Is this the near future?

I don't normally endorse particular products, but I am going to make an exception this time.  A division of Corning Glass is located here in Wilmington, where they make fiber optic cable.  Of course you are aware that fiber optic cable is used in high speed internet transmission, but it is also used in those invasive optical devices that physicians use to peer into your body such as bronchoscopes and colonoscopes.

Here are a couple of YouTube videos from Corning that show how they envision our future.  Some of it is already here, such as in your smart phones.  I enjoyed watching these videos and thought you might like them also:

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As an historical aside, PBS is showing "Ancient Computer" on Nova.  It was probably designed and built by Archimedes and his peers around 250 BC.  It was designed to forecast eclipses of the sun and moon, especially the dire "red" eclipse which foretold great battle losses.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/ancient-computer.html