Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100

wall screens, furniture, on billboards, and even in our glasses and contact lenses. When we blink, we will go online.
    There are several ways we can put the Internet on a lens. The image can be flashed from our glasses directly through the lens of our eyes and onto our retinas. The image could also be projected onto the lens, which would act as a screen. Or it might be attached to the frame of the glasses, like a small jeweler’s lens. As we peer into the glasses, we see the Internet, as if looking at a movie screen. We can then manipulate it with a handheld device that controls the computer via a wireless connection. We could also simply move our fingers in the air to control the image, since the computer recognizes the position of our fingers as we wave them.
    For example, since 1991, scientists at the University of Washington have worked to perfect the virtual retinal display (VRD) in which red, green, and blue laser light are shone directly onto the retina. With a 120-degree field of view and a resolution of 1600 × 1,200 pixels, the VRD display can produce a brilliant, lifelike image that is comparable to that seen in a motion picture theater. The image can be generated using a helmet, goggles, or glasses.
    Back in the 1990s, I had a chance to try out these Internet glasses. Itwas an early version created by the scientists at the Media Lab at MIT. It looked like an ordinary pair of glasses, except there was a cylindrical lens about ½ inch long, attached to the right-hand corner of the lens. I could look through the glasses without any problem. But if I tapped the glasses, then the tiny lens dropped in front of my eye. Peering into the lens, I could clearly make out an entire computer screen, seemingly only a bit smaller than a standard PC screen. I was surprised how clear it was, almost as if the screen were staring me in the face. Then I held a device, about the size of a cell phone, with buttons on it. By pressing the buttons, I could control the cursor on the screen and even type instructions.
    In 2010, for a Science Channel special I hosted, I journeyed down to Fort Benning, Georgia, to check out the U.S. Army’s latest “Internet for the battlefield,” called the Land Warrior. I put on a special helmet with a miniature screen attached to its side. When I flipped the screen over my eyes, suddenly I could see a startling image: the entire battlefield with X’s marking the location of friendly and enemy troops. Remarkably, the “fog of war” was lifted, with GPS sensors accurately locating the position of all troops, tanks, and buildings. By clicking a button, the image would rapidly change, putting the Internet at my disposal on the battlefield, with information concerning the weather, disposition of friendly and enemy forces, and strategy and tactics.
    A much more advanced version would have the Internet flashed directly through our contact lenses by inserting a chip and LCD display into the plastic. Babak A. Parviz and his group at the University of Washington in Seattle are laying the groundwork for the Internet contact lens, designing prototypes that may eventually change the way we access the Internet.
    He foresees that one immediate application of this technology might be to help diabetics regulate their glucose levels. The lens will display an immediate readout of the conditions within their body. But this is just the beginning. Eventually, Parviz envisions the day when we will be able to download any movie, song, Web site, or piece of information off the Internet into our contact lens. We will have a complete home entertainment system in our lens as we lie back and enjoy feature-length movies. We can also use it to connect directly to our office computer via our lens, then manipulate the files that flash before us. From the comfort of the beach, we will be able to teleconference to the office by blinking.
    By inserting some pattern-recognition software into these Internet glasses, they will also recognize objects and even some people’s faces. Already, some software programs can recognize preprogrammed faces with better than 90 percent accuracy. Not just the name, but the biography of the person you are talking to may flash before you as you speak. At a meeting this will end the embarrassment of bumping into someone you know whose name you can’t remember. This may also serve an important function at a cocktail party, where there are many strangers, some of whom are very important, but you