The state of LD'ing a century from now? Probably exactly the same as it is right now.
Sure, we'll invent lots of cool machines, maybe more powerful drugs, and might even develop a machine that clearly records dreams (though I highly doubt that -- we don't dream in production-ready images, and translating meaningful images from the unique firings of millions of neurons is a currently unimaginable task), but ultimately lucid dreaming is an act of conscious will, and it will only be done by the people who care to do it. And, since in a hundred years -- not a long time in evolutionary terms -- the human mind will be pretty much the same as it has always been, so probably the same proportion of people will be interested in exploring their dreams as ever. Indeed, to echo Tradl3s, as technology occupies more and more of our time -- does more for us -- we might become less interested in things that we actually have to sit down and think about.
Pretty dismal, huh? Well, the upside is that
I could be wrong. There's been talk over the last few decades -- just talk, mind you -- about a coming
singularity, an evolutionary moment of mind that might occur when technology finally improves to a point where it can effect, even change, consciousness itself. Though we seem to be doing everything we can to avoid that moment, like focusing all this technology and computing power on video games, making money, the web, and entertainment, there is an excellent chance that we will manage to develop technology (mostly in the form of incredibly powerful computers, but also in genetics, materials applications, and nanotechnology) that will stimulate our consciousnesses toward rapid and dramatic growth in spite of the barriers we continually build. If we manage to form this singularity of mind, we will likely open doors to new adventures and complexities in thought that we can barely imagine today -- LD'ing will very likely be powerful tool for partaking of these adventures, and also understanding them. Indeed, this evolution of mind, this singularity, will be so powerful, complex, and mentally intimate, that LD'ing skills might be a vital tool not only for incorporating the potential changes/improvements to our minds, but for
coping with them. In other words, someone who possesses the discipline and skills necessary to regularly communicate with and exploit the resources of her unconscious will be at the crest of the wave of changes caused by the singularity, rather than on the ground in its path.
So, as with all predictions of the future, LD'ing has a couple of extremely different futures in store for it; one dull, one very exiting. I'm hoping for the latter, myself!
I could go on all day, but I won't -- I said too much already. So here's the
tl;dr: LD'ing will likely have the same position in society in a hundred years as it does today, and be just as hard to do, unless a sudden, dramatic evolution of mind occurs during that century. And if it does, then LD'ing will become quite popular, even necessary, and those who already know how to do it will be ahead of the game. So pick one, or just keep on LD'ing, secure in the knowledge that you are doing something that will either remain a unique hobby, or will become a necessary skill for mental success.
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