The industrial revolution left an impact on us…good or bad that depends on who you ask. It led to a change in life style, gave us concrete buildings, cheap food. All that which can be produced in bulk, offered a lifestyle of comfort and luxuries. On the other hand took away the identity, all is mass produced. But the most alarming outcome has been the harm it had caused to the environment and left us dependent on inherently unsustainable resources and systems. In the last century we have learned how to make things and how they affect us and our planet. The rapid development in technology has made us think that if we can do something or make something doesn’t mean we have to do it. Industrial revolution while being one of the most incredible, is and was not something we can get away with again. This time it’s different, the direction is all about technology of another peculiarity.
With this techno revolution the possibilities of billions of people connected by mobile devices, with unprecedented processing power, storage capacity, and access to knowledge, are unlimited. These possibilities will be multiplied by emerging technology breakthroughs in fields such as artificial intelligence, robotics, the Internet of Things, autonomous vehicles, 3-D printing, nanotechnology, biotechnology, materials science, energy storage, and quantum computing.
Already, artificial intelligence is all around us, from self-driving cars and drones to virtual assistants and software that translate or invest. Impressive progress has been made in AI in recent years, driven by exponential increases in computing power and by the availability of vast amounts of data, from software used to discover new drugs to algorithms used to predict our cultural interests. Digital fabrication technologies, meanwhile, are interacting with the biological world on a daily basis. Engineers, designers, and architects are combining computational design, additive manufacturing, materials engineering, and synthetic biology to pioneer a symbiosis between microorganisms, our bodies, the products we consume, and even the buildings we inhabit.
We need to embrace the nature inspired design and it would be an intelligent principle, and generally start progressing in a way that isn’t so dismissive of the natural world.
The million dollar question is: Will we in reality do it?
Technology has contributed to our environmental problems over time and there has always been a tug of war between the tech –heads and hard core environmentalist….. conversely ecologists have been a source of endless guilt trips for an industry that has so far thrived on wild and reckless progress. Innovations are always accompanied by a degree of uncertainty and risk….ozone hole, lead poisoning but it has also led to amazing technologies like polio vaccine, mobile phones. This arises another question what we really need?
An industrial revolution or an industrial Evolution– a better way to new technologies that can reform life and our earth in harmony. To do so we need a new breed of CONSCIENTIOUS technologist to lead the way.
Tools & Technology in Art Education 