizing them. The list is certainly not exhaustive, and  you  could
probably  persuade me that some I have not thought of are amenable to
technological solution and more important than some of the above.   I
have  not  included avoiding any kind of disasters in the above list,
because that is a another subject.

\section{4.2}{How Do We Get There From Here?}

	The  technological  innovations  discussed  below  are not in
one-to-one correspondence with the above needs, i.e. there is not one
gadget  for each problem.  This is because the innovations have to be
looked at from the point of view of opportunity rather than need.  In
fact,  we must work back and forth between problems, scientific laws,
products, and systems.

\item{1.}  Inventions  that  merely  increase  the productivity of
present activities  are  still  very  important.      Thus,  although
agriculture  now occupies only 5 percent of workers, they work harder
than average; to give them good working conditions without increasing
their   number   will  require  a  large  increase  in  productivity.
Productivity of industrial labor has been the  traditional  focus  of
much  engineering  effort, although for historical reasons it has not
been the subject of much academic engineering effort.    Research  in
improving  industrial productivity has been carried out by individual
producers for their own benefit and by  makers  of  machinery.   This
needs to be changed.

\item{2.}   If the costs of construction could be reduced by a factor
of three, we could rebuild our cities,  and  families  could  rebuild
their  houses.   Productivity in construction has increased much more
slowly than in manufacturing largely because buildings really have to
be  different from each other.  Computers make it possible to go from
the architects computer prepared plans for a  building  automatically
to  an automatic fabrication machine that makes sub-assemblies of the
building and also to a ``Heathkit'' manual  for  putting  the  building
together.   Construction is another area in which the development has
been done almost entirely by machine sellers and in  connection  with
particular projects.  This situation is changing now that HUD has the
beginnings of a research and development program.   The  construction
robot is also a possibility in the next twenty years.

\item{3.}  The  biggest  area  for increase in productivity is in
services. Think of all those tall buildings in San Francisco and  New
York  full of people passing each other papers.  What do they all do?
Is it  really  necessary,  and  can't  most  of  it  be  replaced  by
computers?   I certainly have no clear picture of the office industry
as a whole, but it is clear that almost  all  the  work  involved  in
inter-firm  transactions  can  be  done  computer-to-computer without
human labor.

\item{4.}  Whenever, it is proposed  to  increase  productivity,  the
question  of  unemployment  arises.    The hard-boiled answer is that
increases in productivity are always eventually absorbed in either an
increase  in  goods  and  services  or  in  an  increase  in leisure.
Certainly, more than a ten-fold increase in productivity has  already
been  absorbed  in  this  country. This answer is inadequate, because
even  temporary  unemployment  produces  considerable  suffering  and
anxiety  even  when  the  direct  hardship  is  mitigated.  There are
several policies that might contribute to a solution.  In  the  first
place,  part  of  the  cost of the conversion of an industry to a new
technology that uses less labor is the readjustment of the  displaced
workers.    The industry should buy the jobs at a price that reflects
the age and length  of  service  of  the  worker,  the  re-employment
opportunities,  and the bargaining strengths of the parties.  For new
workers, the government should see to it that there is an  excess  of
jobs  in  each  major  area of qualifications.  Part of such a scheme
might be government financing  of  inventories  as  is  practiced  in
agriculture as a means of smoothing out fluctuations.  Certainly, the
government must do more than simply juggle the money supply  and  the
interest  rate  or even control wages and prices.  All this is out of
my line as a technologist,  but  somebody  has  to  demand  that  the
economists make their contribution too.

\item{5.}   A major possibility is an automatic delivery system.  The
idea of such a system has been around for close  to  100  years,  but
every  generation  has  to examine its economic feasibility.  I don't
know whether it is feasible yet, but there is a  good  chance  of  it
especially  in  connection with computer technology and reductions in
construction costs.

\noindent Imagine the following:  When you  subscribe  to  the  service
workmen  arrive  and cut a hole in the wall under or next to a window
and install a delivery port of the size you have agreed to  pay  for.
On  the  outside wall of the building is installed a rail or possibly
just a set of ``handholds'' which lead to a hole in the ground with  an
eight foot shield around it and a rain lid on top.  The hole leads to
a passage under the street  with  a  rail  attached  to  its  ceiling
attached  to  which  carriers  of  different sizes can ride. When the
appropriate numbers are dialed, checks are made by a computer for the
sending  and  receiving  ports not being full, a carrier comes to the
sending port, is loaded, proceeds through the system, arrives at  the
receiving  port  and  waits  to  be  unloaded. The carrier is powered
through the rail while under the street and is battery powered  while
climbing  the building.  This may not be the best scheme, but it will
probably work.  Whether it is  economically  feasible  now,  I  don't
know.

	In connection with home computer consoles and automated money
transfer, this will save great amounts  of  labor  and  will  provide
great direct benefits, for example: it will deliver the mail, it will
permit the purchase of an article and its delivery in minutes at  any
time  of  the  day  or  night,  it  will take the trash away, it will
obviate the need to own many articles because they will be obtainable
for  rent  in  minutes,  it will take objects away to be stored until
wanted again, and it will enable people to share things they  own  in
common.

\item{6.} Computer  control  of  cars  will  have  the following
advantages: accidents will be reduced by at  least  a  factor  of  10
before computer control of cars will even be acceptable; children and
old people will not be dependent on others to drive them since  skill
will  not  be  required;  the  capacity  of  highway  systems will be
increased without new construction, because cars will be able  to  go
bumper  to bumper on Bayshore at 80 miles per hour without danger; it
will be possible to have the car  park  itself  and  come  back  when
required; and it will be possible to send a car on an errand.

\item{7.}  Computer  control  of manufacturing processes will make
possible the economical construction of unique objects even going  as
far  as  a  car  built  to  individual specifications.  Machine tools
controlled by computer prepared tapes have already reduced  the  cost
of  one-of-a-kind  machining.     Computer  aided  design  will  make
economical the design of a one-of-a-kind object with  assurance  that
the  object  will  serve its purpose without extensive testing. First
steps have already been made in this direction.

\item{8.}  Surveillance of streets by TV cameras that store what they
see  and  make  it  viewable  only  in  case of trouble will make the
streets safe.  (The problem at present is not so  much  that  walking
the  streets reduces one's life expectancy, but that fear of robbers,
muggers, and sex criminals reduces the freedom  of  women,  children,
and  many  men.)  Elimination of money will eliminate much crime.  (A
robber will have to demand that his victim transfer \$1,000 to account
558304793!) Crime prevention technology must be implemented in such a
way that civil rights are increased rather than reduced.   Thus,  the
convenience of the police cannot be the only criterion.

\item{9.}  The home computer console makes possible an information
system with the following possibilities: all published matter in  the
world  is  immediately accessible; anyone can publish anything simply
by declaring it publicly available; buyers can use  programs  to  get
best buys and negotiate with sellers obviating some of the effects of
advertising; the rationales of  government  and  other  institutional
policies can be made publicly available and updated.

\noindent Techniques  that  are  being  developed  in  connection  with
research in artificial intelligence to express  in  formal  languages
the  kinds  of  assertions  now  made in natural language.  When such
systems are well understood it should  be  possible  to  express  the
presumptions  of  a policy and prove that the policy will achieve its
goal avoiding undesired side-effects and with some figure  of  merit.
When  such  rationalizations  are  available  to everyone, anyone who
understands the technique will have the  opportunity  to  see  if  an
altered  policy  will  produce a better result and, if so, to propose
it.  Having a proof that a new policy is better will be  a  big  step
towards getting it adopted.

\item{10.}  Quite soon we shall be able to have a national  juke  box
using  the  Telephone  Company's  Picturephone circuits for a purpose
they have not yet mentioned.  Namely, a central file  will  have  all
published  recorded  music, and a subscriber will be able to dial any
piece for immediate play.

\noindent The  developments  mentioned  above  differ  greatly in their
difficulty and in the length of time that may be required to overcome
the  difficulties.     My intention is not to predict in the sense of
futurology, but rather to point out that there are  worthwhile  goals
that  technology  can  contribute  to.    Thus,  students who wish to
contribute to the welfare of humanity will probably do more  good  by
becoming   engineers  or  scientists  than  by  becoming  lawyers  or
politicians.

	In  future  articles,  I  hope to discuss whether the natural
resources exist to support the even more  technological  civilization
that I advocate, how we can put more effort into technology that will
really benefit humanity, and also what has to be done to solve a  few
of the specific problems mentioned above.
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