The human species is rapidly changing! Mostly not for the better, obviously, but some "futurists" believe their particular demographic (overeducated overpaid youngish professionals starting to worry about mortality) has already begun the process of becoming superhuman mutant cyborgs. Are you kind of depressed that you didn't get around to doing grown-up adult-type things until you were already (technically) middle-aged? Maybe it's okay, because you are the first generation of this new technological human-synthetic revolution! Or maybe you will physically and mentally deteriorate the way humans have always declined, unless they were lucky enough to be killed in a war or wiped out by a plague or eaten by saber-toothed tigers.

American "futurologist" Paul Saffo is getting a lot of buzz for an interview he did with Britain's Sunday Times in which he mused that the upper classes will use their vast fortunes to provide themselves with the bounties of emerging technologies. I sometimes wonder if the very rich will become a completely separate species. Imagine if the very rich can live, on average, 20 years longer than the poor. That's 20 more years of earning and saving. Think what that means about wealth and power and the advantages that you pass on to your children.

A harrowing and plausible vision of our future? Possibly. But he also suggests [...]