Hello, SFIA audio listeners. In this month's Nebula exclusive, big alien theory,

we're asked at the reason alien civilizations might be rare is because most aliens are huge.

To hear it and every episode early and ad-free, plus hours of bonus content,

check out go.nebola.tv slash Isaac Arthur and use my code, Isaac Arthur.

Technology has shaped our civilization as it grew down the centuries, and since the

Industrial Revolution, each new generation seems defined by some new technological revolution.

So what will the next revolution be?

Yeah. What will the next revolution be? Planes, trains and automobiles help shape the world we live in today, down to the very layout of our homes and cities, and the advent of running water, electricity, the internet, and now Wi-Fi, continues these trends.

It's not really accurate to say one technology defines a generation, sometimes it's several,

sometimes they avalanche more quickly, and what they all seem to have in common is they

often seem to sweep out of nowhere, while at the same time they often do seem

like they were obvious in hindsight, or even sometimes in advance.

Everyone knew internet commerce would become a big thing, and cell phones, but we never

really imagined the forms they would take.

As we go through today, we'll be looking at

a couple dozen major technological sectors and asking what they are up to and where they

are going. I'll also give a quick definition or clarification of the ones that might be less

obvious. We'll be covering them alphabetically and many have longer sections, for instance we'll dwell a lot on energy technologies to discuss updates on solar, nuclear,

other renewables, batteries and so on.

Here are those categories for today, 3D printing and additive manufacturing, 5G and

telecommunications, artificial intelligence

and machine learning, augmented reality and virtual reality, autonomous vehicles and electric

...