The book: The thinking pill and other technologies that change your life

Our life in twenty years

- Life science and Medical Technology- Sustainable technologies- Communication

Questions?

- Fundamental barriers

- Solutions and resulting technologies

- Impact society

Limits to man (summary)

• Is there a limit to age?

- technology to support the elder

• Man-made molecular life; self replicating robots?

- man’s release of boring tasks

• Intelligent computers?

- solution to data-explosion

- human embedded computational

intelligence ,replacement of human

intelligence?

- man’s responsibility for decision making,

free-will?

-5

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020 2040 2060

Food and tobacco

Housing

Clothing etc

Food and tobacco

Housing

Clothing etc

Basic consumer expenditures decreased from 51% to 30% of

GDP in only 45 years

Witholt, ETH Zurich 2006

-5

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020 2040 2060

Med care

Recreation

Personal Business

Med care

Recreation

Personal Business

Expenditures for health, longevity and amusementhave grown from 17% to 35% of GDP in the past 45 years

Witholt, ETH Zurich 2006

Copenhagen consensus 2004

10 challenges facing humanity

- climate change

- communicable diseases

- conflicts and arm prolifiration

- access to education

- financial instability

- gouvernance and corruption

- malnutrition and hunger

- migration

- sanitation and access to clean water

- subsidies and trade barriers

From B. Lomborg, Global crises, global solutions; Cambridge 2004

Brundland (1987):

Sustainable development is a social development,

which fulfills the need of present generations without

endangering the possibilities of fulfillment of the needs

of future generations

Engineering and society triangle

The engineer changes the world with his machines

Society ideologies determine definition of society challenges

Progress through technology Power through technology

Technology - Science - Art

function

form material

DESIGN

Adapted from Ludwig Mies von der Rohe,

1921 Bauhaus

Schumpeters conjuctuurcycli: 1 is de Kondratieff-cyclus; 2 is de Juglar-cyclus; 3 is de Kitchin-cyclus; 4 is de resulterende samengestelde cyclus.

Complex phenomena:

Emergence of new phenomena as a function of scale parameter

Example:

Physics of river current with increasing stream velocity,

slow stream small waves eddy’s turbulence

Emotion

No sound musical sound thunder

Sustainable society (1)

- “The finite earth” (motto)

1. Rigid energy supply; centralized versus decentralized

distribution

2. Sense or nonsense of

biodiesel; food versus energy - bio diversity

3. A nuclear future?; threads - challenges politics

4. Fossil future; new clean or alternative technologies

Sustainable society (2)

- “The finite earth” (motto)

5. The ideal factory; small, modular, efficient catalysis design

6. A world without hunger; watermanegement, sustainable agriculture;

logistics

7. Life on a vulcano; sensors, communication, organization

8. A world wide balance; material cycles, extra terrestial life

Sustainability concerns the continuation of our current human civilization

Living system(selforganization outside equilibrium) has to produce entropy(waste) Evolutionary dynamics (as in biological ecology) isalso characteristic for human forms of civilization

Key is adaptation through technological and socialInnovation

Technology gives solutions as well as problems

Sustainable society

Threads

survival

Adaptation

Sustainable dynamical trangle

Ecological adaptation

Type I: colonization Primary concern growth. Exhaustion of environment is secundary

- grass hoppers destr.: plants in the desert- archeological processes (iron, copper)- first industrial revolution

Type II: consolidation

Primary concern survival (draught, cold)

- root-stem formation

- industrialization with attention for primary

environmental effects. Substitution of natural

products, selective catalysis

Ecological adaptation

Type III: Sustainable, self supporting, “zero”

(minimum) emission system, adaptive,

selfrepair

- Tropical rain forest. Specialization of

functions, interdependance

- Sustainable human society; complex interaction

of human artefacts with industrial production:

intelligent systems

Ecological adaptation

Example: soda process

• until 1750; …………….from seaweed

• 1780 Le Blanc process: raw materials: salt, sulphuric acid, coal,

calcium carbonate

product: hydrogensulphide (detrimental

to environment) and soda

• 1870 Solvay process: …ammonia, carbondioxide and salt gives

soda and Cl2

Thread

Limited adaptation; destruction

Figure 1 | Inequality in economic growth. a, Although gross world product and the value of exportsthroughout the world rose steadily during the period 1981–2001 (values relative to 1990 = 100), thenumber living below the US$2 per day poverty line has increased slightly. b, Whereas in 1820 thedifference between the mean incomes of the poorest 60% of countries and of the richest 10% wasfourfold, by 1992 the disparity was tenfold (value of mean income of poorest countries in 1820 = 1)

R. Kerry Turner and Brendan Fischer, Nature 451, pp. 1067-1068 (2008).

Utopia

Human Extended healthy life- well being

Society Peaceful coexistance- culture- wealth

Earth Sustainable future- natural resources- adaptation

Space Exploration- non-terrestial life?- resources?- threads

Adapted from Ruddiman, Scientific American 2002

Source: Nature, Vol. 437, 27 October 2005Hans Joachim Schnellnhuber’s map of global ‘tipping points’ in climatic change

Source:The Skeptical EnvironmentalistBjørn LomborgCambridge University Press 2001

Source:Energy at the Crossroads:Global Perspectives and UncertaintiesVaclav SmilThe MIT Press 2003

Source: Sustainable Fossil FuelsThe Unusual Suspect in the Quest for Clean and Enduring EnergyMark JaccardCambridge University Press 2005

Source:Energy at the Crossroads:Global Perspectives and UncertaintiesVaclav SmilThe MIT Press 2003

Source: Science Vol 311 10 February 2006, pp. 764Article: A Budget With Big Winners and Losers

Source: Sustainable Fossil FuelsThe Unusual Suspect in the Quest for Clean and Enduring EnergyMark JaccardCambridge University Press 2005

Source: Sustainable Fossil FuelsThe Unusual Suspect in the Quest for Clean and Enduring EnergyMark JaccardCambridge University Press 2005

Source: Science Vol 311 27 January 2006, pp. 484Article: The Path Forward for Biofuels and Biomaterials

Source:The Skeptical EnvironmentalistBjørn LomborgCambridge University Press 2001

Sustainable society

Scientific issue - Stability analysis of complex systems (climate;

stability rainforest);

network theory

- Frictionless conversion of energy to motion;

efficient primary to secundary energy

conversion

(molecular systems; precision engineering)

-From craddle to cradle, nonemission society;

recycle

Outcome of the book:

- Technology is a necessity to maintain human civilization- The challenge to technology is to create predictable behaviour of complex systems- The challenge to science is to understand the interacting networks and building blocks that lead to the multiscale phenomena of natural world and universe- Technological innovation through organizational adaptation is also a necessity to maintain human civilization.

V. Kandinsky, Blue Segment 1921

Essential technologies

- Pattern recognition (data mining)

- imaging (hardware)

- resolution, speed

- Communication - nano / molecular dimensional devices - embedded systems - hardware - software - networks - long range, short range

Essential technologies

- Materials

- electronic, mechanical

- smart, self-healing - tissue engineering - complex molecular systems (biomimetics)

- Robotics - integration - computer science - sensors and actors and materials

Utopia

Human Extended healthy life- well being

Society Peaceful coexistance- culture- wealth

Earth Sustainable future- natural resources- adaptation

Space Exploration- non-terrestial life?- resources?- threads

Ecological adaptation versus Disruptive change through human thrive