The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future

by Kevin Kelly

Here are other unlikely realms waiting to be cognitively enhanced: Cognified music—Music can be created in real time from algorithms, employed as the soundtrack for a video game or a virtual world. Depending on your actions, the music changes. Hundreds of hours of new personal music can be written by the AI for every player. Cognified laundry—Clothes that tell the washing machines how they want to be washed. The wash cycle would adjust itself to the contents of each load as directed by the smart clothes. Cognified marketing—The amount of attention an individual reader or watcher spends on an advertisement can be multiplied by their social influence (how many people followed them and what their influence was) in order to optimize attention and influence per dollar. Done at the scale of millions, this is a job for AI. Cognified real estate—Matching buyers and sellers via an AI that can prompt “renters who liked this apartment also liked these . . .” It could then generate a financing package that worked for your particular circumstances. Cognified nursing—Patients outfitted with sensors that track their bio markers 24 hours a day can generate highly personalized treatments that are adjusted and refined daily. Cognified construction—Imagine project management software that is smart enough to take into account weather forecasts, port traffic delays, currency exchange rates, accidents, in addition to design changes. Cognified ethics—Robo cars need to be taught priorities and be...