Thursday, March 13, 2008
"FUTURE THINKING" student submits interesting article on "digital" human beings...BY 2020!!!
The article I have chosen is The Future of Medicine and Health Care in the Third Millennium & People with digital bodies by 2020. Advancements in all aspects of health care is taking place here and now, and at a very fast pace. Doctors are having a difficult time keeping up with such rapid advancements. New drugs, new treatments, new technologies, new diseases means new medicine and genetic revolution is at the heart of this new medicine. The tools are readily available and already widely used in animals, giving today's scientists the power to alter every aspect of life on earth. This power has the potential of redesigning the human race. Computers and genetics are going the two greatest technologies for the future of health care, at least for the first decades of the next century. "Computers change how we live, but genes can change what we are." By the year 2020, combining these two technologies, it has been predicted that digitally enhanced human being will be created. By 2030 we will have the ability to create bionic people. We already have the ability to link computer chips to human cells to help those who are paralysed. The next step will be to implant biochips which control blood sugar levels, helping diabetics. Beyond that, biochips will be implanted directly onto the surface of the brain, to restore sight, hearing, movement or enhance memory and intelligence. This article goes into depth with extraordinary possibilities of gene technology, things I can't even imagine happening. It's disturbing but fascinating the things they can do with genetics, such as using animals to produce human organs. These technologies do need to be regulated, otherwise they could go completely beyond our control.
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Another Student follows up>>....
• the Human Genome Project, which may isolate the genetic roots of many human diseases - including many that are not generally considered genetic
• the use of these genetic markers to screen mass populations, and prevent (through diet, gene substitution, or other special therapies) the specific diseases that individuals are likely to develop
• nanotechnology, the just-born craft of building molecular-scale machines that holds the promise of completely new types of drugs: tiny machines with the tools and intelligence to perform specific tasks, kill certain viruses, repair certain cells, manufacture certain needed proteins or enzymes.
• new modes of pharmaceutical research that go far beyond the old blind trial-and-error techniques to actually building the molecules (or evolving the bacteria) that can carry out specific tasks, lock onto specific receptor sites in the body, or defeat specific pathogens.
Some shifts that will help in the future include the use of computers, telecommunications, databasing, management and expert systems, population health. All these will help with restructuring and reform.
Thank you for your comments 'another student'...I would like to know more about 'nanotechnology'....
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