Are We Advancing Too Fast?

This speed at which ideas now move around the world is one of the defining characteristics of invention today. But another is the degree of specialization it takes to make these advancements in the first place. When you think about all the science that lies behind innovation today, it is so complex and so advanced it does not seem possible to stay on top of everything that's happening. And so to keep the pace of invention scientists have to work in a very different way from that of the lone scientist in the past.

Specialized Sciences

Certain sciences have become so specialized that is impossible to be an expert in all areas. Once upon a time, there was just one science journal today there are over 1000. Among the scientists of the world not many of them are aware of what the others are doing. Many have some basic idea and background information but there's no possible way they could all keep up with each other. Even we as writers researching new advances in technology are taken by surprise at new scientific advancements being made almost every day. Look at the Nobel Prize, when you read the citation for something that's been done in the scientific community it very often is totally alien to anyone not working in that field.

Alien Technology

Indeed, the simple categories we learned in school have now multiplied into a complex web of interconnected fields each with their own highly specialized subject areas. Brand new emerging fields of science include Quantum optics, Photonics, nanotechnology, genomics, quantum teleportation, quantum cryptography, Neuro-electro-dyametry, transcriptonics and bioelectrochemistry. Could this be a true definition of alien technology when our own intelligence outpaces us at a phenomenal rate?

Inevitable Obsolescence

The science of these fields was not even discovered yet when many of us were in school, yet they will be staples in the coursework of our emerging young scientists tomorrow. By the time those college students graduate, new emerging fields will have been discovered rendering many of their specialized degrees obsolete. What remains clear in our highly specialized and technological world is that scientists must collaborate if they ever hope to stay ahead of the next generation of advancements.

In a seemingly endless wellspring of information where no question seems far-fetched, perhaps what we should really be asking ourselves now is where all of this is coming from. And even more frightening, where will this blinding pace of rapid technologically-based intelligence ultimately take us?