Tomorrow Now: Envisioning the Next Fifty Years
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'd2Nobody knows better than Bruce Sterling how thin the membrane between science fiction and real life has become, a state he correctly depicts as both thrilling and terrifying in this frisky, literate, clear-eyed sketch of the next half-century. Like all of the most interesting futurists, Sterling isn'd5t just talking about machines and biochemistry: what he really cares about are the interstices of technology with culture and human history.'d3 -Kurt Andersen, author of
f1b Turn of the Century
f0b0
Visionary author Bruce Sterling views the future like no other writer. In his first nonfiction book since his classic
f1b The Hacker Crackdown,
f0b0 Sterling describes the world our children might be living in over the next fifty years and what to expect next in culture, geopolitics, and business.
f2i Time
calls Bruce Sterling 'd2one of America'd5s best-known science fiction writers and perhaps the sharpest observer of our media-choked culture working today in any genre.'d3
f1b TomorrowNow
f0b0 is, as Sterling wryly describes it, 'd2an ambitious, sprawling effort in thundering futurist punditry, in the pulsing vein of the futurists I'd5ve read and admired over the years: H. G. Wells, Arthur C. Clarke, and Alvin Toffler; Lewis Mumford, Reyner Banham, Peter Drucker, and Michael Dertouzos. This book asks the future two questions: What does it mean? and How does it feel? 'd3
Taking a cue from one of William Shakespeare'd5s greatest soliloquies, Sterling devotes one chapter to each of the seven stages of humanity: birth, school, love, war, politics, business, and old age. As our children progress through Sterling'd5s Shakespearean life cycle, they will encounter new products; new weapons; new crimes; new moral conundrums, such as cloning and genetic alteration; and new political movements, which will augur the way wars of the future will be fought.
Here are some of the author'd5s predictions:
'a5 Human clone babies will grow into the bitterest and surliest adolescents ever.
'a5 Microbes will be more important than the family farm.
'a5 Consumer items will look more and more like cuddly, squeezable pets.
'a5 Tomorrow'd5s kids will learn more from randomly clicking the Internet than they ever will from their textbooks.
'a5 Enemy governments will be nice to you and will badly want your tourist money, but global outlaws will scheme to kill you, loudly and publicly, on their Jihad TVs.
'a5 The future of politics is blandness punctuated with insanity.
The future of activism belongs to a sophisticated, urbane global network that can make money'd1the Disney World version of Al Qaeda.
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f1b cf0 Tomorrow Now
f0b0 will change the way you think about the future and our place in it.
| uuid: |
3238DDA4-A48A-4496-B1A2-1D8E2CD0BD4A |
| upc: |
9780679463221 |
| title: |
Tomorrow Now: Envisioning the Next Fifty Years |
| purchase date: |
25-11-2006 |
| publisher: |
Random House |
| published: |
17-12-2002 |
| price: |
$24.95 |
| pages: |
352 |
| net Rating: |
3.5 |
| last lookup time: |
187237062.074988 |
| genre: |
Social Theory
Futurology
General & Reference
History of Technology |
| fullTitle: |
Tomorrow Now: Envisioning the Next Fifty Years |
| currentValue: |
$3.50 |
| created: |
186204160 |
| country: |
us |
| author: |
Bruce Sterling |
| aspect: |
Hardcover |
| asin: |
0679463224
|
