The Fourth Industrial Revolution is changing the world. Artificial intelligence, blockchain, and nano- and biotechnologies are already transforming society. The dramatic rise and fall of the world’s most famous cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, is the result of the actions of millions of people who trusted the technology. Klaus Schwab, founder and permanent chairman of the World Economic Forum, states: “The actions we take today influence the chain of events that transforms the world. The technologies around us change as a result of our decisions—and then we change as well.”
We all participate in shaping the future, and to create a world we want to live in, we need to understand the scale of the changes taking place. More than 200 of the world’s leading experts in technology, economics, and sociology took part in creating this book to present readers with the most complete picture of the transformation of the world around us.