The Last of the Savages

Ray Kurzweil has a history of making accurate future forecasts. One of them is that the 3D printer is coming and the current ones are but a small hint of what is to come.

That got me thinking. We are quite possibly the last generation to have a direct connection between taking raw materials and making an end product.

Imagine your far distant relatives ordering a steak from their Acme Wondermatic 5000 3D printer.

The steak itself would be made of animal protein but would not have been grown on an animal. I’m not saying that it is morally wrong to slaughter an animal for meat, although I do understand why some people do. What I am saying is that, people who are completely divorced from a world of producing things the messy way, may think the way we do it today is pretty savage.

A stone age man looking at a modern super market would ‘get’ it. He had the inconvenience of actually hunting and gathering, and we don’t. But the food itself, and where it came from, is at least understandably the same.

If the cave man wanted meat, he hunted an animal and slaughtered it. If I want a steak, somewhere down the supply chain, an animal is slaughtered.

With the advent of the 3D printer, the connection between the means of production and the end product is about to be broken.

I can’t say that upsets me at all.