Science-fiction novelist Robert J. Sawyer recently penned a revelatory vision of the near future for Backbone Magazine. Sawyer, like me, must have pored rapt as a child over social studies texts, paying particular attention to the renderings of deco-inspired hover cars. Heady stuff, and I for one can’t wait, because of course this future will come swiftly, efficiently, and flawlessly, as the future always does.
Sawyer opines that in 2014 I will still be waking up in the morning. Sure, you think, better technology, less work, more time to sleep, but no. Instead we’ll use that time to work more. Lots more. (A common human fear is that we will lie abed in our final hours lamenting all the times we could have gone to work but didn’t? Technology will fix that for us.) He proposes replacing my jarring clock-radio alarm with a sophisticated brainwave monitor programmed to slowly bring up the room lights for a serene awakening. Fantastic, but I hope I can set it to stay off when my middle-aged self tries to pull a stealthy three a.m. move on my sleeping wife.
That’s all I need to disrupt the domestic serenity: an over-eager brain triggering an over-eager brain monitor to spotlight my aging and unclothed ass trying to sneak in the once-a-month Bareback Cowboy. And trust me, you can’t sue an alarm clock manufacturer after a divorce, either.
When I’m awake, I’ll have a hot breakfast waiting for me that I can eat all alone, standing up in my kitchen. For some reason that breakfast will be low carb, so I’ll toss out the beef and kelp in favor of lox, bagels, and cream cheese – which will no doubt be thoroughly spoiled because my health-conscious techno-fridge has zoned out those particular foods and refused to properly cool them. I’ll go to Starbucks – there’s one at the end of every driveway by 2014 – for a “scone” and a whole milk latte. Just one more time shouldn’t hurt.
To hell with the kitchen; this technology is better suited for my bathroom. I’m pleased to discover that in Sawyer’s plan for the future, my toilet will analyze my urine for any pesky illnesses that might bar me from a single day of heroic, machine-assisted toil. Good to know I’ll be able to face the day with the confidence imbued by a clean bill of health. “GOOD MORNING, SANFORD. YOU HAVE CANC——RUNTIME ERROR IN LINE 58974352.” Hopefully the tech support phone number will be stored somewhere in my personal databank, because if the toilet auto-dials the funeral home again I’m fucked. The first time they laugh at you, but the second time they take you for reprocessing anyway.
Despite my fervent desire to loll about all day in my boxer shorts, Sawyer thinks I may still be headed to the office each morning. First, I’ll have to drop off my kids at school, after I pick them up from the house where they live with Mommy and their new daddy. At least my car will be a wonder of automated, self-driving efficiency. “No more traffic accidents; no more gridlock.” No more stops at Starbucks, I presume. After turning the children loose on the halls of academia – where they’ll learn how to stay out all night and get pregnant, much as today — I’ll review my email in full-motion video.
Sawyer doesn’t specifically mention it, but I foresee great things for porn junk mail in the future. No wonder the cars will be self-driving. “You’ll arrive at your office relaxed.” Oh, you bet I will.
At the office, a computerized wristband will guide my every move. Mobile phone, calendar, camera. And e-book display. I’ve previously complained in this space about reading e-books on a laptop, but reading them on my wrist, hey! Problem solved. While perusing the morning papers on my forearm, I may blunder smack into the company’s video communications system, a vast flat screen virtually connecting my office – presumably in Dallas, if they can get this climate thing under control in the future – with a field outpost in exotic Houston. Maybe with collision-detection in my Dick Tracy wristband thingy I can avoid virtually fondling, quite accidentally and not at all desperately, the junior vice president for sales in the midst of her morning videoconference.
But I’ll finally get that window office I’ve always wanted. Sort of. Instead of real windows facing on the real outside, each cubicle will have a “smart wall” engineered to placate me with the appearance of having a window. And I won’t have to settle for mere Dallas skylines. Presumably I can tune my fake window to cityscapes of Mobile, Scranton or even Oshkosh – all locales where we’ll maintain offices. Better still, the chair on which I perch to ogle video images of those distant, romantic lands will automatically adjust to my body’s proportions. That’s a nice touch, really. Since for the sake of my health I’m not allowed to eat actual food in the future, I’m going to need some extra padding in my furniture.
After work I’ll probably go for a jog, a circuit determined by computer to best suit my fitness needs and wear me out enough to forget the micromanaged misery that is my life. All the while, sophisticated nanotechnological probes will scour my bloodstream, wiping away arterial plaques and eliminating potentially toxic chemicals – like that 15-year-old Scotch of which I’m so fond. Back at home, I’ll take a fast shower – computer-controlled water temperature and flow rate, no doubt – and discover upon toweling off or being blow-dried by some demon machine that I don’t have enough non-food for the digital cafeteria lady in my kitchen to prepare dinner. Out to the grocery store, a quick and easy trip made painless by radio frequency devices that enable me to select my items and head home, no lines, no checkout, all purchases transparently and immediately deducted from my bank account. Various pricing errors totaling more than $14,000 are smoothly resolved in a two-hour wristband phone call to my bank the very next day.
Then it’s my weekend with the kids, and the little rapscallions finish faking their homework while playing DOOM 28 and Half-Life 2 (they got it for Christmas). Now it’s bath time for the tiny angels. As I sit down to enjoy a drink and a movie, I can hear the distant sound of my young son’s smart washcloth admonishing him, “YOUR ASS IS UNCLEAN. YOUR ASS IS UNCLEAN. YOUR ASS IS UNCLEAN.” Ah, family. It warms my heart. But before I can begin searching the vast communal online library of video entertainment, likely choosing an old episode of Baywatch, my laptop computer alerts me to an important email. Instead of rising and taking four steps to my desk, I call up the email on my living room’s vast flat screen. It’s just an automated message from the mass mind of the million nanotech probes scooting through my vascular system. Oh, it’s one of those nice notes they occasionally dispatch to tell me what great shape I’m in. Just a couple of voice commands and there’s the email displayed on my wall. “RUNTIME ERROR IN LINE 58974352.”
My future, an enchanted life of fantasy, and a whole new meaning for the Blue Screen of Death.
Related
Feature Creep: The Real World [Gizmodo]
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https://gizmodo.com/feature-creep-the-real-world-19837
