Future History

[e1618978]

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Rules of this Thread
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This is intended to be a brainstorming session on what the future holds. Please no name-calling, swear words, or emotional/non-factual replies. Feel free to discuss points raised by others, but no rants.

Post your ideas about how things will progress in the world over the next half century,

[Wrong Robot]

Personally, I highly expect to see some form of world changing apocalyptic like event within the next 30-50 years. By then I'll be old and I won't really care, but it sucks for my kids.

[e1618978]

[moved from another thread]

If I am looking at this from the point of view of an American president - who wants to maintain the American Lifestyle and the clout of American in the world.

- The price of oil is going to shoot up dramatically as we pass "peak oil".

http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/

- The power of the Saudis will increase as the price of oil goes up, because they will become richer, and as a result more funds will flow to terror groups.

- Poverty and death around the world will naturally increase as we start competing with them for farmland (we want the land for biofuel, they want it for food). The third world will be a very fertile ground for terrorist recruiting, because it takes people a long time to starve to death.

http://www.energybulletin.net/3288.html

I don't think that we can afford to let this happen. I think that the US is going to start invading any middle east country that does not pump enough oil, because keeping the oil price down will minimise the above effects.

We should also find some reason to declare war on Saudi Arabia, and confiscate the $1 Trillion that they have in our country as "terrorist funds" - if they have blackmailed us in the past (it was asserted in the other thead that Saudi Arabia threatened to pull its money out of the US to force the first gulf war, but I can't find that via Google), then we can't let them keep that leverage.

I think that 20 or 30 years from now, Hydrogen fusion will give us cheap energy, but it will not occur quickly enough.

[hardeeharhar]

You think a lot of things e. They are almost always wrong and based entirely on fantasy.

[hardeeharhar]

I know you do not realize that invading a country to tap its declining resources is completely useless if those same resources are needed to successfully acquire them. What is worse with your analysis is that if we find the need to invade a ME country to get its oil (by what right?) that oil flow will necessarily be cut off. Think about it this way. Our stores of fuel in this country will last roughly a year at current consumption levels. These levels of consumption will necessarily rise in the event of a war with the ME. At the same time, our access to other oil sources will be cut off. It has taken over a year to "secure" Iraq and its pipelines are still getting bombed. In other words, we would run out of oil before we can secure another supply. Idiotic idea.

[e1618978]

I do think alot - and my conclusions are only as good as my sources (which may or not be valid), but the links that I have supplied have convinced me that these things will happen.

If I get new information, or find out that my current information is wrong, I will of course change my view. The problems of fuel access should we go to war for oil is an interesting point, and I will mull it over.

I'm interested in hearing your prediction of how things will fall out. What do you think is going to happen over the next 50 years?

[e1618978]

Here is an alternate future:

In the next few years, carbon-nanotubes will grow long and strong enough to allow us to build a space elevator

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast07sep_1.htm

The first elevator will be very difficult to build, but once it is in place, successive elevators will be much easier, because the first one will be used to lift materials into orbit, and elevator factories will be built in orbit.

the equator of the earth will quickly become populated with elevators, eventually giving the earth a ring like Saturn.

The Equtorial nations will be under military and economic pressure, because they will be the most valuble places on earth, and they are currently backwards mudholes.

[hardeeharhar]

Ok. So. Argh!

There should be an expression that historians use, which is: Never put down on paper what you think will occur in events you have no control over.

In other words, I have no control other than over the immediate events of my life (and at most 24 hours of them) so I cannot play this game.

[e1618978]

And another one:

Global warming will raise the oceans 1 meter. Bangladesh, the Maldives and other low-lying areas will become uninhabitable. The northern nations (Canada, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Russia, etc) will get a lot of extra farmland and northern sea routes - so there will be a lot of pressure to allow the displaced millions to immegrate.

The northern nations, who in the past had the luxury of nearly homogonous populations, will experience racial tensions that they will find difficult to cope with.

[e1618978]

Originally posted by hardeeharhar
Ok. So. Argh!

There should be an expression that historians use, which is: Never put down on paper what you think will occur in events you have no control over.

In other words, I have no control other than over the immediate events of my life (and at most 24 hours of them) so I cannot play this game.

I started this thread because I like this kind of stuff, obviously. Most of the other threads frustrated me, because I don't see much point in talking about "what should happen" (based on moral or ethical code), or "what has happened" (in order to point fingers of blame) - I am more interested in "what is happening" and "what will happen", because I see them as being more useful.

[e1618978]

Another one:

One of the largest volcanos in the world in in the middle of the US, and it blows up every 600,000 years. Yellowstone park is 40,000 years overdue for a blow-up, and it will wipe out almost all of the "red states" when it does.

http://armageddononline.tripod.com/volcano.htm

New York city is also overdue for a large earthquake. which will send a rain of glass into the streets and kill half the population.

http://pbisotopes.ess.sunysb.edu/classes/oldclasses/GEO201 NYearthquake.htm

If these occur, America will probably become a third world country.

[e1618978]

Originally posted by Wrong Robot
Personally, I highly expect to see some form of world changing apocalyptic like event within the next 30-50 years. By then I'll be old and I won't really care, but it sucks for my kids.

Actually, to tell the truth, yours is probably the most likely (except technological change) - look at the last 200 years (1800 - 2000), the next 50 years will be about the same amount of technogical change.

[e1618978]

Medical science makes it possible to no longer age, through any number of means, the easiest of which is probably cloning your body and doing a head transplant.

There are rumors of body transplants being performed already, but they cannot attach the nerves (so you end up a parapaligic), and you have to take immune system supression drugs - a cloned body would be better, and the nerve connections are only a matter of time.

This would nessessarily be illegal, because of the effect on global population levels, so only the very rich could get the surgury performed

[e1618978]

Ice Age:

We are overdue for an ice age, and one could be triggered by a number of causes, including massive volcano eruptions (yellowstone), or global warming (fresh water in the arctic causes the gulf stream to stop flowing).

The reflectivity of the ice enhances the cooling effect, and we spray stuff on the ice to try and reverse the damage (tar from the oil sands in Alberta?)

[Gene Clean]

Start thinking less; you might get some ideas that are actually reasonable.

[Harald]

Nothing e said is unreasable!

Well, one thing: the assumption of US hegemony continuing unimpeded.

The oil crash is coming very soon. We have probably reached peak oil already; Shell hasn't replaced 100% of its oil for 3 years. (http://news.ft.com/cms/s/5db1c8c0-7652-11d9-8833-00000e2511c8.html).

So interesting that e's thinking is "We musn't let this happen," meaning "The American way of life must not be threatend" to the point where invading Saudi is something we should find a pretext to immediately.

[e1618978]

Originally posted by Gene Clean
Start thinking less; you might get some ideas that are actually reasonable.

Gene - so propose a future. What do you think will happen?

[Anders]

In short: The periode 1992-2000 will be seen as the heyday of our culture.

[e1618978]

Originally posted by Anders
In short: The periode 1992-2000 will be seen as the heyday of our culture.

Don't be short - its bad for your height.
Why will 1992-2000 be seen as the heyday? What will the future look like?

[Aurora]

Originally posted by Anders
In short: The periode 1992-2000 will be seen as the heyday of our culture. That was until the Politician's and Big Business Special Interest sold out America. Ross Perot warned what would happen. A huge sucking sound as all manufactors and corporations move overseas. Both Parties will be to blame for the distruction of the middle class and the removal of the manufactoring sector from N.America.

[e1618978]

Originally posted by Aurora
That was until the Politician's and Big Business Special Interest sold out America. Ross Perot warned what would happen. A huge sucking sound as all manufactors and corporations move overseas. Both Parties will be to blame for the distruction of the middle class and the removal of the manufactoring sector from N.America.

This thread is not about the past, it is about the future. Pretending to be in the future looking back at the past does not cut it.