Because the future has just started
I’ve decided, after fifteen and a half years, that this blog needed a fresh look, which you are seeing now. While I try different things out, I am going to keep things very minimal, and then gradually add features if they seem right.
So you can consider what you are looking at as a work in progress. I am reminded of a Website I once visited that showed just a simple yet elegant haiku:
There are all sorts of interesting questions around embodied telecommunication, which until now have remained largely theoretical. But with the advent of the Apple Vision Pro, which brings us significantly closer to that capability, this might be a good time to revisit those questions.
Forgetting for the moment how the technology works, let’s look forward to some time in the coming decade when people will just be able to put on a pair of lightweight sunglasses and have an in-person face-to-face conversation with anyone anywhere else who’s also wearing XR sunglasses. What effect Will that have on social interaction?
There are many questions to ask about this, but here’s one to begin with: Will it be good or bad for the airline industry?
To my thinking, it could go either way. On the one hand, people won’t need to physically move their bodies to have a face to face That makes them feel like they are in the same room. On the other hand, the increase in social connection might produce a greater motivation to meet in the flesh.
There is a theme in literature of a “death list”. The idea is that the act of adding someone’s name to a list in a book or on a piece of parchment condemns that person to death.
This idea pops up in works as disparate as Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Mikado and Tsugumi Ohba’s Death Note. But today it occurred to me that there could be interesting variations.
For example, this afternoon I went on Wikipedia to see what famous people were born on this day. I got to one entry in particular, and found that I had a strong urge to delete it.
“Imagine,” I thought to myself, “If I could just remove this one name from the list, then that particularly destructive person would never have been born. Think how much better off we would all be right now.”
Alas, as far as I know there is no such superpower. But it would make a great idea for an operetta or a Japanese manga, wouldn’t it?
Today is the fortieth anniversary of a very important day in human history. On June 13, 1983, Pioneer 10 passed beyond Neptune.
In that moment it became the first human-made object to leave our modern Solar System. Although the story is more complicated than that.
Because in 1983, Pluto was still considered a planet. Pluto didn’t stop being considered a planet for another quarter century — in 2006 in fact.
So Neptune did not yet mark the edge of our solar system in 1983. But in the intervening decades, the rules changed.
40 years ago our human reach got bigger. Since then, our solar system got smaller.
What is it about little plastic dinosaurs that makes them so compelling to kids? Is it the fact that they represent something big and scary, safely scaled down to the size of a toy?
Or is it the fact that they serve so well to spark a child’s imagination? Or are those two qualities in fact the same thing?
We’ve been through this kind of transition before. Photography went from being “the death of art” to being a respected profession and a skill taught in school. Recorded music went from being perceived as an enemy of live performance to being an important complement to it.
There are many similar examples. And now here we are with A.I. At some point, the skills needed to make the most of this powerful tool will become part of the standard school curriculum, and new professions will emerge that are based on the expert use of A.I.
I wonder how we can best get a jump on understanding how to structure that curriculum. Maybe part of that should be encouraging kids to use ChatGPT, Bard, MidJourney and similar offerings, and learn from the creative ways that they use it.
Kids tend to be better at this stuff than grownups. I’m guessing that we could do worse than to follow their lead.
If the direction forged by the Apple Vision Pro succeeds, the now ubiquitous notebook computer might soon go away. Rather than hunching over a little computer with a limited screen size, people who need to do serious knowledge work will be able to access a truly expansive virtual computer with unlimited screen space upon which to see and organize their work.
In moments of future nostalgia, we might look back on the clamshell format with a wistful fondness. These memories might be somewhat akin to the way we now remember the old corded phone that used to be found in every kitchen and bedroom.
Eventually the entire concept of the notebook computer might fade from collective memory, other than as an historical curiosity. It will be seen only in old movies and TV shows, a quaint period detail forever preserved in amber.
To sum up yesterday’s post, the great Disney animator told me that if you want to understand how a character moves, you need to understand how it gets its food. And it occurred to me that there is a very profound and generalizable truth in this statement.
Whenever you encounter anyone, whether in friendship, or professional relationship, or as a romantic partner, or as a family member, you would do well to understand what motivates them. At core, why do they do what they do, and what makes them believe what they believe?
All relationships are transactional, no matter how much our romantic view of the world might lead us to believe otherwise. Everybody has emotional needs, and their feelings and actions in the world are manifestations of those needs.
Whenever we are surprised by someone’s actions or beliefs, it is an indication that we do not understand that person’s core underlying needs. People with a high EQ (Emotional Quotient) are particularly good at understanding the core needs of others, even if those needs are hidden behind a veil of misdirection.
Peoples’ actions and beliefs, no matter how confusing, are always a consequence of what they really need, on an emotional and existential level. In other words, if you want to understand how a character moves, you need to understand how it gets its food.
I once had the good fortune to have a conversation about character animation with a great Disney animator. He talk to me about the difference between animating cats and animating dogs.
Basically, he said, if you want to understand how a character moves, you need to think about how it gets its food. Dogs hunt in packs, which means they need to be fast and loud and they do not need to move gracefully.
Cats, in contrast, are solitary hunters who depend upon stealth to catch their prey. Everything about them is about graceful silence, from their slinking gait to their retractable claws.
It occurred to me afterward that this bit of advice has implications far beyond the field of animation. More tomorrow.
Today is Bill Hader’s birthday. As it happens, today is also the day that I watch the last episode of the last season of Barry.
What could possibly be a better day for that?