Ten Upcoming Technologies That Will Shape the Lives of Our Children
- Lydia (Founder)
- Apr 14
- 7 min read
Updated: 6 days ago
Note: This is a long read.
As the world barrels toward a future shaped by artificial intelligence we are constantly learning how to manage it. While I'm still struggling to manage all my passwords, I often wonder at what kinds of things our children will have to contend with. What kind of world will our children grow old in?
Technology is increasing at a faster and faster rate. This means the changes that happen over the next 20 years will be exponentially more than the changes we've had in the past 20.
Some very interesting and useful tech is currently being developed and although still obscure, it could easily become commonplace for our kids' generation. We mostly hope tech will improve our quality of life, speed completion of “mundane” tasks (perhaps even eradicate them completely) and move us toward a greener world.
It can feel exciting to learn about what new tech is coming up but we still struggle with imagining it happens in our lifetime. So let’s explore 10 of these technologies - ones that are not yet fully reliased but expected to be commonplace in the next 20-50 years.
This will give us a sneak peek into the incredible world our children may grow old in. Here we go....
NOTE: in the spirit of writing an article about future tech I have used AI to generate the images in this post
1. Emotional AI Support Companion
Chatbots like Chat GPT & Gemini are getting quite good at understanding human complex emotions. Which opens up a whole array of potential for Emotional AI companions. AI chat bots who recognize and respond to human emotions in nuanced, supportive ways.
It’s likely that within 5 – 10 years most people will regularly check in with a chatbot on their phone who can detect tone, facial expressions, and even stress levels. They will likely offer emotional support, therapy-like interaction and even personalized mental health support.
The benefit this could bring is to offer low-cost, 24/7 mental health care for all. Currently psychologists are overbooked, expensive and not always available when we need them.
2. BCI Technology (Thought-Controlled Interface Prosthetics)
Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) are a technology that will allow us to control prosthetics—or digital devices—with just our thoughts. They are currently under development (you have probably heard of Neuralink!) By reading brain activity and translating it into physical commands, this kind of tech has enormous opportunity to improve life for people who have experienced a stroke or who need assistive technology like prosthetics. In the future, say 30 years time, it might be commonly used to restore eyesight, neuro degeneration, or even be used to identify and diagnose mental health issues.
The risk here is high cost, privacy risks associated with brain data, and complex requirements and risks with implantation….interesting.
3. Nuclear Fusion Energy
For those unfamiliar, nuclear fusion is when the nucleus of two atoms, form to become one. This releases massive amounts of energy. It’s also how our sun stays hot.
Nuclear fusion was once the holy grail of clean energy—is inching closer to becoming reality in 30-50 years time with successful experiments already taking place in France, US, UK, Japan, China and South Korea.
Nuclear fusion does not make destructive radioactive waste or harmful atmospheric emissions and unlike nuclear fission, has no risk of meltdown. It could also be transportable. The downside is that it’s challenging and expensive and we don’t know how to do it large scale yet.
4. Smart Cities
A smart city is one that uses a bunch of useful tech around the city to improve things like air quality, traffic management, public safety and waste management. Just last week I visited Thornlands Community Playground (in Brisbane) and found a self-compacting public rubbish bin there. It uses sensors to monitor fullness, compacts the rubbish up to 8 times and automatically notifies council once it's full.
Most major cities, including Brisbane, already have plans in place to roll out smart city initiatives. Cities will be much “smarter” in 20 years but we will begin to see smart benches, lights, security and bins popping up everywhere over the next 5-10 years.
5. Personalised Medicine
Personalized medicine is made using your own genetic information and takes into account your environment, lifestyle and family history to put together a personalised treatment plan that is unique to you. Moving away from a one size fits all approach makes a lot of sense. By looking at our genes, Doctors could also identify risks we weren’t even aware of.
Personalised medicines mean better and faster diagnosis, predictive prevention, and more effective treatments.
For example, the British Heart Foundation use computers to make digital models of a persons heart, identifying a individuals’ proteins on platelets to tailor medicine that helps prevent heart attack, and researching ways to personalised chemotherapy drugs.
Personalised medicine is accelerating, expected to become more widespread in 10 years time. Meanwhile, AI and robotics are poised to further transform healthcare in the next 10-20 years.
6. Self-Driving Transportation
Driverless cars are a reality already! Companies like Waymo already use an autonomous ride-hail service in Phoenix, Arizona and San Fransisco. While a Chinese owned company, Baidu, operates fully driverless taxi services in Beijing. So when can we expect public transport to become fully driverless in Australia? Some experts say no more than 10-20 years.
There is also a CAVForth bus in Scotland which already runs a pilot driverless bus service for the past two years!
7. Virtual Reality Training
Virtual Reality (VR) is no longer just for gamers but is being developed to train all sorts of students, from medical students, to firefighters, pilots, and even customer service workers. The idea is to train students in an immersive, risk-free simulation before going out to do real life training.
This is already pretty common but is expected to become more widespread in about 5-10 years to provide all kinds of professions with realistic, cost-effective training. However, it remains to be seen just how effective it is for certain real-life events. While I think VR training has potential benefits, it’s place is with enhancing educational material and foundational training – rather than a replacement for hands-on training.
8. Hyper-Personalised Advertising
The next wave of marketing is going to feel creepily accurate. Advertising companies will tailor ads not just to demographics, but to an individual level. It may use individual names, voice and tonality preferences and even adapt colour schemes.
It’s already happening, but will become more widespread and targeted over the next 3–7 years. Some people love it – others hate it but regardless how we feel about it – it’s happening.
9. AI-Generated Movies
AI is still pretty bad at telling stories in a human way. Can it be used to one day design visuals, compose soundtracks, and even "cast" virtual actors? The film industry is already experimenting with AI to try and reduce production costs and generate entirely synthetic content. The projected timeline to see our first ever AI generated movie? Maybe 5-10 years.
Personally, I hate it, but I guess we’ll see!
10. WiFi-Integrated Home Robots and Appliances
Smart homes are getting smarter. A lot of money is being spent developing IOT (Internet of Things). With the not so distant dream being appliances that talk to each other, adjust based on environment and personal usage patterns, or can even perform tasks autonomously without being asked. Think of pot plants that read the soil and automatically release water an nutrients according to the needs of the plant or toilets that self clean.
Homes are expected to be fully smart in 20-30 years. I for one, cannot wait for my little home robot to fold and put away our clothes or take out the trash! I also can imagine compatibility problems, or being locked into buying one brand for all your appliances.
Final Thoughts: Raising Children for a World of Rapid Change
We may be living out the last few decades of a life that can be lived untouched by constant input from AI - if we want to. But, our kids may not have that luxury! It’s up to us to teach our children how to embrace tech but also know how to balance it. Our bodies—and minds—are not designed or adapted to tech yet. We certainly already suffer the effects of a lifestyle that often requires us to sit down all day and stare at screens – and now? We face our problems being solved from morning till night which sounds like it’s a good thing but I have many doubts and fears about that.
All we can do is try to balance integrating helpful, common tech with exposing our children to completely tech free experiences, games and conversations. They are relying on us to know how to correctly adapt to tech and when they should avoid it.
Soon AI will help us manage our emotions, drive us to work & suggest what we should wear. Parents will need to try and find time to sit still in nature. To turn the pages of a physical book. To cook a meal without instructions from a screen. To write emails without assistance.
If we value teaching our kids those abilities – we must first make a habit them ourselves. If we can intentionally choose to enjoy the moments that are slow, boring and yes, even tedious – we show children that these are the best ways we learn important lessons about resilience and grit.
When power goes out or our phones die, will we remember to adapt, to problem-solve, to slow down and manage with just the bare minimum – so that our kids can too.
I believe that whatever the future brings, it will belong to the people who can plug in but also remember when to log off.
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