Patrick Tucker's blog

Google has just launched its much-anticipated Google Voice service and the song of cellphones floats upon the air. Suckers that we are, my wife and I are already signed up. The nifty features are these: You get one number that attaches to all of your other numbers. When someone calls that number, it rings on your home phone, your cell, and any other device you choose to connect.

Google and Verizon have gone public with a joint policy framework that will have enormous ramifications for the future of the Internet as we know it. You can read it here (PDF).

A three to six meter sea level rise by the end of the century is looking increasingly likely, based on continuing IPCC projections. This raises a number of serious questions, including: how do we protect the Earth's biodiversity from the attendant habitat loss? And what happens to my beachfront condo?

This year, as the mainstream media focused on the scandals of the day, THE FUTURIST looked at potential “fixes” to big problems awaiting today’s and tomorrow’s young people. Generous members of the World Future Society make that happen.

Special thanks to Alex Lightman for catching this.

A new paper argues that cutting greenhouse gas emissions, switching to nuclear or geothermal power, and even sequestering carbon in the earth won’t stave off massively disruptive climate change. Greenhouse gases are less a threat to stable climate than is the excess heat produced when fuel is burned to create energy, say Swedish researchers Bo Nordell and Bruno Gervet.

Mainstream science maintains that humans stopped evolving about 50,000 years ago. Civilization put an end to this process. Therefore, the human of the pre-modern era is the human of today and will be the human tomorrow, right?

Our capacity for self control may be running on empty.

If you’re looking for the future of fun, you may need to look no further than your own brain. Within the next thirty years, humanity will likely become more comfortable incorporating wireless technology into our biological functioning, particularly our neural functioning, to create sensory experiences and thoughts that are literally beyond our comprehension today. For instance, we now know that the human retina uses .02 grams of neuron mass to send data to the brain, which, in turn, uses 75,000 times more neuron mass to analyze data it’s received.

We’re used to interfacing with the Internet via a PC or handheld device, but in the next twenty years, the Web is going to make its way into our bedrooms, our bathrooms, and even our clothes.