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Human Body Version 2.0
Moreover, all of the underlying technologies are accelerating.
The power of computation has grown at a double exponen-
tial rate for all of the past century, and will continue to do
so well into this century through the power of three-dimen-
sional computing. Communication bandwidths and the pace
of brain reverse-engineering are also quickening. Meanwhile,
according to my models, the size of technology is shrinking at
a rate of 5.6 per linear dimension per decade, which will make
nanotechnology ubiquitous during the 2020s.
By the end of this decade, computing will disappear as a
separate technology that we need to carry with us. Well rou-
tinely have high-resolution images encompassing the entire
visual field written directly to our retinas from our eyeglasses
and contact lenses (the Department of Defense is already using
technology along these lines from Microvision, a company
based in Bothell, Washington). Well have very-high-speed
wireless connection to the Internet at all times. The electron-
ics for all of this will be embedded in our clothing. Circa 2010,
these very personal computers will enable us to meet with each
other in full-immersion, visual-auditory, virtual-reality envi-
ronments as well as augment our vision with location- and
time-specific information at all times.
By 2030, electronics will utilize molecule-sized circuits,
the reverse-engineering of the human brain will have been
completed, and bioMEMS will have evolved into bioNEMS
(biological nanoelectromechanical systems). It will be rou-
tine practice to have billions of nanobots (nano-scale robots)
coursing through the capillaries of our brains, communicating
with each other (over a wireless local area network), as well
as with our biological neurons and with the Internet. One
application will be to provide full-immersion virtual reality
that encompasses all of our senses. When we want to enter a
virtual-reality environment, the nanobots will replace the sig-