The first decade of the “new” millennium is quickly coming to a close, and things have drastically changed. (Even though we still don’t have flying cars, hover boards and a cure for the cold.)

Ten years ago, 56k Internet was the norm as were tube TVs and monitors, “green screen” cell phones and iPods did not even exist yet.

I love living in “the future.” It’s absolutely mind boggling the progress the world has made in the past century, or even in the past decade.

These types of improvements are not typical for humanity. Considering civilization has existed for only a fraction of how long the planet has, it is safe to consider modern normality to be anything but normal.

For example, I do not remember not having the Internet. We got it in our home when I was about 7 or 8 years old, and though I have a few memories prior to then (my earliest memory being the Flood of 93, when I was 6) I do not recall what it was like to not be able to log on to a computer.

Having spent this semester doing my Teaching Practicum, essentially a student teaching class, I can’t help but be struck by the fact that as of next year an entire generation of students will be taught by teachers who can’t remember life without cell phones or the Internet.

There is some sort of generational gap that exists between those of us who hadn’t even hit puberty when 9/11 happened, and those just a few years older, and I find it fascinating.

Why does such a gap exist, when there is only a few years age difference? Normally, a generational gap does not form so quickly, but the digital boom and the War on Terror occurring simultaneously seems to have developed an odd fissure for those born in the late 1980s and those born earlier.

The pace at which the world has changed in the last decade is exponentially greater than anything society has seen before. Usually it is just one new technology, or one new concept, but the past 20 years has seen an onslaught of developments.

Cloning, the mapping of the human genome and the large hadron collider all occurred so close together. How has, or how can, humanity cope with such radical transitions when historically we have only had minor adjustments made over long periods?

Science has progressed so much just in my short lifetime that it has literally blurred the line between itself and magic. And now people like myself will be responsible for preparing the next generation for what is to come.

But the scary part is, we have no idea what to prepare them for. What will the world be like in 2020? Nobody has any clue.

For instance, as a child in the late 1990s I often fantasized about being able to use the computer or play video games by just using my mind. Now there is actually a commercially available device that can do it with extreme accuracy called the Emotiv-EPOC.

Although the Emotiv-EPOC costs $300, if it goes the same way that laser mice, touch screens, and multi-touch tracpads have gone, it will be a standard feature in no time.

Were my parents to see me doing my homework with an Emotive-EPOC, it would probably scare them. (I’ll admit, it still creeps me out a little bit.)

None of this is typical. Technological change has always been slow, which is why having a slowly changing society was fine. But now that everyone is connected instantly, it is like the invention of the printing press all over again, except this time almost everyone is literate and has it in his or her pocket. (Or in this case, in their mind.)

The easier and faster we are able to communicate, the faster things get done; it only makes sense that on a larger scale the same would be true.

For those around my age and younger, this rapid improvement and constant connection is normal. To everyone else, it must be unnerving and irritating to always be outdated as soon as you get up-to-date.

Maybe we need to appreciate the advances that are being made on a daily basis, instead of focusing on how different it makes the world of tomorrow from the world of yesterday.

Muscatine native Matt Naber is a senior at the University of Iowa, double majoring in English and secondary education. Contact him at mega_matt87@hotmail.com