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Aleks Krotoski explores the power of toys and play in shaping our technological future.

Apple's Tim Cook has said he began working on the smartwatch aged 5 after seeing the cartoon character Dick Tracy's wristwatch two way radio. So how much of our technological present has been prescribed by future visions of the past? Clearly many innovators imagination\\u2019s get fired up by childhood experiences but do they end up pursuing technologies that don\\u2019t actually solve the problems we\\u2019re facing? Or worse still, do they lock coming generations into futures where many key decisions have already been made and they\\u2019ll end up having to deal with them? Look at climate change.

Aleks explores these ideas with Steven Johnson author of Wonderland: How Play Made the Modern World, Jonathon Keats experimental philosopher and founder and curator of The Museum of Future History and Valentina Boretti; a researcher who has been looking at how toys were used to shape the children that would create China\\u2019s industrial miracle.

Producer: Peter McManus