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We depend at least as much on simple “old” technologies such as corrugated iron and paper as we do on the internet or biotechnology. So why do we go on ignoring what the world really uses and create a fantasy world built on technohype, wonders David Edgerton

IT’S 2007 and we all live in outer space in silver suits, with pills for food, reproducing via artificial wombs, coexisting in perpetual peace and knowing everything through our brain implants.

No, of course, I know it never happened – just as I know that today’s brand of technohype predictions will prove as…

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