Scenario 11: Poetry of Nutrition
OPPORTUNITIES
There are opportunities for companies that are involved in food technology and innovation, healthcare and wellness, robotics and AI, agriculture and sustainable food production, education, community building, data analytics, and gaming. Precisely, companies that develop food apps, innovative food products, and technologies for monitoring food quality and safety could see potential in this scenario. This includes companies working on food processing, packaging, and distribution technologies. Next, healthcare companies focus on mental and physical health solutions, as well as those involved in psychotherapy and holistic wellness approaches. Companies specializing in soft robotics and artificial intelligence, particularly those interested in applications for human-robot interaction, could be intrigued by the use of empathetic robots in the scenario. On the other side, businesses engaged in sustainable agriculture, organic farming, and local food production may see potential in the shift towards supporting local farmers and food producers. This includes companies offering agricultural technology solutions and services. Companies specializing in data analytics and artificial intelligence, especially in the context of personalized nutrition and behavior change, could be interested in leveraging data to promote healthy habits and optimize food production and distribution systems.
KEYWORDS
- Holistic food perspective
- Healthcare and wellness
- Soft robotics
- Empathy
- Sustainable agriculture
VIDEO
SCENARIO NARRATIVE
What are our true priorities? Is nutrition the most extensive field of destructive consumerism or a noble means of survival? Poetry of Nutrition is a realistic dystopian industrial saga with an optimistic and brave revolutionary twist. Let’s imagine the future we really want to have in spite of everything.
The global health crisis in the near future will reach its peak by 2030. The mental and physical health of all generations rapidly deteriorated. Huge protest outbreaks and changes of governments follow all around the globe due to this immense threat that 35% of the previously employable population is unable to work and economically contribute.
A new additional health system is established. The Nutritional Health System is merging sophisticated technology with the valuable therapeutic tradition of psychotherapy. Soft robots are used to bring people closer, especially among different generations, while learning how to control the food production and market. With beautiful somatosensory and visually opulent behavior, the robots appeal to humans much more than the dry warnings of doctors in the past. This empathetic appearance of robots opens people’s true motivation to change and implement new habits. Art, humanities, medicine, and science completely fuse and intertwine.
Industry follows the lead and offers plenty of products that can help the general cause of the battle for collective health. Food therapy apps, pesticide monitoring drones, statistical dishes, and educational, therapeutic computer games mold the new everyday experience.
Outside of the health system, the creation of communities branches out, and people start to connect and nurture relations with local farmers and food producers. They switch from global brands to local small sources of food. They turn to the food that they can trust and feel as theirs truly. A communal chain of practical empathy is established. People rediscover the true meaning of community and collective health.
Scenario developed by Irena Djukanovic
TRENDS OF THE SCENARIO
Trend 1
Edible robotics
An emerging trend of creating robots from edible materials for the purpose of design and technology. Previously fragile and technologically unusable materials are redefined in robot use. Materials such as gelatine, previously considered fragile and technologically unusable are reclassified. Edible robots are redefining the notion of what is edible, what is food and what is a reliable material for further technological development. Revolutionizing materiality and the notion of food is implemented in nutritional therapy.
Trend 3
Robots clinicians
Robots are already present in therapeutic treatments. Both in clinical trials in facilities that are homes for the elderly. Robots are already serving as clinicians helping convince people to lose weight. Therapy robots that are companions for elderly people especially ones with dementia are a common occurrence in certain countries. The idea that is interwoven in the scenario is that robots are sometimes equally or more beneficial than human clinicians (due to their distance from the involvement in the human experience). They strengthen human motivation and active pursuit for improvement of their health in new ways.
Trend 5
Robots in food service and automation of kitchens
Replacing workers with robots is a trend in restaurant kitchens and even service, as well as using them as a tourist attraction. Future trends are announcing full automation of kitchens and kitchen appliances. Dehumanizing service is permeating the media. Poetry of Nutrition is trying to oppose these trends or transform them. Robots are turned from work market threats into pets, therapists, toys, companions and utilities that help humans as individuals and as workers. The labor market recovers and doesn’t use technological advancement as a means of further exploitation but as a tool for improving the standard of life of the entire population.
Trend 7
Biomimicry
Biomimicry is a scientific, design and creative principle of imitating nature models for the sake of improvement of science and technology. It is learning from and then emulating nature’s forms, processes, and ecosystems to create more sustainable designs. It is a crucial trend for the development of soft robotics. Most soft robotics advancements were achieved and inspired by the anatomy and intelligence of octopuses. This principle is essential for the development of most products supporting the Nutritional Health System in the scenario.
Trend 2
Philosophy of Food
Food determines our identity behavior. The history of food shows us how food marked our sense of self, and determined some of our behavior, customs and societal roles. Through retrieving organic food and pre-industrial production of food we can connect to the experience of our ancestors most directly. Today’s production of food is robbing us of our health but also of our past. The connection between our biological and social past is the key to our global health recovery and inspires many aspects of the nutritional health system.
Trend 4
AI generated soft robots
Merger of robotics and AI is a prevalent trend in today’s robotics. AI is a crucial tool for self-generating data. The use of self-generated data is translated into the creation of soft robotics. It affects the fluidity of form, fast creation and recreation of robots making them immensely durable and usable. Robots generated by AI similar to the one from Northwestern University can be generated in seconds and have the ability to move and walk. These patents evolve significantly into the utility therapeutic soft robot The Food Taster in the scenario Poetry of Nutrition.
Trend 6
Self healing and liquid robots
There is a rising trend of highly sophisticated soft robots. Some can contain human skin that can heal when injured. Others are liquid robots. They are highly fragile but promising in the near future to have incredible amorphic abilities to transform their shape and function. These humanoid traits of robots inspire the creation of bonds and underline similarities between humans and robots for therapeutic purposes. Through the organic traits and behavior of robots in the scenario, humans relate to robots incomparably more than before. This strengthens the therapeutic effects of soft robot therapy.
ELEMENTS OF THE FUTURE SCENARIO
Nutrition health system
A nutrition health system that consists of institutes, individual and group nutrition therapy sessions, education of children, and soft robotics therapy. It is completely dedicated to saving the collective physical and mental health.
Technological advancement of robotics
Sophisticated soft robotics open a new space for specifically beneficial soft robot toy play food taster therapy. Rigid robotics revolutionize the production of food.
Connecting communities through technology and nutrition
Food bonding sessions between local farmers and local inhabitants are stimulated. Creating a connection to the process of how you receive food, be aware and appreciate the process, time and dedication that comes with having food.
Nutritional therapists
The lady is an experienced nutrition therapist who was advocating for this system since the late 1980s. She is finally living her dreams by helping people in the most humane way to help themselves.
All DIY Mum
She is a highly responsible mother who proclaimed war on additives and unhealthy food. Due to high criteria, her health is suffering and she is regularly attending therapy at the institute.
The Food Taster soft robot
It is a soft robot, utility, kitchen utensil, pet, and companion with an existential crisis. Nevertheless, it still cares a lot about humans even though it is not clear what it is to them and why they abandon destructive habits hard.
Local farmer
He is a pesticide, additive and pollution control enthusiast. He is trying to learn how to take care of his crops most optimally. He regularly participates in bonding sessions with a community of people who buy fresh food from him.
