Technology

I look at my life, one thing that has had the greatest impact has been technology.
That is of course, excluding my wife and son :)  They dwarf everything, but that is a different level of impact.
My parents, family, friends, and the masses give depth, breadth, perspective, and giving content to life.

But for the mind, for my interest, to learn, grow, observe,  connect, earn a living, entertainment, technology crushes everything.
I have witnessed at age of 8, the first personal PC, the Apple 1 released in 1976.
I still remember my father showing me article BEFORE 76 about these hobbyists making home PC's then when Apple 1 came out about them.
Fast forward to today, my cell phone contains much more power than computers that drove spaceship Apollo to the moon.  At any whim, I can watch just about any video ever made online. I can listen to any music, audio book, read any book, look at any picture, learn any topic, basically do anything that is not a human connection but of the mind.
Sure there is social media, a farce of a personal connection.  I was lucky enough to live before the internet to see the difference of knowing people vs 'connecting' with them.

I now see a future that includes local creation of any physical object below computer chips from every home as 3d printing technology advances.  Local sourcing of energy with a combination of sun, wind, water and thermal.  Automation to wipe out any job that does not require a doctorate in a generation. Decentralization removing the few commanding the many on many fronts, culminating with decentralized currency and government.

It is truly an amazing time to live, to see this unreal transition in the core of humanity.
It is actually possible for this post to be discovered 1,000 years from now, heck a million years from now and become a topic of some sort of viral boom.

And all it took was for me to sign up using any PC, tablet, and phone to Google and spend a few minutes to create this post.  Seconds after I hit save a person anywhere in the world could read this.

As much as I am awe of technology, the ability to level the playing field from the mega rich to the poorest of the poor, I can't help but worry about the other side of the sword.
All technology has two edges, a side for good and evil, makes it even more human to see how we use the tools available.  I no longer watch TV or read fiction.  The mystery of  past, present, and future on a personal, professional, and humanist level is so engaging, why bother?

Sure, I have a a few personal indulgent vices like occasional video game,  I'll chalk that up to human self indulgence.

But what keeps me going at this age is my immediate family, sheer curiosity of how all this chaos turns out, teaching the next generation of brilliant minds I encounter, and my awe of scientific method driving humanity from humans 4,000 years ago.

There will come a time where the advancement in computing processing power will advance in 1 day what it took from 1971 to 2001.  This is Moore's law in effect to this day, and if it maintains what it has done since 1971, it will happen.
Can you conceive of computing power advancing in 1 day equal to 30 years global human of effort to advance computing technology?  It will come to pass and the NEXT day will be that plus extra.

Lets hope through this advancement we keep perspective on human life, relationships, and enjoyment of the gift of life.