I led my Zoom discussion session the other day. The next one is next week. I am now preparing my slide deck and snide, off-hand remarks. My thesis is that since 2007, the year which I mark as the beginning of Industrial Revolution 4.0, the many different ways in which humans all over the world, live, work and play, eat, mate and communicate, as well as die, has changed dramatically. Those changes have come faster, and have encompassed more of the people of the world than at any time in humans history.
The only time that can roughly be compared to now, is around what is referred to as the second industrial revolution. That began in the 1870. That was when the use of oil and electricity changed the production and transportation of goods. It also was the time of the invention of electric lights, which changed the time of day for everyone who could afford it. The invention that had the biggest impact on how things were done was the internal combustion engine. The method of sparking an oil based fuel in a very confined space, creating thousands of small explosions that could turn, push, lift, or move something, totally changed transportation and work. Those engines are still widely used today, although, that is finally changing. It also polluted the world, although no one had any thoughts about that at the time.
There were great disruptions during the years from 1870 through 1940. People moved into cities. Factories and sky scrapers were built…
