“Extending the human will”, Entering Deep Technology

The definition

Erwin Schrödinger, an eccentric thinker, would ask the most bizarre questions and then himself would get on a path to answer them. His non-customary means of using metaphysics in solving the most circumscribed area of science, was one of the key ingredients of his excellent intellect helping us in understanding the complex quantum world, and maybe even helping him to earn his Nobel prize.

His definition of technology: “Fantastic abundance of ‘mechanism’, in the widest sense, constructed to extend the sphere of influence of human will” is by far the most accurate definitions that I have ever read.

Fantastic abundance of ‘mechanism’, in the widest sense, constructed to extend the sphere of influence of human will

Erwin Schrödinger

If you think about it, any invention, innovation or discovery is made to expand the “sphere of our influence” or in other words to mechanize the circle of tasks that are either too mundane (boring and repetitive) or very complex and difficult for us, and these are instigated by our will. We also found a way to reward these concoction of ideas using a tool called money. History has proved this and can be verified in the timeline of technology’s development over time.

The timeline

Every inventions, innovations, discoveries in tech has over the time formed the base for humanity to grow and develop more advance ways of solving problems. This can be seen below, where how industrialization became the base for discovering studies like chemistry and electricity, that led to invention of long distance communication sparkling many brains with idea’s of automation, leading us to today where we are using automation as the base for the next step; Intelligence.

Today and the future: Deep Technology

Until today, technology was only at its beginning stage. All focus were to setup means of communications, accessibility and to understand this field of science. With its growing popularity, more and more field of studies accepted and adopted technology. Now, it is more like a tool that can be used to enhance, improve and automate any field of study one can think about.

Today, we are in a midst of upgrading this tool box from a simple automation tool to a much advanced set of intelligent tools that will be able to provide unparalleled security (using one application of quantum mechanics), intelligent decision making (using artificial intelligence) and many more.

Deep Technology is an umbrella term to exactly these intelligent tools which have the capacity to solve many societal and environmental issues that we have always been experiencing in our daily lives.

Any technological solution can be termed under deep technology if it is a disruptive solution that involves:

• Extensive Scientific Research
• Extreme fundamental knowledge of the underlying technology and field of application
• Thorough mentor ship
• Large investments
• Lots of Patience

Deep Tech: The Market

Today, the following 7 categories have been successfully categorized as deep tech solutions.

We always signify technology some or the other way with computers, and computers with machines like desktops, laptops, mobile phones etc. or anything that has a screen and some processor. However, deep technology is here to change that.

Many deep tech solutions are using various other ways of interaction with the computers instead of a screen or keypad. These solutions are designed to use other means of interfacing e.g., sound or movements. Some do not require direct processors available and are just behaving as a relay between the user and the actual computer residing thousands of miles away in a data center e.g., the cloud.

A great example of this is blockchain. The only way to interact with this system of chain of blocks or a ledger is by modifying it some how. No one can directly interact with the blockchain network but by using the only mechanism of buying and selling the underlying asset (crypto). These behavior then modifies the chain. And since blockchain is decentralized, no single processor is used to process the network but a multitude of them spread across the globe.

The Economy

Below shows the total investment within each market between 2015 – 2018 and it is estimated that this investment will grow by 22% per year bringing the investments to around 21 billion dollars over the next year.

An Example

A very interesting emerging category of deep tech is Internet of Senses. It is the next leap in the field of communication and mobile technology and experts have estimated that it’s time to market is about next 10 years. This means we will be able to communicate touch, taste, smell and even our thoughts over the internet by 2030.

References:

•Hello Tomorrow Deep Technology Observatory

•Singularity University Resources

•Ericsson 10 Hot Consumer Trends 2030

•MIT Blog

•RibbonFarm, Welcome to Future Nauseous