I participated in a panel today about the future. We panelists did our best to discuss that things might be like in another five, ten or fifteen years from now, given continued development of virtual and augmented realities. It was a really fun experience, and everyone had thoughtful things to say.
One thing that I found oddly charming about the panel, given its topic, was how old-fashioned this event was, on a strictly formal level. To discuss how our future selves might become transformed by the virtual, we were physically gathering together in a room.
Other than hand-held microphones, there was no mediating technology between the panelists and the audience. Attendees crowded around, gathering as they have for many thousands of years, watching us intently, listening to the conversation, and laughing at the occasional joke.
I find myself wondering whether this will ever change. It may not matter how good the technology gets. Perhaps there are some things that are not about technology at all, but about something more primal, some viscerally deep emotion that connects our brains through our bodies, that only comes to life when people gather together in a room.
Certainly *I* enjoy being in the room with you! Let’s keep meeting, us humans, and leave the machines to do whatever it is they do.