Even if it is apparently gradual, the nature of technical progress in the digital age, they say, is exponential, as in the ancient (Persian) legend in which grains of rice placed on a chessboard must be doubled from one square to the next: the volume is almost negligible at first but in the second half of the board it becomes overwhelming.
Not to mention other pioneering areas of research like robotics, genomics and artificial intelligence, which may have incredible applications that were once unimaginable (save for people like Jules Verne or Isaac Asimov), with an extraordinary impact on productivity and in the ultimate analysis on our well-being.