[ExI] Is future progress moving to virtual reality?

[Anders Sandberg]

On 11/03/2013 10:28, BillK wrote:
> Who predicted the internet is a popular topic in SF. Try this page for 
> an overwhelming history of the many writers who wrote about computers, 
> machine intelligence and the internet. 
> <http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/computers>

But note the lack of stories that got the explosive power of Internet 
right. Most stories with connected computers assumed they would be like 
a telephone network, not something that changes the way society is run 
globally.

The one mentioned exception is "A Logic Named Joe", which actually does 
get it - except that the protagonist is doing a heroic job of returning 
it to a phone system. Closer to the real thing is Brunner's 1975 "The 
Shockwave Rider" that involves networked hacking and online "delphi 
pools" doing crowdsourced prediction. By the point we reach Vinge's 
"True Names" in 1981 the authors can actually cheat since there are real 
computer networks, and at least Vinge had access.

The point is, people are used to the standard sf world within a 
sub-genre. The reason nobody needs to explain what a hyperdrive is in 
space opera is that it is part of the space opera standard. Before 
Cyberpunk created the standard cyberpunk future there were no other 
standard sf worlds where networked computers were anything but glorified 
mainframes or telephone networks: they were not assumed to have any 
particular impact on culture, economics or politics. Yes, there were 
stories that were exceptions, but they were not part of the standard 
setting. And it is the standard settings that are used as metaphors by 
people when thinking about the future.

-- 
Anders Sandberg,
Future of Humanity Institute
Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University