Preliminary Review and Analyses of:
Preliminary Review and Analyses of:
Author: Michio Kaku
Published: 2011
Today I'm going to review a book about
Science and Physics general, which are very far away from my area of expertise
(international relations and politics), but I always had a soft spot for advanced science
for two reasons: I love science fiction, Star Trek and Star War ( in that
order), have hijacked my mind and set me on a path of nerdisim since I was a
little kid and the other reason is that my grandfather was a aeronautical engineer
that worked on the US space program during the space race, especially on the Apollo missions, and he
used to love to talk to me about physics and about space, and he was a gifted
professor, and that's probably way I like
Michio Kaku he reminds me of my grand father Carlos Cavoti, he's able to explain things in a ways that you can understand, even super
complicated stuff. In my analysis of this book I'm going to look at things from
social political point of view, to see how these scientific milestones possibility
impact our societies and alter the political dynamic.
So to start off its important to know that Mr. Kaku is a Theoretical Physicist who
Works at the City College of New York, and that he works tirelessly to get people in
Physics and Science, and in this book his futurist side just runs totally unfiltered.
The book starts of explaining the that
scientist are just too busy investigating, and that they do not spend too much
time thinking about the future, so futurology has fallen into the hands of many
literary greats, and their fascination with science has fueled science fiction for more than 150 years,
people like Jules Verne, H. G Wells, Isaac Asimov...just to name a few, the
author explains that they were true visionaries and that actually inspired
legions of young people to get into science in the first place, it's
interesting to reach a personal conclusion right at the binging of the book,
that culture and science actual work together to push progress forward,
mutually inspiring each other and its a mistake forcibly separating the two.
So Michio dives in different areas of science
that are going to shape the future in each chapter and he actually talks about
thing that scientist are working on now, literally prototypes of some
incredible stuff, he does talk about purely theoretical stuff, but he tries to
keep speculation down to a minimum, his nerd side does get the best of him at
moments.
The Good:
·
The book actually explains
super complicated science stuff in a way that makes it very accessible for none
experts. Michio has an incredible gift in explaining things in such a way that
it really gets to you and it easy to
understand. his writing style is pretty engaging it keeps you wanting to read
more.
·
Michio Kaku is a fully fledged
nerd, he loves science fiction as much as I do, he
actually references Star Trek on 12 occasions ( more references than to Albert
Einstein with. 7), Star Wars mentioned 7 times and even Terminator 4 times. He
does this for reason to get to the reader hooked and relating with the reader find commun ground, he's trying to explain to the reader that all that cool stuff you
see in the movies are actually possible thanks to scientific investigation. In
the case of Star Trek he make some hardcore references he actually mention the
Borg and Q to important character from the series to explain in what phase of
civilization a specie has archived.
·
The author divides the book in
nine chapters, and each one is dedicated to a specific area where science is making major progress
and each chapter is divided in three parts the
now, thirty years from now and finally how will be a hundred years from
now.
A interesting aspect of this book that I actually found stuff that I used on other blogs about Immigration, Religion and International Politics, at moments not even Kaku understands the scope of the thing he's writing about.
A interesting aspect of this book that I actually found stuff that I used on other blogs about Immigration, Religion and International Politics, at moments not even Kaku understands the scope of the thing he's writing about.
Some core topics, debatable stuff and Analysis:
·
Artificial intelligence is
still in its infancy, so we don't have to worry about losing our jobs yet. But
many people will lose their jobs to semi autonomous robots and computer programs,
from my point of view it will be pretty interesting to see how governments will cope with rising unemployment,
and this actually happening now the slow growth of empolyment in the US in part
is thanks to these type of robots invading the work force. And also thanks to
this, many professions will basically becomes obsolete,
it's truly
surprising to see the fields robots and programs are invading, progressively eliminating the "frictions of capitalism" especially eliminating the middle man and having the potencial to producea social backlash if not well handled.
In the chapter about the future of medicine and how
some major advances will help us live better and longer, I can't stop thinking
how this will affect humanity demographically, States will have to manage this
issue responsibly because this will affect population growth and its well
being, but this will inevitably bring a strain on the world's economy, especially
on food production and energy consumption, just to start off longer life spans
will cause State to rethink the retirement ages which is already has sparked a
very strong political debate.
The chapter dedicated to energy production is fascinating,
if there is a break through with nuclear fusion, which can create colossal amounts
of energy at a low cost and low risk, that generates very little radioactive waste
and contamination, this really would be
a game changer on a global level, this should a total priority for Nation
States, and established as global Moonshot. I actual used this for class I gave
as a adscrip university professor talking
about the renaissance of nuclear energy which countries are starting to debate again
and giving nuclear energy a second chance but
that there are two very important
projects related to nuclear fusion that will change the energy sector forever if
ever made functional on a industrial level, one in France called ITER, which
was a cooperation project between the United State of America and Russia, which
was spawned during the end of the cold
war , France and Japan joined in at the very early stages, now it's a global initiative and the other nuclear
fusion project can be found in the US called NIF.
Kaku establishes that the two
major weakness in our modern civilization are decency on cheap oil and Moore's
law.
The four phases in the
evolution of technology presented by Kaku is fascinating, it gives you a unique perspective in
understanding how these products transition from being used super exclusively
to being used by just about anyone, and from my point of view this has a profound
social impact altering the groups power dynamic, on a political level, phase
I or II can be used by a particular
group of people, like a political elite to obtain political power, controlling
the accesses to any particular technology once this exclusivity is gone they
loss their political edge the playing field is leveled.
The why Kaku uses to classify
our civilization fusing the models created by Nikolai Kardashev and Carl Sagan,
is super interesting to use to establish possible ways how human society could evolve, even though
even though Kaku's social/political views are pretty simplistic.
The Bad:
Michio is a little too optimistic at moments.
· Some of Kaku's political and Economic views are a little naive.
· Some of Kaku's political and Economic views are a little naive.
Even though these technological advances will
inevitably leave capitalism and establish the need of a new economic model, the
author has the inclination to think that capitalism is the only valid economic
system, till its left obsolete.
The book gets 8 out of 10.
Have you read this book? Did
you like it? What do you think about Michio Kaku?
I would love to revive feedback guys.
