
My Dated Predictions - isp
http://rodneybrooks.com/my-dated-predictions/
======
tahw
I don't understand why so many people are hung up on flying cars. It's a huge
increase in the energy it takes to get from point A to point B, and for what
reason? What do they hope to gain by wasting so much more fuel?

~~~
BonesJustice
Flying cars are a terrible idea. People can't be trusted to not drive into
things or run out of gas while driving _on land_. I wouldn't want the average
person flying their car anywhere near me or my property.

The only conceivable way I could see flying cars being a 'thing' is if we
carved out 'air roads' for them that didn't cross over buildings or other
cars. At that point, what's the benefit?

~~~
cgh
Maybe a big part of the solution is self-driving flying cars? Of course they
would use Tesla batteries. And let's not forget to use Fuschia, while we're at
it.

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Isamu
Since he brings up a number of Elon Musk initiatives, it seems to relate in
part to the public conversation that Elon has been having about AI.

For those who don't know Rodney Brooks, he was faculty at MIT for years, co-
founded iRobot and Rethink Robotics, where he is working on collaborative
robotics (robots that can work with humans without maiming them.)

~~~
ChuckMcM
It kind of gives you a sense of the sort of messaging that Dr. Brooks doesn't
have a lot of respect for. I have big fan of Brooks' work from his MIT days
on, it is very practical robotics which has done things that others haven't
(Ghengis, the walking robot, really was a revolution in terms of mobility[1]).

But hype cycle or not, it would have been interesting to see where he had
placed reusable rocketry in 2007. Would it have been 'by 2020 it will be
common' or would it have been 'won't happen, the existing rockets work quite
well and there isn't enough gain to justify the additional work.'

While Brooks picks on Elon a lot, the core of his essay is what makes it
'easy' to predict something will happen versus what makes it 'hard'. And I
think he doesn't give enough credit to the fact that even if something is
possible it needs a catalyst to get it to precipitate out of the realm of
possibility into the realm of reality.

I think Dr. Brooks has a blind spot on space challenges, but I enjoyed his AI
predictions. Of course it is entirely possible I just want easy access to
space more than he does :-)

[1] I'm guessing @animats will disagree with that assessment :-) But he and
Dr. Brooks approached the problem of inverse kinematics very differently and
both got good results.

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Isamu
> he and Dr. Brooks approached the problem of inverse kinematics very
> differently

Could you expand on this? Thanks.

I like this essay, it seems to condense a lot of his thinking over some time.

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simonebrunozzi
I want to humbly add my 2020 predictions from 2017: [https://medium.com/the-
naked-founder/2020-predictions-from-2...](https://medium.com/the-naked-
founder/2020-predictions-from-2017-617893fffdda)

Happy to hear comments about it.

~~~
ars
The only one of those with even the remotest chance of happening is the
Cryptocurrency one.

A Robocop by 2020? If you had a Robocop by 2090 I'd be shocked. (A remotely
controlled Robocop is not a Robocop, you said helped by AI, and that's the
part I'm focusing on.)

Just try to talking to one of those assistants like Google Home, and you'll
realize just how far away we are from AI.

> [Driverless cars] Today, in 2017, I believe that at least 19 out of 20
> people would agree.

Nope, not happening. Driverless cars (except in dedicated lanes) are not going
to happen for 20 or 30 years if not longer.

What I do agree will happen is dedicated instrumented lanes for them on
freeways (little point in doing it in cities). Kind of like train rails.

But your vision of them transforming cities is not going to happen for
decades, if ever.

~~~
dpcx
Personally, I think many of your time estimates are wildly pessimistic.
Humanity is on an improvement graph that almost seems exponential - I don't
think it would be crazy to see driverless cars in the next 5-10 years,
considering how many people continue to get in to this space. There may be
strict legislation around it, but that's a different discussion. Similarly,
look how far we've come in "assistants" in the last 6 years since Siri was
released... 2090 definitely seems like a stretch.

~~~
p1esk
_look how far we 've come in "assistants" in the last 6 years since Siri was
released_

Not far at all. I still struggle to do basic tasks with my Apple Watch 3 (like
sending a text to one of my contacts, or automatically start/stop Run app when
I start/stop running).

~~~
dragonwriter
To be fair, _look how far we 've come in "assistants" in the last 6 years
since Siri was released_ can be read as “look how much Siri has been surpassed
in quality by other assistants since it was introduced” rather than “look how
far Siri has advanced since it was introduced”.

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isp
Predictions start here: [http://rodneybrooks.com/my-dated-
predictions/#tablepress-1](http://rodneybrooks.com/my-dated-
predictions/#tablepress-1)

Abbreviations are:

* NIML meaning "Not In My Lifetime", i.e., not until after January 1st, 2050

* NET some date, meaning "No Earlier Than" that date.

* BY some date, meaning "By" that date.

~~~
kurthr
Yann Lecun has a nice comment on Deep Learning vs Supervised learning being
the Heat Engine vs Steam Engine example, although they both seem to agree on
hype.

I wonder if the 'Spam in a can' problem for underground transport can be
resolved with VR or simply human absorption into BYOD.

~~~
dbcurtis
I'm not so sure. A significant portion of the population will find the "Spam
in a can" problem a claustrophobia trigger. There are people that would just
never get into one. Like my wife -- who lasted about 5 minutes into a tour of
a WW II submarine that was sitting on the surface with the hatches open. Which
means we would never travel as a family in Spam can.

Of course there are ways of dealing with that. It will require thoughtful
industrial design and human factors design, and certain minimum volume. A VR
headset will itself become a claustrophobia trigger enhancer in a triggering
environment. The human factors problem should not be trivialized.

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jasonmaydie
What is the value to predicting things other than stroking ones own ego?

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grzm
Accurate speculation, which prediction is, is a skill that can be practiced
and improved. This has benefits as it makes one better at estimating outcomes.
Posting it online also helps keep people accountable. Yeah, there might be
some promotion going on as well, but that can be true for anything one posts
on line. If you find someone's post valuable, great. If not, that's fine, too.

~~~
klenwell
I agree here and would underscore this point: in the hands of public experts,
media talking heads, and many types of charlatan, predictions can be immensely
powerful and have tremendous influence over public policy and social behavior.
So I consider assessing them for accuracy and holding prediction-makers
accountable a public good.

For a compelling book-length treatment of this question, see Philip Tetlock's
Superforecasting:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superforecasting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superforecasting)

This project was spun off from the book and is my favorite online forecasting
site:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Good_Judgment_Project](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Good_Judgment_Project)

