We live in an age in which fact can seem stranger than fiction. From <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/ipcc-report-climate-change">the climate</a> to finance to our political systems, it feels like we&#8217;re at an inflection point in history where truly anything could happen. Nothing seems harder to predict than the future.
Maybe that&#8217;s why dystopian narratives have become so popular.  We&#8217;re hooked on shows like West World, The Handmaid&#8217;s Tale, and Black Mirror. Several studies have found that millennials — a demographic that will make up <a href="https://www.kenan-flagler.unc.edu/executive-development/custom-programs/~/media/files/documents/executive-development/maximizing-millennials-in-the-workplace.pdf">nearly half the workforce</a> by 2020, and the primary audience for shows like Black Mirror — are one of the most <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/04/30/millennials-dont-trust-anyone-what-else-is-new/?utm_term=.9c77c943ba65">cynical generations</a> in modern history.
It makes sense. Dystopian shows can help us work through possible (or even plausible) realities. &#8220;Writing dystopias and utopias is a way of asking readers: where do you want to live?&#8221; Margaret Atwood said at the 2018 Women in the World Summit.
But cynicism and distrust can be damaging, too. Feeling like the nail is already in our proverbial collective coffin can discourage people who might be able to fix society&#8217;s ills.
This is all addressed in the final episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST. Watch the episode below.
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Indeed, these dystopian tales are only half the story. The technologies that will power the future — artificial intelligence, genome editing, advanced robotics, blockchain — are not innately good or evil. We need people who will use them for good. Our fate, as a civilization, as a species, hasn&#8217;t been decided yet. If we&#8217;re smart, and if we&#8217;re diligent, and if we&#8217;re motivated, we can create a happy ending for ourselves.
<figure id="attachment_139605" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img class="wp-image-139605 size-large" src="https://wordpress.futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/futuristic-utopia-1200x630.png" alt="" width="1200" height="630" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Image Credit: Getty Images</figcaption></figure>
Utopian fiction plays a role in getting us there. The way dystopian narratives can caution, optimistic ones can inspire. They could bring new uses for technology we already have, and maybe even tools no one has come up with yet.
In fact, optimistic stories played a key role in one of the United States&#8217; biggest achievements. In October 1951, at the dawn of the space race, the United States held the <a href="http://www.tested.com/art/43726-sci_fi-art-propaganda-across-cultures/">First Symposium on Space Flight</a>. The event, held at American Museum of Natural History&#8217;s Hayden Planetarium in New York City, was &#8220;one of the keys in introducing the U.S. public to the idea that human space flight was a serious possibility,&#8221; according to <a href="https://www.facebook.com/NASAHistoryOffice/photos/a.528287657222921/1016892505029098/?type=1&amp;theater">NASA</a>. There were speakers and journalists in attendance, and major media outlets like <a href="https://www.scribd.com/doc/118710867/Collier-s-Magazine-Man-Will-Conquer-Space">Collier&#8217;s</a> Magazine and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omWRxonewL4">Disney</a> created educational materials (as well as science fiction stories) that walked through hypotheticals about how humans would survive and thrive outside Earth&#8217;s atmosphere. When President John F. Kennedy Jr made has famous <a href="https://www.space.com/11772-president-kennedy-historic-speech-moon-space.html">Moonshot speech</a> a decade later, the public was already comfortable with the idea of putting a man on the Moon, setting the stage for the once-incomprehensible Apollo 11 mission in 1969.
<q class="pullquote">The way dystopian narratives can caution, optimistic ones can inspire.</q>
Utopian fiction could do the same for today&#8217;s moonshots. We want to believe that we can break down barriers, cure persistent diseases, stop the planet from warming, visit new worlds. We just need to be convinced it&#8217;s possible.
This is driving force behind <a href="https://futurism.com/glimpse-narrative-drama-futurism-studios">Glimpse</a>, Futurism Studios&#8217; first-ever science fiction series. Over the course of eight episodes, we sought to tell positive and engaging stories about the world of tomorrow. We <a href="http://wordpress.futurism.com/glimpse-artificial-wombs-future-present/">grew babies outside the body,</a> and <a href="https://futurism.com/glimpse-electronic-tattoos">turned ourselves into cyborgs</a>. We <a href="https://futurism.com/glimpse-deextinction-mammoths-global-warming-glimpse-2">brought back the wooly mammoth</a>, and made <a href="https://futurism.com/glimpse-instant-translators-why">language barriers</a> a thing of the past. We created <a href="https://futurism.com/robotic-dog-glimpse">immortal best friends</a>, and <a href="http://futurism.com/virtual-reality-social-media-glimpse">broke the hold of VR</a>. We finally even saw <a href="http://futurism.com/glimpse-augmented-reality">augmented reality</a> reach its full potential (it was about darn time).
These episodes may be fiction, but they&#8217;re a small insight into the kind of world researchers and innovators are making just a little more possible every day. None of them depict a perfect world, but none are totally far-fetched, either. Utopian fiction isn&#8217;t marked by the absence of conflict, but the resolution of it.
So fiction — of the dystopian and optimistic varieties — both have their value. Dystopian stories can be a powerful motivator for societies headed down the wrong path to right themselves. In the same way, utopian fiction illuminates a possible right way forward — the ones that lead to the kind of society we all wanted in the first place.

It's time for science fiction to stop skewing so negative.

Utopian fiction could help us unlock the bright future we never imagined

Asian man standing on patio in rain forest

Dystopia Today

Dystopian narratives appeal to disillusioned millennials. But to create a better tomorrow, we need positive narratives to show us what could be possible.

Glimpse: Utopian Fiction Could Help Us Unlock the Bright Future We Never Imagined

We're drawn to narratives like Handmaid's Tale and Black Mirror. But they're not helping us create a better world.

Six years ago, Google ushered in the age of <a href="https://www.x.company/glass/">face computers</a> with perhaps the coolest tech publicity stunt out there: a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uh-liQDE3cM">live stream</a> of product engineers jumping out of a zeppelin and landing on the roof of a building. The crowd — ostensibly there to hear Google co-founder Sergey Brin speak — watched the whole thing from the divers&#8217; perspective, live-streamed via the brand new Google Glass. The demo promised an era of geeks-gone-badass, stunts made more awesome with seamless sharing.
But the reality of face computers has been much more disappointing. Since that defining airdrop, we’ve seen the blindingly-bright future of augmented reality (AR) take the form of a wildly popular (for a second) <a href="https://www.pokemongo.com">Pok</a><a href="https://www.pokemongo.com">é</a><a href="https://www.pokemongo.com">mon game</a>, some truly ridiculous<a href="https://www.spectacles.com"> Snapchat </a><a href="https://www.spectacles.com">camera glasses</a>, and — not much else.
The lack of useful or even interesting applications for AR makes it clear that we’re still in the tech’s early days. That’s probably for the best, since we have no idea what role we want AR to play in our lives, or in the world at large.
Analog Boy, an episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST, shows one potential version of a future world full of augmented reality wearables. Watch the episode below.
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Before the technology truly becomes ubiquitous, we need to have a serious look at how we want to shape AR — and the ethical lines we don’t want it to cross. Right now, addressing these issues has been left to the tech companies who have been allowed to collect and use our personal data willy-nilly, with little input from the privacy-wary humans who would be using the tech in the real world.
<q class="pullquote">Before the technology truly becomes ubiquitous, we need to have a serious conversation about how we want to shape AR — and the ethical lines we don’t want it to cross.</q>
Now seems like a pretty good time to sort these things out. We are fast approaching the day in which recording technology, from cameras to microphones, can fit seamlessly into the kinds of objects we already use. Companies from <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-08/apple-is-said-to-ramp-up-work-on-augmented-reality-headset">Apple</a> to <a href="https://futurism.com/intel-smart-glasses-vaunt/">Intel</a> to <a href="https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2018/3/9/17100410/bose-ar-platform-audio-augmented-reality-glasses-headphones-sxsw">Bose</a> are already working on it. If they succeed, AR may integrate into our lives seemingly overnight, the way <a href="https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/06/08/ten-years-ago-apples-iphone-3g-brought-speed-and-apps-to-the-smartphone">the iPhone did</a>.
In truth, people are worried about face-mounted, AR-equipped computers not just because they’re new. AR, when it matures, will likely be able to do more than superimpose Pokémon onto park benches. Let’s say AR becomes standard issue within technology from Google, Facebook, or Amazon. Real-time information would highlight our environments, enabling us to <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/4-surprising-ways-augmented-reality-will-revolutionize-your-life-ncna830911">learn so much more</a> about the world around us. The technology could have some truly beneficial uses, such as <a href="https://futurism.com/google-glass-back-factories/">assisting factory workers</a> or others with hands-on jobs.
<img class="size-full wp-image-138265 aligncenter" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2018/09/image2.gif" alt="" width="480" height="270" />
But there’s a dark side to it, too — bringing AR into a world dominated by tech companies that collect <a href="https://futurism.com/facebook-moves-1-5-billion-users-data/">ever-growing amounts of our personal data</a> means being comfortable with the fact that other people will be able to interact with us in new ways, probably without us ever knowing.
If people start walking around using sophisticated AR-enabled devices, paired with powerful facial recognition software, it’s easy to imagine how some creeps could covertly violate people’s privacy. Say you’re walking down the street. Someone with an AR-equipped phone or Google Glass would be able to, say, scan your face and find all your social media. This sort of technology could bring about a new era where it’s even easier to stalk or bully people online (not to mention generally icky).
People have been concerned about the privacy implications of AR since it first emerged. Back in 2014, at the height of Google Glass’s 15 minutes, market research firm Toluna <a href="http://www.toluna-group.com/docs/default-source/Brochure_Docs/googleglass_tolunatopics.pdf?sfvrsn=0">surveyed</a> how customers felt about the device. They found that 72 percent of Americans wouldn’t wear Glass due to privacy concerns.
<q class="pullquote">72 percent of Americans wouldn’t wear Google Glass due to privacy concerns.</q>
The thing that prevented Google Glass’ mainstream adoption? Its <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/01/how-the-camera-doomed-google-glass/384570/">miniature spy camera</a>. With Glass, you could simply turn your head, frame a shot with your eyes, and plink — the device could take a photo or a video. With a few tweaks to the software, your subject would never even know it happened. The current iteration (<a href="https://futurism.com/google-glass-back-factories/">rebranded for industrial use</a>) is a little better — it requires a voice command and a button press to record video, but that doesn’t demand the subject’s attention the way, say, sticking a camera lens in their face might.
Most of today’s augmented reality wearables are a lot less subtle than that. The hardware has <a href="https://futurism.com/autofocal-vision-glasses-focus/">simply not progressed</a> as quickly as the software, so the devices are often clunky and unwieldy. Upside: it’s easier for a passerby to tell how they’re being used.
Companies like Google want AR features to be sleekly embedded in a pair of smart contact lenses (perhaps just to see if it can be done) but it will be many years, possibly decades, before this is possible. There are still <a href="https://www.inverse.com/article/31034-augmented-reality-contact-lenses">major technical challenges</a> to overcome, like figuring out how to power such a contact. And that doesn’t even address our own discomfort with the idea.
But the software is rapidly advancing even farther. For the first time, tech giants are testing the boundaries of AR in everyday gadgets instead of separate wearable gizmos. Take Google’s <a href="https://blog.google/products/google-vr/google-lens-real-time-answers-questions-about-world-around-you/">Lens</a>, a camera tool that the company says “answer[s] all kinds of questions — especially when they’re difficult to describe in a search box, like ‘what type of dog is that?’ or ‘what’s that building called?’”
And that&#8217;s <a href="https://gizmodo.com/all-the-new-features-coming-to-google-lens-1825864652">just the beginning</a> of what AR could do for us. With sophisticated augmented reality, we’ll have new types of movies and games, but also a more streamlined experience going about our daily lives. Everything we need will be right in front of us.
<img class="size-full wp-image-138263 aligncenter" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2018/09/image1.gif" alt="" width="480" height="270" />
We need ground rules for how to use augmented reality. Those could be hard rules like formal legislation and restriction (ban facial recognition software from any AR platform), or soft rules like social norms (basic decency and not using our newfound technological powers to exploit people.). If we don’t make them before they’re needed, we might find ourselves in a world where our already-scarce digital privacy goes away altogether.
As individuals, we don&#8217;t have much leverage over the tech companies pushing these gadgets. But we can push our leaders to address forward-looking concerns. Congress has recently held Facebook and Twitter accountable for their role in the 2016 presidential election. It&#8217;s not a stretch to think the companies that might be bringing AR into maturity might find themselves in a new age of intense scrutiny.

First in AR was in your glasses, now now it's in your phone. Who knows where it'll end up next?

Glimpse: Truly useful augmented reality is coming. We're not ready.

AR's Dark Side

As companies work to get augmented reality out of the realm of science fiction, they'll need ground rules for how we should be able to use it.

Glimpse: Truly Useful Augmented Reality is Coming. We’re Not Ready.

Soon we'll be using augmented reality more seamlessly than ever before. And that means we need ground rules for how to not be creeps. 

Back in December, Facebook admitted something you might have already suspected: too much social media <a href="https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2017/12/hard-questions-is-spending-time-on-social-media-bad-for-us/">probably isn&#8217;t very good for you</a>.
A month prior, Chamath Palihapitiya, a former Facebook VP, put it more bluntly: &#8220;The short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops that we have created are destroying how society works: no civil discourse, no cooperation, misinformation, mistruth,&#8221; he said during an <a href="https://youtu.be/PMotykw0SIk">interview</a> at Stanford.
That might be a little harsh, but it&#8217;s in line with a growing body of research. Excessive social media use has been linked to higher rates of <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563216307543">anxiety</a>, <a href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2016/11/10/peds.2016-1878">depression</a>, <a href="http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/the-teenage-brain-on-social-media">increased peer pressure</a>, and <a href="https://spssi.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/sipr.12033">negative social comparison</a>. More and more neuroscientists believe it may even be changing the underlying chemistry of our brains.
How will this be treated in the future? Day 180, the sixth episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST explores the effects of these types of addictions. Watch the episode below.
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&#8220;In a face to face interaction, everything is qualitative,&#8221; Lauren Sherman, the author of a <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0956797616645673">2016 study</a> on the effects of social media on adolescents, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2016/07/12/health/social-media-brain/index.html">told</a> CNN. &#8220;You use someone&#8217;s gestures or facial expressions, that sort of thing, to see how effective your message is. If you go online, one of the ways you gauge the effectiveness of your message is in the number of likes, favorites or retweets.&#8221; In other words, we gauge the success of an online interaction quantitatively, not qualitatively.
Experts now liken this &#8220;social quantitative reasoning&#8221; to the methods used to make gambling addictive. “The rewards are what psychologists refer to as variable reinforcement schedules and is the key to social media users repeatedly checking their screens,” explained Mark Griffiths, a professor of behavioral addition at Nottingham Trent University, in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/may/08/social-media-copies-gambling-methods-to-create-psychological-cravings">an interview with The Guardian</a>.
While we don&#8217;t yet know if social media can be addictive, it&#8217;s clear that sometimes a little break would do us some good. Even some of the companies behind some of these at-times-detrimental tools are making it easier for people to unplug; in May, Google announced its first-ever &#8220;<a href="https://wellbeing.google/#_ga=2.179902180.1735966381.1525880046-112300203.1475248017">Digital Wellbeing</a>&#8221; initiative, aimed at developing tools to help users do exactly that.
Clearly, there are things we can do better. But for a lot of people, swearing off social media altogether isn&#8217;t exactly an option. A digital presence is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/guides/business/social-media-for-career-and-business">increasingly part of</a> the workplace, whether you&#8217;re marketing your small business or simply connecting with colleagues in the same field.
Plus, moderate use of digital technologically doesn&#8217;t seem to be inherently harmful. Last year, a <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0956797616678438">landmark study</a> of 120,000 adolescents indicated there was a &#8216;Goldilocks Zone&#8217; for digital screen use. So instead of creating tools to keep us off social media, a better challenge for Silicon Valley, and ideally society as a whole, might be: &#8220;How can we reengineer social media to serve people better?&#8221;
The answer might just lie in virtual reality.
<img class="wp-image-130484 size-large" src="https://wordpress.futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/vr2-1200x723.png" alt="" width="1200" height="723" /><a href="https://pixabay.com/en/virtual-reality-vr-goggles-men-s-1898441/">Getty Images/szfphy/Victor Tangermann</a>
By definition, virtual reality is designed to simulate the real world, immersing us in a digital duplication of it. That, inherently, might protect people from some of the &#8220;dopamine-driven feedback loops&#8221; they might fall into with social media as we use it now.
And now, the technology is ready to be a part of our everyday lives. The cord-free, phone-free Oculus Go, which <a href="https://mashable.com/2018/05/01/oculus-go-review/#kTsL0LgX3Pq1">Mashable recently called</a> &#8220;the iPhone of VR headsets,&#8221; may herald in a mass market inflection point.
The Oculus Go&#8217;s release is also pushing VR developers toward shared social experiences, instead of individualized play. This is Facebook we&#8217;re talking about, after all. Take <a href="https://www.polygon.com/virtual-reality/2018/5/2/17280272/oculus-go-rooms-social">Oculus Rooms</a>, an app created by Facebook Reality Labs (formerly Oculus Research). Billing itself as your &#8220;personalized home base in VR,&#8221; Oculus Rooms evokes the customizable chat rooms in Ernest Cline&#8217;s Ready Player One to enable close-quarter, face-to-face interaction with a small group of friends joining in from anywhere on Earth.
The emphasis here is on small groups—Oculus Rooms only allows four people to be together at any given time, promoting more meaningful and intimate interactions. The <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2018/5/1/17306830/oculus-vr-tv-streaming-service-espn-showtime-netflix-launch">newly expanded</a> Oculus TV offers a similar experience, allowing friends to get together to stream movies and TV together.
Apps that allow small groups of friends to congregate are likely the future of social networking. &#8220;What VR does is it takes all the gadgets away, it takes all of the multitasking away and you actually feel like you&#8217;re with someone,&#8221; Jeremy Bailenson, director of Stanford&#8217;s Virtual Human Interaction Lab, explained in an <a href="https://www.pri.org/stories/2016-03-14/how-advances-virtual-reality-will-change-how-we-work-and-communicate">interview</a> with Public Radio International. &#8220;We call this social presence — you see their emotions, you see their gestures and it feels just like you&#8217;re in the room with them. It takes what is typically seen as something that&#8217;s unemotional and distant and makes it feel like somebody is right there with you.&#8221;
Bailenson is onto something. Studies have shown that virtual reality is effective in eliciting specific emotions like <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7893343/">awe</a> and <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(18)30226-8/fulltext">fear</a> in ways that a smartphone never could. Whether this will ultimately be good or bad for human anthropology remains to be seen, but we&#8217;ll find out soon enough.
Ironically — inevitably — it looks like Facebook will be leading the way.
&nbsp;

The future of digital interaction is in quality-driven virtual reality, not in the quantitative world of posts and likes.

Glimpse: Virtual reality for the masses might solve the problems social media started

Sci-Fi Visions

Back in December, Facebook admitted something you might have already suspected: too much social media probably isn’t very good for you. A month prior, Chamath Palihapitiya, a former Facebook VP, put it more bluntly: “The short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops that we have created are destroying how society works: no civil discourse, no cooperation, misinformation, mistruth,” […]

Glimpse: Virtual Reality For The Masses Might Solve The Problems Social Media Started

Interacting with others in virtual reality could help us have interactions similar to those we have in the real world.

In 2015, The New York Times debuted a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/18/technology/robotica-sony-aibo-robotic-dog-mortality.html">short documentary</a> called &#8220;A Robotic Dog&#8217;s Mortality.&#8221; The film profiled a woman named Michiko Sukurai. She owned an Aibo, a robotic dog sold by Sony between 1999 and 2006. Recently, though, Sukurai and many like her suffered a loss: in 2014, Sony announced would no longer repair the robo-pets.
After that, owners and were on their own. Sukurai, in particular, struggled to come to terms with the impermanence of a companion she&#8217;d grown to love — one that was never supposed to die.
As it turned out, that wasn&#8217;t the end of Aibo&#8217;s story. At a press conference held in November 2017, Sony made a surprise announcement. It would begin manufacturing the iconic dogs once again, this time with all of the bells and whistles of modern robotics: OLED eyes, built-in LTE, facial recognition. Aibo owners, it seemed, were finally getting the &#8216;forever friend&#8217; they were promised.
This same connection is seen in Sparky, the fifth episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST. Watch the episode below.
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Michiko Sukurai&#8217;s story isn&#8217;t unique in the world of robotic pets. Scientists have long understood the psychological benefits of computerized companions. Studies have shown they can help <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1525861013000972">combat loneliness</a> among the elderly, <a href="https://www.springerprofessional.de/en/how-could-companion-robots-be-useful-in-rural-schools/15361348">motivate students</a> in isolated communities, and even <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1525861017301895">improve symptoms</a> in dementia patients.
<q class="pullquote">Scientists have long understood the psychological benefits of computerized companions.</q>
Still, despite all of this research, one big question remains: are robotic pets as good as the real thing?
The robots of yesteryear clearly were not. In 2009, researchers conducted a <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2016/images/10/03/melson-2009-robotic-pets.pdf">series of studies</a> that looked at the emotion with which children responded to Aibo robotic dogs and live dogs. They discovered that while the children did ascribe thoughts, feelings, and social value to Aibo, they also showed markedly less attention and affection toward it than they did the real dogs.
That isn&#8217;t surprising, since early Aibo units were so simplistic. Even the most advanced models were limited to 128mb of memory, barely enough to hold a copy of The Beatles&#8217; &#8220;White Album.&#8221; Robotics has come a long way since 2006, though, and the field continues to evolve even more rapidly thanks to advances in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and microprocessing.
<figure id="attachment_137009" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img class="wp-image-137009 size-large" src="https://wordpress.futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Screen-Shot-2018-09-06-at-1.02.02-PM-1200x667.png" alt="" width="1200" height="667" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Copyright Dust/Futurism, 2018</figcaption></figure>
In the future, though, it&#8217;s not going to be so obvious whether or not robotic pets are as good as the real thing. To figure it out, we need to determine what makes dogs so lovable in the first place. According to Ronald Arkin, director of the Mobile Robot Laboratory at Georgia Institute of Technology, it all comes down to basic biology.
&#8220;People enjoy biological pets for their behavior,&#8221; Arkin told Futurism recently. &#8220;As a roboticist, I study human psychology and try to engineer systems that will provide them with the same types of satisfaction and interaction that the best pets can offer.&#8221;
Arkin calls this area of study &#8220;behavioral simulation ethological modeling,&#8221; and he&#8217;s been doing it for a <a href="https://smartech.gatech.edu/bitstream/handle/1853/21553/icra-2001-sony.pdf?sequence=1&amp;isAllowed=y">long</a> <a href="https://smartech.gatech.edu/bitstream/handle/1853/21544/sony-iros.pdf?sequence=1&amp;isAllowed=y">time</a>. He believes all aspects of animal behavior — &#8220;movement, emotion, even morality&#8221; — can be authentically simulated in robotic companions. He says he holds patents on robot &#8220;emotions&#8221; and is currently working on simulating feelings like guilt, shame, embarrassment, and empathy in robots to prove out his theories. For Arkin, though, it isn&#8217;t enough to build a robotic dog that&#8217;s as good as the real thing. He believes he can build one that&#8217;s better.
&#8220;It pays to understand how humans relate to animals, and find out what provides them with satisfaction in their interactions,&#8221; Arkin said. &#8220;Not everything does: chewing the furniture, humping a leg, and biological elimination in general are things that pet owners might like to do without.&#8221;
While Arkin&#8217;s &#8220;perfect&#8221; robotic dog may not be here for a few years, he&#8217;s pretty enthusiastic about where the field seems to be headed. He believes the next generation aibo (it wouldn&#8217;t be a reboot without a letter case facelift) is miles ahead of the competition.
Perhaps Michiko Sukurai was onto something.

They may not have fur, but we love them anyway.

Glimpse: Man's best friend, forever? We may love robot dogs as much as the real thing

Forever friend

For years, engineers have worked to create robotic dogs that don't pee on the furniture. But could we ever love them as much as we love the real deal?

Glimpse: Man’s Best Friend, Forever? We May Love Robot Dogs As Much As the Real Thing

Sit, rollover, calculate Pi to the 90th digit.

They tell us the weather, DJ our morning shower, and time our eggs while they cook.
The world’s AI assistants, once a gratuitous novelty, are growing up fast. For their next act? They will let us communicate in every language on Earth. The limits of which are seen in Esperanto, the fourth episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST. Watch the episode below.
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People have long been drawn to the idea of a device that can translate any language, human or alien, in real time. Most works of science fiction depict instant translators as a <a href="http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Universal_translator">device</a>, though it occasionally shows up as an <a href="http://hitchhikers.wikia.com/wiki/Babel_Fish">extraterrestrial fish</a> that has evolved to feed off brain waves, translating the thoughts of nearby organisms simultaneously.
Fish like that? Kind of unlikely. But here in the real world, instant translators are being built into the hardware and software we already own. Just in the past 18 months, Google, Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft have all made major strides. Real time translation services are now live on <a href="https://www.engadget.com/2018/04/18/microsoft-translator-offline-ai/">Cortana</a>, <a href="https://www.macrumors.com/how-to/siri-translation-ios-11/">Siri</a>, and <a href="https://futurism.com/googles-new-earbuds-can-translate-40-languages-instantly-in-your-ear/">Google Assistant</a>. Alexa, reportedly, <a href="https://futurism.com/amazon-alexa-real-time-translator/">isn’t far behind</a>. In China, Xiaomi’s <a href="https://www.engadget.com/2018/04/03/xiaomi-unveils-xiao-ai-voice-assistant/">Xiao AI</a> is joining in, too.
<figure id="attachment_130453" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img class="wp-image-130453 size-large" src="https://wordpress.futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Esperanto1-1200x672.png" alt="" width="1200" height="672" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Copyright Dust/Futurism, 2018</figcaption></figure>
This is only possible because rapid advances in software that can achieve speech recognition, speech synthesis, neural networks, and machine translation — all necessary for real-time translation. 
So it makes sense that instant translators are only beginning to mature now. But what&#8217;s still not clear: why did we start pouring money into them in the first place — and who will benefit when they become commonplace?
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To answer that question, we have to get a sense of how the world is changing. Worldwide, there are now 250 million migrants — people who reside outside of their birth country — according to a recent <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/04/25/7-demographic-trends-shaping-the-u-s-and-the-world-in-2018/">Pew Research Study</a>. 50 million of those live in the United States — twice the number as was living here in 1990. Overall, more than <a href="https://www.census.gov/data/tables/2013/demo/2009-2013-lang-tables.html">60 million Americans</a> speak a language other than English at home. By 2055, these trends will have <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/04/03/what-america-will-look-like-in-2050-less-christian-less-white-more-gray/?utm_term=.3b6f3a637ec9">completely transformed</a> the social, ethnic, and religious makeup of the United States. All of these migrants — students, doctors, teachers, engineers, laborers, mothers, fathers — stand to benefit from instant translation technology.
Refugees will benefit even more. The UN Refugee Agency <a href="http://www.unhcr.org/5943e8a34.pdf">predicts</a> that 1.2 million people will be forcibly displaced from their homes in 2018 alone. A major vulnerability? &#8220;language barrier.&#8221; Cheap, accessible instant translation technology could help ensure people&#8217;s basic needs are met, especially for those with serious medical conditions and disabilities. It could also help refugees get settled more quickly into their new lives, as has <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/refugees-and-technology-exile-180959606/">been the case</a> in Turkey.
Ultimately, though, instant translators will help everyone, no matter their linguistic aptitude, connect to the growing migrant populations <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/01/18/naturalization-rate-among-u-s-immigrants-up-since-2005-with-india-among-the-biggest-gainers/">in our communities</a>. As we travel to the world&#8217;s most spectacular sites, we <a href="https://silintl.carto.com/builder/852e178e-e26e-11e5-88b4-0e674067d321/embed">won&#8217;t be hindered by</a> language barriers. Because smaller populations won&#8217;t have to turn to the lingua franca, instant translators may even <a href="https://vimeo.com/206569091">breathe new life</a> into dying languages.
The world is changing fast. Fortunately, so are the tools that help us navigate it.

You'll soon have the power to speak every language on earth. What will you do with it?

Glimpse: why are tech companies pouring money into instant translators?

In the near future, your AI assistant will let you speak every language on earth. That will change a lot more than just international travel.

Glimpse: Why Are Tech Companies Pouring Money Into Instant Translators?

Do we *really* need to speak every language on earth? Tech companies seem to think we do.

It&#8217;s 12,000 B.C. Modern humans are starting to migrate to the Americas for the first time. We won’t discover farming for another 2,000 years. We won’t build cities for another 9,000 years. As a species, our story is just beginning. In Siberia, another’s is coming to an end.
The mammoth steppe, one of the world’s most expansive ecosystems, is on the brink of collapse. For millennia, these arctic grasslands have played host to a variety of enormous plant-eating mammals, most notably the wooly mammoth. As a keystone species, the mammoths had long ensured environmental harmony. They kept the trees from multiplying, which allowed grass to grow in its place, sustaining all of the animals in the steppe.
But then, around 12,000 B.C., that changed. Rising global temperatures (a product of a receding ice age) and human activity rapidly drove down the populations of mammoths, triggering a domino effect that transformed the Siberian landscape. Trees, bushes, and shrubs proliferated in the mammoths&#8217; absence, choking out the grasses that once sustained life there. As a result, the permafrost slowly began to thaw, releasing potent greenhouse gases that sped up global warming.
Now, 14,000 years later, scientists are faced with <a href="https://futurism.com/global-temperatures-reached-new-highs-2017/">record-breaking global temperatures</a> of humans&#8217; own doing. And they&#8217;re realizing how valuable that ice age ecosystem was, and that we may be able to bring it back.
This possibility is explored in Sebastian Moller, the third episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST. Watch the episode below.
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Famed geneticist George Church has made bringing back the ice age ecosystem his mission. In 2015, he and a team Harvard researchers <a href="https://www.popsci.com/woolly-mammoth-dna-brought-life-elephant-cells">successfully spliced</a> the DNA of a wooly mammoth into the genome of its closest living relative, the Asian Elephant. They chose 14 of the mammoth&#8217;s most recognizable genes for the experiment, activating them for the first time since their extinction. It was a watershed moment — scientists finally had all the tools they needed to bring an extinct animal back from the dead.
That’s the good news. The bad news, as Church well knows, is that bringing one mammoth back isn’t the same as bringing the species back. To restore the mammoth steppe to its Pleistocene glory, he estimates that we’ll need 80,000 mammoths. At least.
Making pretty much anything in such high numbers is daunting. But an enormous, extinct organism? Even harder. Genetic engineering isn&#8217;t exactly known for its ability to scale.
<a href="https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1365-2435.12705">Current de-extinction proposals</a> rely on surrogate mothers from living species to bear the resurrected organisms. The shorter the evolutionary distance — that is, the number of genetic differences — between the extinct species and the surrogate species, the better. That makes the Asian Elephant a perfect candidate to carry mammoth babies — there are only <a href="https://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(15)00420-0?code=cell-site">44 differences</a> between them. Unfortunately, the elephants are also endangered.
<figure id="attachment_136984" style="width: 1146px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img class="wp-image-136984 size-full" src="https://wordpress.futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Screen-Shot-2018-09-06-at-11.33.58-AM.png" alt="" width="1146" height="638" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Copyright Dust/Futurism, 2018</figcaption></figure>
“If we want to have 80,000 wooly mammoths or cold-resistant elephants that satisfy the wooly mammoth range at once, there aren’t enough mothers that you have access to, even it all relevant governments say, &#8216;This is a good thing.&#8217;” George explained in a <a href="https://after-on.com/episodes/024">recent interview</a> on the After On podcast with Rob Reid.
He estimates there are only about 17,000 Asian Elephant females in prime reproductive health left on earth. That’s barely enough to keep their own species going, especially since the species reproduces slowly (it takes 22 months of gestation for a baby elephant to be born). Using them to bring an extinct species back? A tough sell. African Elephants could be used, too, but you’ll eventually run into the same problem.
The only viable solution, Church posits, is “full development outside the body with adequate blood supply and nutrients.” He’s talking about growing baby mammoths in artificial wombs. No scientist has ever accomplished that for a species that gives birth to live young (that is, not in an egg). But Church and his team are already making a lot of progress with mice, and plan to release the results of those studies this year.
“We’re getting better at turning stem cells into embryo-like structures. We’re getting better at turning embryos into support structures that are vascularized. Mice can implant into that,” he told Reid.  “Once that’s working well for mice, we’ll try moving into larger animals.” Church believes the first success for a mammoth will happen within a decade.
Even if he has all the organisms and technology he needs to accomplish his mission, Church will still run into opposition from ethicists. They&#8217;ll argue, among other things, that we should focus our limited resources on protecting species we still have with us. But Church and <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/04/pleistocene-park/517779/">others like him</a> believe the rewards of such a feat make it worth the struggle — and cost.

To raise 80,000 wooly mammoths, George Church will need a lot of elephants.

Glimpse: How an army of resurrected mammoths could curb global warming

George Church wants to raise 80,000 wooly mammoths from the dead. To do that, he'll have to invent artificial wombs first.

Glimpse: How An Army of Resurrected Mammoths Could Curb Global Warming

Genetic engineering isn't known for its ability to scale.

Given the speed at which reproductive technology has advanced over the past few decades, it doesn&#8217;t feel all that far-fetched: A future in which anyone can have a baby, regardless of creed or need, whenever they feel like it. Already, in our present moment, one can buy or sell eggs and sperm; we can give embryos genetic tests to ensure the children they produce don&#8217;t have any life-threatening hereditary conditions; and babies can even be born, now, with the<a href="https://futurism.com/two-women-undergo-three-parent-baby-therapy-uk/"> genetic information from three parents</a>.
So it follows that we should soon be able to to have pregnancy outside the body — artificial wombs. Right?
You&#8217;d think. Scientists have already figured out how to mimic many of the body&#8217;s processes for techniques like in-vitro fertilization and even hormonal birth control. But the ways mothers&#8217; bodies support and signal fetuses is incredibly complicated — and the science isn&#8217;t yet at a point where we can simulate these processes. And because <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/03/02/516280895/embryo-experiments-reveal-earliest-human-development-but-stir-ethical-debate">scientists are prohibited</a> from studying embryos 14 days past their fertilization, that&#8217;s one sci-fi vision that is not likely to come to fruition.
At least, not in the near future.
For now, it&#8217;s imagined in The Stork, the second episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST. Watch the episode below.
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That&#8217;s not to say that artificial wombs aren&#8217;t useful. They might just have a slightly different use than the sci-fi works that have employed them have envisioned.
That is: They can address the growing problem of premature birth.
When &#8220;premature&#8221; births are discussed, people are usually referring to babies born before 37 weeks of gestation. But the biggest concern surrounds babies born between 22-24 weeks, on what&#8217;s called the &#8220;border of viability.&#8221;
In recent years, doctors have <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/07/health/premature-babies-22-weeks-viability-study.html">figured out some interventions</a> that make it more likely that babies born in this window will survive. But even then, they&#8217;re much <a href="https://www.marchofdimes.org/complications/long-term-health-effects-of-premature-birth.aspx">more likely to have long-term</a> neurological problems, lung issues, or other effects on their minds and bodies. The survival rate for babies born at 23 weeks is<a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/jp201470"> just 30 percent</a>. One more week, though, makes a huge difference; at 24 weeks, the odds of survival double.
It&#8217;s important now because, in the United States, the <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/11/01/500250022/premature-births-rise-once-again-despite-efforts-to-prevent-them">rate of premature birth has risen</a> in recent years. No one is quite sure why, but <a href="https://www.nichd.nih.gov/health/topics/preterm/conditioninfo/who_risk">some factors</a> that increase a mother&#8217;s risk of preterm birth include the mother&#8217;s age (the average age of the first-time mother <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/01/14/462816458/average-age-of-first-time-moms-keeps-climbing-in-the-u-s">has risen in the U.S</a>.), and if the mother has other medical conditions during pregnancy (more common for older mothers).
Artificial wombs could help. And for this use, at least, they could be on the not-too-distant horizon.
In 2017, researchers from The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) unveiled a<a href="https://futurism.com/4-artificial-womb-could-revolutionize-treatment-for-premature-children/"> working prototype</a> of an artificial womb. In experiments, the system (which looks a bit like a Reynolds oven bag) helped carry eight extremely premature baby lambs to term. The researchers shifted the fetuses into the &#8220;womb-like environments&#8221; at 110 days gestation — the equivalent of the human border of viability.
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In their study published last year in <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms15112" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nature Communications</a>, the researchers never refer to their systems as &#8220;artificial wombs,&#8221; likely because the term carries too much weight and controversy with it. &#8220;Our goal is not to extend the current limits of viability, but rather to offer the potential for improved outcomes for those infants who are already being routinely resuscitated and cared for in neonatal intensive care units,&#8221; the researchers write.
Of course, like plenty (if not all) reproductive technologies before it, the &#8220;womb-like environment&#8221; was met with <a href="https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2017/11/01/controversy-walks-hand-hand-artificial-womb-warranted/">controversy</a>. In the days following the CHOP study&#8217;s release, a wave of media expressing concerns popped up, with most of them asking some variation of the same questions: How ethical is it to grow a fetus in a bag? Is this the end of natural pregnancy? Will a Matrix-like baby factory open in your neighborhood?
And of course, yes: There are absolutely legitimate ethics issues to sort out over artificial wombs. The technology could eventually lower the age at which fetuses are considered &#8220;viable,&#8221; which could<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/sep/04/artifical-womb-women-ectogenesis-baby-fertility"> complicate abortion rights</a>. And there’s also the question of <a href="https://futurism.com/gatekeepers-future-reproductive-technology/">who decides which families get access</a>.
<figure id="attachment_129896" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img class="wp-image-129896 size-large" src="https://wordpress.futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Stork1-1200x673.png" alt="" width="1200" height="673" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Copyright Dust/Futurism, 2018</figcaption></figure>
And this technology won&#8217;t move forward until we start having conversations like these — which is exactly why we need to have them now, before the technology gets here. But it also shouldn&#8217;t stop the research from moving forward.
Yes, parents of premature babies might be uncomfortable seeing their newborn inside a plastic bag (that is, if the CHOP technology matures to be used on humans). But doing so might save the baby&#8217;s life.
It&#8217;s why addressing the binary of whether or not this kind of technology is or isn&#8217;t dangerous or &#8220;unnatural&#8221; is counterproductive. Yes: We&#8217;ve got a lot of work to do before artificial wombs are available for human use. We need to increase the breadth and quality of healthcare coverage. We need to revamp the laws and regulations governing reproductive health.
But education — about how these devices work, about why they&#8217;re needed — and storytelling, about people whose lives could be improved by such devices, can help keep these conversations balanced. It could reduce alarmism and overreaction. It could begin to facilitate the manifestation of this sci-fi fantasy into a real-life story.
After all, artificial wombs aren’t so different than any other transformative technology that&#8217;s taken root across history. As with those, scientists will create the tools — and we won&#8217;t just determine how we&#8217;ll use them, but not before we decide how long it is before we stop fearing them, and start exploring the possibilities of a world that uses them.

We're actually pretty close to having them, but they may not look the way sci-fi might have taught you to expect.

Glimpse: on the promise of a future with artificial wombs, and why it's being stopped by the present

Human Fetus in Early Development

Given the speed at which reproductive technology has advanced over the past few decades, it doesn’t feel all that far-fetched: A future in which anyone can have a baby, regardless of creed or need, whenever they feel like it. Already, in our present moment, one can buy or sell eggs and sperm; we can give […]

Glimpse: On the Promise of a Future with Artificial Wombs, and Why It’s Being Stopped by the Present

We have three parent babies. Why can't we grow fetuses outside the body yet?

It&#8217;s the stuff of cyberpunk science fiction — tattoos adorned with flashing lights and sophisticated circuitry. They&#8217;ll monitor our vitals, we&#8217;re told, and feed us personalized health advice in real time. They&#8217;ll wire our biology to the web, and put the internet of things at — on, in — our fingertips. They&#8217;ll enhance our five senses, and perhaps even give us new ones.
This type of human augmentation is depicted in Circuits, the first episode of Glimpse, a new original sci-fi series from Futurism Studios (a division of Futurism LLC) and DUST. Watch the first episode below.
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Thanks to recent developments in advanced materials and biomedical engineering, wearable electronics to do all of these things may almost be here. We already have <a href="https://futurism.com/ultrain-elastic-skin-display/">biocompatible materials</a> that allow electronics to seamlessly fuse with the body. We&#8217;ve already <a href="https://futurism.com/ultrain-elastic-skin-display/">developed e-tattoos</a> that can control a smartphone.
Now, it&#8217;s just a matter of refining and improving upon those technologies.
In April, <a href="http://www.me.umn.edu/people/mcalpine.shtml">Michael McAlpine</a>, a mechanical engineering professor at the University of Minnesota, <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/adma.201707495">published a study</a> in the journal Advanced Materials in which he demonstrated a way to print electronics directly onto the skin. The device — cheap, accessible, and compact — already offers groundbreaking applications for the military and medicine. In the future, it could completely change how we interact with the world around us.
Futurism recently spoke with Alpine about his research, and the future of printable electronics and e-tattoos.
<figure id="attachment_130462" style="width: 1200px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img class="wp-image-130462 size-large" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2018/05/Circuits1-1200x675.png" alt="" width="1200" height="675" /><figcaption class="wp-caption-text">Copyright Dust/Futurism, 2018</figcaption></figure>
This interview has been slightly edited for clarity and brevity.
Futurism: I want to start by talking about the 3D printing technology at the center of this study. What&#8217;s so special about it?
Michael McAlpine: As a whole, our research group develops printers that can print beyond the hard plastics that most 3D printers use. Hard plastic has limited value. Not many people are going out and buying these printers, because no one at home really has any need to print hard plastic objects. So we&#8217;re expanding the capabilities of 3D printing beyond hard plastic, and toward what we call “functional materials.” That means printing materials that have some practical use — electronic materials, soft polymers, and even biological materials like cells — all on a single platform.
We&#8217;re also integrating scanning and computer vision into 3D printing. 3D scanning enables us to scan the surface that’s being printed, like an organ, or a nerve. That allows us to print anatomically specific biomedical devices. Computer vision enables us to print on moving surfaces, like a hand. In this most recent study, we printed an electronic device directly on the skin. That’s never been done before. The printer is compensating both for the topology of the hand as well as the motion of the hand. So you have multifunctionality, you have tracking, you have complex surfaces, and you have anatomically accurate device matching. That’s what makes it unique.
F: The study specifically mentions military applications for this technology. Tell us more about those.
MM: The key insight we got from talking to the military folks was that they’re interested in this concept called ‘autonomy,’ meaning systems that are detached from the grid, but still have some sort of functionality. In this particular case, you can think of the 3D printing tool as a Swiss Army knife for functionality. A soldier could carry it around in their backpack, take it out in the field, and print any kind of device using only raw materials fed into the printer.
So, it’s autonomous because you don’t need anything other than the printer itself in order to create a device. You can start to think about printing life-saving devices on the body, like a solar panel on the wrist, or a chemical or biological warfare sensor on an arm. The printer we use costs less than $400, it’s pretty lightweight and compact, so it can fit into a backpack. In the future, perhaps it can even be folded.
F: How will this technology be used in medicine?
MM: There are huge implications for medicine, and particularly for emergency responders. Right now, if there’s an accident, the patient has to wait at the site of the accident for the ambulance to show up. Then, the ambulance has to take them all the way to the hospital. So it can be half an hour or more before any real treatment takes place. But if you could just bring the printer to the patient, and print a biomedical device directly on the patient at the site of the accident, that would be a gamechanger.
For our most recent paper, in addition to printing electronics on the back of the hand, we also printed cells onto the wound of a mouse. We collaborated with the dean of the medical school here, <a href="https://www.stemcell.umn.edu/bio/stem-cell-ins-faculty-staff/jakub-tolar">Jajub Tolar</a>, who works on a rare skin disease where the epidermal layer flakes off as a result of a genetic disease. We were able to print regenerative cells onto the mouse’s wound while the mouse was moving.
F: Let&#8217;s move to civilian applications. Imagine a world, five or 10 years from now, where printers like these are more ubiquitous, more accessible, and more capable. How could they be used in everyday life?
MM: I gave a talk recently at a science fair that had a bunch of children and parents in the audience. The first question I asked was, “How many of you know what 3D printing is?” And pretty much everyone in the room raised their hand. Now, the second question I asked was, “How many of you have actually used a 3D printer before?” All the parents put their hands down, but the kids still had their hands up. So I asked, “Is that because you use it in your class?” And they all said yes. So then I asked, “How many of you actually own a 3D printer?” And pretty much everyone put their hand down.
Even though these things are affordable and accessible, no one is buying them, because no one wants to print hard plastic. There’s no use for it. Even kids don’t really care that much. They can print one toy that does absolutely nothing. Then I asked, “What if you could print electronics on your skin? What if you could print your next iphone or your next smartwatch directly on your wrist? How many of you would then go buy a printer?” And then all the children put their hands back up. It’s every kid’s dream to print all kinds of flashing lights and electronic devices on their skin. It’s kind of a strange idea, having electronic tattoos all over your skin, but kids are going to do it. And then adults are going to do it too.
F: I want to look a little further down the road. Where will this kind of technology take us long term?
MM: All of these technologies we’re developing will lead to the post-computer era. You’re basically going from 2D to 3D [microchips to integrated circutry], which is essentially what biology is. So, that’s where the merger of electronics and biology is going to happen. Any privacy or ethical issues that spring from that aren’t going to be much different from the ones that we have with current electronics.
F: What’s the next big problem or opportunity you want to tackle in this field?
MM: We’re particularly excited about the idea of nerve repair [renewing or regrowing damaged tissue to restore nervous system function]. We’ve already published <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4765385/">research</a> on peripheral nerve repair. 
We’re also now working on central nerve repair, or spinal cord repair. Right now there are all sorts of different approaches to treat spinal cord injuries, from embedding scaffolds and stem cells to introducing biochemical molecules and gradients to promote regeneration. Our printing tool provides an all-in-one solution, because you can print a scaffold, and you can print cells within that scaffold. You can also print biochemical cues, and electronics within the scaffold for stimulation. And then, of course, you can tailor the scaffold so it’s anatomically specific and anatomically accurate to the patient. Having an all-in-one tool that combines all of the existing technologies used to treat those injuries could have huge implications for patients.
F: It&#8217;s funny, we talk so much about technology replacing biology in the future. But I really like the idea of technology creating biology.
MM: Or augmenting it. With our 3D printing tool, you could potentially integrate electronics with organs to do things regular organs can&#8217;t do. The very first paper that we published in the 3D printing space was called &#8220;<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23635097">3D Printed Bionic Ears</a>.&#8221; In it, we showed that you can actually merge cells with electronics. It was very crude — that was our first printer, and it was five years ago — but we proved we could make a bionic organ that was functional, and that could “listen to music that was beyond the normal frequency range of hearing.”
That opened up a lot of the space for us. We recently completed a <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/admt.201700235">similar project</a> with organ models, where we made lifelike organ models that were 3D printed, but felt like the organ itself. They were made out of a soft polymer. So, imagine somebody who&#8217;s recently suffered liver failure. With this kind of technology, instead of replacing their liver with a cellular version, maybe it doesn’t need to have cells or biology at all. Maybe it can be purely synthetic, and maybe it could function better than a normal liver ever could — an augmented organ.

Your cyberpunk dreams are about to come true.

How electronic tattoos will change the world — and ourselves

Engineers have invented a new kind of 3D printer that can print electronic tattoos directly on your skin. Here's how we'll use it.

Glimpse: How Electronic Tattoos Will Change The World — And Ourselves

Biological 3D printers could repair spinal cord injuries and usher us into the post-computer era. 

You don’t have to travel to the Arctic to disconnect, technically. If you’re strong of will, you could do it in your apartment. Even if you’re not, there is undoubtedly some corner of some state forest where you can ditch your cellular bars for a day or two.
But there’s also the Arctic.
The pitch was compelling—a week in a snow-covered cabin made of 400-year old pine logs, and a chance to see the aurora borealis through the panes of a tempered Glass Igloo at the resort that started it all. We booked our tickets the same day.
“Digital Detoxing” is a product of the connected generation. Across the world, access to the internet is increasingly being viewed as essential for quality of life. Back in December, Canada declared it a <a href="https://futurism.com/canada-to-spend-750-million-to-ensure-all-citizens-have-internet-access/">basic service</a> that must be made available to all citizens. They will not be the last.
While it would be foolish to discourage its proliferation—the web has cultivated countless new industries, brought quality education to the ends of the Earth, and raised a generation of globally minded citizens—it would also be ignorant to suggest that its side effects aren’t worth addressing.
The average American now spends <a href="http://digitaldetox.org/">30 percent</a> of their leisure time browsing the internet—never mind those of us who spend our whole workday on a laptop as well. The average employee checks 40 websites per day, and changes tasks every two minutes. We also spend nearly two hours each day recovering from distractions.
Frenetic behavior like this takes a significant toll on us over time.
Studies have <a href="http://www.upmc.com/media/NewsReleases/2016/Pages/lin-primack-sm-depression.aspx">consistently linked</a> heavy social media usage with depression. Similarly, exposure to artificial light—the kind emitted by our electronic devices—has <a href="http://rstb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/370/1667/20140120">proven to be</a> detrimental to our natural sleep patterns. What’s more, the CDC now considers insufficient sleep to be an epidemic. And the list <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/cyber.2016.0259">goes on</a>.
It’s why millennials are flocking to expensive <a href="https://campgrounded.org/">adult summer camps</a> that promise opportunities to unplug (in many cases, they take your phone from you). It’s why remote retreats like <a href="http://www.kakslauttanen.fi/">Kakslauttanen Arctic Resort</a> are beginning to host a younger crowd. And it’s why we decided to go experience it for ourselves.
<img class="aligncenter wp-image-69779 size-full" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/01/Photo1.jpg" alt="Photo1" width="1080" height="720" />
Nearly every aspect of Kakslauttanen impedes digital connectivity. The renowned resort is located deep in Finnish Lapland—home to some 200,000 wild reindeer, and little else. In December, temperatures frequently dip below -30°C (-22°F). It is the kind of cold that renders text messaging fingers inanimate in a matter of seconds.
Inside, it doesn’t get much easier. By design there is no wi-fi or cable in the hotel’s sprawling collection of cabins, igloos, and kelo-igloos.  “[The] fireplace is our television,” owner Jussi Eiramo told us during an interview. He isn&#8217;t joking.
By the end of your first day at Kakslauttanen, withdrawal sets in. <a href="http://www.academia.edu/11105910/Smartphone_Use_Addiction_Narcissism_and_Personality_A_Mixed_Methods_Investigation">Real withdrawal</a>. By day two, however, you begin to sense a shift. When your phone is turned into a glorified alarm clock overnight, there is little reason to ever pick it up (outside of force of habit). There is so much more to do, anyway.
In early December, the sun rises above Lapland for just 15 minutes per day. The residual magic hour extends your time in the light by three or four hours, but the pervading experience is darkness. Fortunately, these are just the right conditions for Aurora Borealis—the Northern Lights shine for the better part of the year here.
They&#8217;re also just the right conditions to celebrate (and practice) the naturalist lifestyle of the Finns, which has been proven to be incredibly healthy. Finnish sauna <a href="http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/sauna-use-linked-longer-life-fewer-fatal-heart-problems-201502257755">has been linked</a> to longer life and fewer fatal heart problems. The cold weather characteristic of Lapland <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8022726?ordinalpos=1&amp;itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum">has been linked</a> to better sleep and an improved metabolism.
Kakslauttanen has engineered the whole resort to empower guests to experience the auroras both comfortably and adventurously (the choice is yours). Jussi and team were among the first to build Glass Igloos in Lapland, and they&#8217;re still busily innovating year over year. Consider them &#8220;Northern Lights Lite.&#8221;
The local reindeer, who winter in the resort, allow you to experience the lights deep in the forest from the cold comfort of a wooden sled. Consider them &#8220;Northern Lights Advanced.&#8221; Soon, an in-progress Glass Igloo Tower will allow guests to get closer than ever to the action. In short, there are no excuses for missing the greatest show on Earth.
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While you’re waiting for the auroras to take over the sky, there is plenty else to keep you occupied: snow mobile trekking, husky dog sledding, cross-country skiing, horseback riding, and ice fishing. There’s a traditional Finnish smoke sauna, too, if sweating it out is your thing.
That’s not to say you’ll want to book yourself solid, of course. The daily rhythms of relaxation at Kakslauttanen are key to the detoxing experience.
It goes a little something like this:
08.30 I wake up in my cabin and begin collecting my layers—long johns, jeans, snow pants, wool socks, winter boots, long sleeve thermal, fleece, jacket, earmuffs, hat, gloves. It probably won’t be enough.
09.00 I brace for the cold and step outside. The resort’s restaurant is just a few hundred yards away, but the way is treacherously cold—35 below zero, and still falling somehow.
09.05 I arrive at the restaurant and begin curating the usual breakfast—greek yogurt, Lapland berries, toasted bread, cold cuts, cheese. coffee (x3).
09.45 The sun rises.
09.57 The sun sets.
10.00 I head out for the morning’s activity—a 4-hour snowmobile trek through pristine Finnish forestland.
14.00 I return to the restaurant for lunch—a veritable buffet of traditional and international soups. The thawing process begins.
15.00 I disappear into my cabin’s personal sauna, where I&#8217;ll remain until all the snow and ice has turned to sweat.
17.45 I restart the long process of layering, changing nothing but my socks. I should have brought more wool.
17.58 I glance at the clock on my phone, then set it back down.
18.00 I brace for the cold and step outside, delighted to find that the temperature has risen to a balmy 25 below. I head to the restaurant once again.
18.05 I order the dinner selection of the day—smoked reindeer, smashed potatoes, and local vegetables, with a berry compote for dessert.
20.00 I head out for the evening’s activity—a reindeer-led sledding expedition to hunt aurora borealis.
20.13 The aurora begins. Our eyes are glued to the sky as the lights dance around us. Even the reindeer seem to take notice.
20.45 We arrive at a lonely canvas tepee in the deep of the forest, where a fire and hot tea have been prepared for us.
21.30 We return, half frozen, to Kakslauttanen.
22.00 I drop by the igloo bar for a few drinks before turning in for the night.
23.00 I return to my cabin, and prepare to do it all again tomorrow.
<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-69780" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/01/Photo2.jpg" alt="Photo2" width="1080" height="720" />
It’s a strange thing to find pride in—spending a few hours, or a week (in our case), without your phone. The feeling is doubtlessly and distinctly millennial, a product of a generation whose livelihoods are dependent on connectivity. As I ponder the week’s juxtapositions, I recall an anecdote Jussi told me during an early conversation about his creation.
<blockquote>“Evenings, when the people come to dinner here, don’t speak nothing with company, or with friends. Only with computer. This is normal today. I think in future, people wake up. This is not all life. Here, you can find life without computer.&#8221;</blockquote>
He’s got a point, of course, but I don’t think we’re meant to reject technology completely. For all its flaws and harmful side effects, the web has done immeasurable good for humanity, and we are just getting started. At the same time, it should be used as a reference guide to life, not a replacement for it.
The 45-second Facebook videos that show us the depths and dynamism of our world—the ones that led us to Kakslauttanen in the first place—are meant to inspire us to start packing, not keep scrolling. When you finally arrive, you’ll find there’s no reason to look to your newsfeed for beauty,  because it is all around you.
If you’re lucky, the lesson is one you’ll bring back home.
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Disclosure: Kakslauttanen paid for Futurism&#8217;s travel and lodging expenses.

Future Society

Glass igloos, ancient cabins, wild reindeer, and the long Polar night. Here's why Kakslauttanen is the world's best place to unplug.

Digital Detox at the End of the World

<h2>AMERICAN LAG</h2>
It’s no secret that the United States lags behind in global internet performance. In 2016, the average upload speed for mobile users was just 7.94 mb/s. Broadband upload speeds weren’t much better—just 18.88 mb/s on average [<a href="http://www.speedtest.net/reports/united-states/">source</a>]. 
At that rate, it would take nearly 15 hours to upload the contents of a 1TB hard drive to the cloud. In the age of 4K video and 63-megapixel panoramas, these are embarrassing and indefensible statistics. 
And our problems don’t end there. 
Data security and vulnerability has rapidly become one of the principal threats of our time. There isn&#8217;t a week that goes by that we don&#8217;t hear about some massive breach that compromises the privacy of millions of Americans. 
Most of the world’s biggest platforms are susceptible—not just from external hackers breaking in, but also from internal employees who can simply walk out the front door with enormous amounts of sensitive information.
This was supposed to be the future; why isn’t the internet working for us yet?
<img class="alignnone wp-image-69290" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/01/sndrblock-1200x614.png" alt="sndrblock" width="714" height="365" />
<h2>A SECURE ELEVATOR TO THE CLOUD</h2>
Enter <a href="https://sndr.com/">sndrBlock</a>. Billed as a “hybrid cloud communication device,” it promises to resolve many of the stubborn hangups of the modern web—upload speeds, data vulnerability, even messaging and file control.
The palm-sized gadget was developed by cyber security expert Shaun Murphy, who spent the better part of his career building secure communication and transport systems for high profile clients like the Department of Defense.
sndrBlock launched on <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sndr/sndrblock-your-secure-elevator-to-the-cloud">Kickstarter</a> on Tuesday, and has already blown past its $68,000 goal. “We knew we wanted a low power device—about the power of a charging iPhone—that would have really fast network and disk throughput, so we could build our caching software,” Murphy explains. 
“We couldn&#8217;t find anything out there that met our requirements, so we teamed up with Gerald Coley&#8217;s team to build this device.” Coley is best known for the BeagleBoard, a low power, open-source, single-board computer designed in collaboration with Texas Instruments.
The company is currently offering three versions of the device—a “pro” edition with a 32 GiB cache, a “business” edition with a whopping 256 GiB cache, and a “developer” edition for tinkerers. All three are backed with secure, near-unlimited cloud storage with max file limits of 5TB. 
Ensuite software allows you to control the messages and files you send in perpetuity. You can recall or delete them remotely, disable downloading and printing, and even prevent screenshotting. The device also doubles as a secure virtual hard drive. 
sndrBlock works like this:
<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;">You select a message, document, or file (up to 5TB) you wish to send to someone in your contacts. This can come from any device—your laptop, tablet, even your phone. </li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;">The file is quickly beamed to the sndrBlock device, which will transmit the communication on your behalf. That means you don’t have to wait around for it to finish uploading.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;">Before the file is transmitted, sndrBlock utilizes proprietary technology to split your file into many encrypted fragments. </li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;">One of these fragments will remain locally on the device, ensuring your file is safe in the cloud  (it’s useless without the missing fragment).</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;">Because you have the fragment, the message or file you’ve sent always remains under your control. That means you can recall it or delete it anytime, even if it&#8217;s been downloaded.</li>
</ol>
<h2><img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-69280" src="https://wp-assets.futurism.com/2017/01/Capture.png" alt="Capture" width="769" height="244" /></h2>
<h2>“SECURITY FIRST”</h2>
We sat down with Shaun to learn more about what makes sndrBlock unique and why it’s so important to preserve net neutrality in 2017. 
Q: Why did you create sndrBlock?
We created sndrBlock out of sheer frustration of slow upload speeds and the limitations of the centralized cloud platforms out there.
Q: How will it benefit the average internet user on a daily basis? 
They will have the freedom to share the highest quality content they captured or created without waiting for slow cloud uploads, they can take back messages or files they sent immediately or even years after they hit send, and they have a single app that does all of this with true security.
Q: How is it different than other messaging and file sharing platforms that promise end-to-end encryption?
From day one, sndr was built around practical end-to-end cryptography, and every feature built into the system used that as a core foundation—not an afterthought or optional setting like other products. We see encryption as an essential layer, and it shouldn&#8217;t be a burden. People should be able to pick up a new device and continue a conversation they started on another device and see all of their old content, not just what&#8217;s happening now. 
Our stack is built on encrypt + sign + hmac of all objects that pass through our system, all of the files, file metadata, messages, contacts, etc. This content is individually encrypted using unique keys, and those unique keys are wrapped for the sender and recipients. There are two levels of public key crypto: User and the user&#8217;s devices have separate keypairs. The user keypair is used for secure transmission of the encrypted object keys between users and the devices keypairs are used for system and peer authentication and for p2p signalling.
Q: What is your position on net neutrality, and how has that been incorporated into the product design?
Net neutrality is a must in our modern world. Every day, we use our smartphones, tablets, and other devices to try out new apps and services that just might make our lives better. It&#8217;s terrifying to think that innovation will be destroyed because the little guys can&#8217;t afford to pay for &#8220;fast lane&#8221; access or we&#8217;re stuck with the existing services that won&#8217;t allow us to upload 4K videos without first reducing the quality.
It&#8217;s also an insult to the US taxpayers who spent so much money building up this infrastructure only to get horrible upload speeds with the threat of even worse access in the upcoming year. You can&#8217;t make your ISP any faster, and even if you buy the top tier plan, you still get insulting upload speeds. This was the driving force behind our sndrBlock. 
Q: How do you think the web will evolve in the coming years?
I see an elevation to a more authentic web in the upcoming years, where private and intimate content sharing and communication is cherished—not just because of security, but because of the high quality content that can be shared, as well as the control you (not some faceless tech giant) have to make sure content isn&#8217;t fake, modified, or abused.

Robots & Machines

sndrBlock bears the burden of large file uploads, so you never have to stare at a progress bar again. The device launched on Kickstarter on Tuesday, and has already blown past its $68,000 goal.

/Author

Luke Kingma

VP Creative

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