Westworld has 7 science fiction technologies that might become possible in the real world
faster than you think.
They include:
1.
Realistic Humanoid Robots With Consciousness The primary technologies in Westworld are
extremely advanced humanoid robots that are completely indistinguishable from real people.
The most advanced models are created using synthetic skeletons with synthetic muscles
and skin overlayed on top of them.
Realistically, these types of robots are so advanced that it could take several decades
or more before they could be created on a regular basis.
However, prototypes might exist far sooner.
These robots also have general intelligence and the capacity for consciousness.
The AIs for these robots are trained in simulations millions of times to work out any bugs in
their behaviors.
And paper-thin devices are used to upload detailed life stories and personalities to
these robots.
We’re probably 10 – 30 years away from having those technologies.
When that happens, we’re likely to have conscious AI virtual assistants in the form
of robots, holograms, and virtual characters that can assist us with reaching our life
goals on a daily basis.
However, as the show highlights, there are major problems we could face as a result of
our treatment of these AIs.
This includes AI uprisings at the local and global scales.
2.
A Powerful AI That Controls Everyone’s Lives In season 3 of Westworld, there’s a powerful,
general AI that’s able to collect data from every person on Earth and predict their life
paths.
To take it a step further, this AI can also deny job opportunities to people to make sure
they don’t deviate from their designated journeys in life.
Presumably, it can prevent anyone it chooses from dating who they want as well.
An AI like this would need access to hundreds or even thousands of computer systems connected
to the internet.
And no one would have any privacy online, similar to how it is now, except worse.
In reality, the civilians in a society might have to be slowly conditioned over a period
of decades before this controversial technology could become widely accepted.
Similar to how it is in Westworld, it would have to be presented as something that’s
actually protecting humanity despite the obvious negatives of it.
3.
Digital Immortality For The Rich And Powerful In the second season, a company called Delos
is offering a simulation for the world’s elite to live in after their physical bodies
die.
This simulation would provide an eternal life of luxury.
There are even ongoing experiments in the show to allow someone’s consciousness to
live in a realistic humanoid robot after they die.
According to some experts on the topic, digital immortality could be possible anywhere from
30 to 100 years from now.
It’s reasonable to believe that the process of becoming digitally immortal would be incredibly
expensive when its first introduced.
And initially, the rich and powerful would have exclusive access to it.
However, many people believe that the consciousness that lives after someone dies is only a copy
of the original person, which might undermine some of the reasoning of becoming digitally
immortality.
4.
Full-Immersive Virtual Reality And VR Goggles Full-immersion VR makes people feel like they
totally exist in another world.
In season 3, mental patients are subjected to photorealistic, full-immersion virtual
realities as a form of involuntary treatment.
Also, individuals who are considered threats by a powerful AI are rounded up off the street
and forced to connect to these types of realities for many months and years at a time as a form
of mental conditioning.
Compact and lightweight VR goggles are used to enable these experiences.
Realistically, it might take another 15 to 30 years before we can have photorealistic,
full-immersion experiences with VR goggles similar to the ones in this show.
For the most immersion possible, humans might need billions of nanobots in the capillaries
of their brains.
These nanobots would control incoming and outgoing brain signals so that users literally
feel like they’re in another world.
5.
Pharmaceuticals That Enable Full-Immersion Augmented Reality
In season 3, there’s a substance called “genre” that makes people feel like they’re
in various movie genres.
And the experiences it provides change dramatically throughout the duration of the trip.
In a couple of decades or more, it would probably be easier to induce these types of psychological
experiences using brain-computer interfaces and nanobots.
This could cause people around you to look dramatically different and appear to have
different clothing.
It could cause you to hear conversations that aren’t real.
And it could cause buildings around you to appear like they’re from different time
periods from both the past and the future.
6.
Blockchain-Based Apps That Promote Criminal Behavior
In season 3, there’s a blockchain-based app called Rico, that allows criminals to
pursue illegal odd jobs.
These gigs include robbing ATMs and delivering illicit packages.
Ironically, many of these criminal activities benefit the AI in this show that is controlling
everyone’s lives.
In reality, services like this already exist on the dark web, but with much smaller scales
of operation.
If an app like what is seen in the show actually existed, it would probably be quickly identified
by local law enforcement because of the nature of the crimes involved.
In some countries, apps like this could continually emerge one day if societal conditions are
particularly unfavorable.
7.
Pharmaceuticals That Control Human Thoughts and Behaviors
In season 3, there are pharmaceuticals that cause people to completely forget all of their
memories.
Because of this and augmented reality conditioning, an organization in the show is able to control
trained mercenaries and get them to incapacitate or capture people that are considered threats
to that organization.
In reality, quantum computers and other technologies could speed efforts to create these types
of mind-altering chemicals in the coming decades.
To take it to another level, perhaps a several decades from now, it may be possible to create
pre-programmed nanobots that could force people to perform actions that they’re totally
unaware of.
Using wireless technology, it may become possible for a person to physically control another
person from a nearby location.
Perhaps scariest of all, a general or super-intelligent AI could brain hack unsuspecting humans and
completely take control over their thoughts and actions.
Thanks for watching.
Make sure to watch this next video about science fiction technologies.