“New technologies exist but have yet to invent the … – L’Atelier: Disruptive innovation

robots and new technologies gradually invest the company but their use still raise questions.
 

interview in connection with the issuance Workshop Digital Olivier Levard, journalist and author of “We are all robots” published Michalon

Workshop. In your book you say: “we are all robots” can we say that this is really the case

Olivier Levard : As a child of the 1980-1990 generation bathed in Science fiction, I’ve always dreamed of robots. But today, we are often disappointed humanoid robots created, which are much less well than science fiction. So I asked: “But where are those humanoid robots that move well, who are smart?” And I realized that it was us! We are seeing more and more technological objects that bear directly on the body. I think this is the next step. After the era of the smartphone that has made us slaves, soon we will have new features that allow us to interact with the digital world more directly. A striking example summarizes very well the revolution: Google Glass.

While the object and its dedicated applications exist, but the people they will use real?

Maybe this generation connected glasses will not work. However, I believe deeply in the future. The idea, as I discuss in my book, is that people have tired of always having his head down on their phones. Accidents have arrived because of this: people fall on the subway tracks, or a young woman fell after a dyke because she read his notifications on Facebook. Fortunately, she survived. And for the record, she never gave up her phone throughout his journey … So the value of these glasses and connected these watches is able to interact with the digital world, whether on social networks, SMS or information in the broadest sense. It could be to search on the internet so much more natural without such a phone out of his pocket. This is actually a reflection on the interface of the future that ultimately could be improved our own body, hence the concept of man increased. The interest of these objects that covers the body, is to take stock of his body physical activity permanently. The idea is that we ourselves become robots, a bit like the Terminator has a screen that allows him to know when he is injured. We will have to analyze our body constantly devices. We are beginning to resemble those robots that have not yet arrived.

The term “robot” still has a somewhat negative impact on the language and the common imagination. However, the purpose of all these objects is increasing us and be more in control of our reality. Where do we stand between the fear and all the opportunities ahead?

robots arrive at one time or another, we will have to accept. There are actually two ways of approaching the subject. The first is that the robots are appreciated. People like robots because they think the robot science fiction. A survey by the European Union in several countries has focused on the assessment of robots. She noted that 80% of respondents answered “Yes, I like it because it is a dream, it’s childhood.” The other view is a terrible picture of the robotic world of metal and life fast and efficient. People think of robots that we see today in mass and are present in our factories. They fear for their particular use. France is one of the European countries where we are most afraid of these robots that could steal our jobs. In addition, there is the matter of the body connected, and affects both the philosophical, religious, ethical and intimate. Reflections on this subject will probably last 30 years and more. The right to change his body may seem like a no brainer but we enter the great debates of society: the right to abortion or euthanasia. This is a question that has been touched with surgery and still raises many questions.

dir=”ltr”> In addition, these technologies can have a very practical use. I imagine that in the skin with an RFID chip products that are already on the market or that will happen very quickly. I can open the door of my apartment, pay in a store, open my car, set the temperature and lights when I get home, etc.; all with the help of a tiny chip. A startup located in the United States you can buy but it is illegal in France. In fact, new technologies exist but have yet to invent the world that goes with it.

When society and the law have really started to move forward on this, be able we begin to develop the actual use of these connected objects?

Before writing the book, I thought the company was not ready at all, but I realized I was wrong. Some technologies that we considered first breathtaking end up being socially accepted. For the record, the remote that we use every day to zap our TV was invented initially for people with disabilities. And very quickly, when a technology becomes widespread, we see the benefits that ultimately affect everyone. Man kit for example, designed by an MIT laboratory, can give a lot of hope to people who are blind or deaf. It exists and it is now very well done.

In the end, it just scares us because our futurist look at these technologies seems perhaps too far from current practice?

technologies have continued to change us. Clothes have changed our appearance, having a hammer has changed the way we understand the world. These are examples but with new technology, it is a bit the same. Except for the first time, the technology is outermost. While in the medical field, this is already the case, would not the fact that taking medication. But now touching the body, which still keeps a sacred side, raises questions that were never asked before.