Dr. Michio Kaku

Last week, I had the opportunity to go see Dr. Michio Kaku speak for Rollins Collge’s Winter Park Institute speaker series. I was extremely hyped up on going, though I’m no scientist or physicist and only slightly familiar with him and his work. The lecture was titled “The Next 20 Years: How Science will Revolutionize Society and Our Lives”, which sounded like it was going to include some secret sort of knowledge that isn’t publicly known.

It wasn’t. Though Dr. Kaku is an extremely dynamic speaker, the information he was giving us almost sounded more like the r/science sub-Reddit on any given day. There were things that were new to me to hear him expand on briefly, but even then it was information that is already publicly known. It was an extremely disappointing lecture just based off the information provided. As a speaker, Dr. Kaku was charismatic, but even he seemed bored by the information he was sharing.

Sure, the idea that in 7 years from now, X, Y, and Z technologies will have progressed to a certain point is an interesting thing to think about. Was it something really that note worthy during a lecture from one of the top physicists in the world? No. 

The key points that I found most interesting and that I really wish he had expanded on further involved how scientists are using microbes to eliminate cancer cells, the growth of human organs, and robotics. Rather than focusing his lecture on anything other than computer chips and how they’re built into everything nowadays, his lecture was almost like an overview of a book written about the near future. It started with a very brief history lesson, but was rushed and didn’t go in depth on any of the topics regarding the digitization of education and medicine. For christ’s sake, he was reading off a [very poorly put together] PowerPoint!! For someone who was discussing the future of technology, he sure was using an outdated method of presentation.

I would have enjoyed his lecture much more had he talked about something that isn’t so easily found on the internet, or if it wasn’t such a broad topic that gave little way to focus. Dr. Kaku must have had a very different public speaking teacher than I, because if my high school or college public speaking teachers reviewed his speech before he gave it, I’m 98% sure they would have told him it lacked focus, and that he was trying to cover too much in too little of time.

I’m not sure if Rollins gave him a topic to speak on or any sort of limitations, or if it is part of an ongoing tour he is doing, but regardless, the talk was underwhelming coming from someone with such prestige. The talk lacked opinion and focus. Dr. Michio Kaku’s charismatic reputation was the only hype he lived up to, and even that was a disappointment. Maybe next time, Doctor.  

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