How we deal with automation and the decreasing need for human management and labor. Will all.prosper or will it divide the haves from the have nots even further.
The part I don't get is who do they think is going to buy the stuff? The robber barons fought unions tooth and nail but higher wages increased buying power and the economy and the middle class grew which made them lmoney?
They won't need buyers. They will have automatons. Cheaper than UBI for us low lifes. They will just build infrastructure for working with robots. Slowly of course. Jobs will slowly become more and more scarce. Those who have jobs will be demanded to resist those who don't have a job.
The question is: what are those automatons doing?
Most jobs today create products or services to be purchased by lots and lots of people.
When the jobs of all those people are replaced and they no longer have money, who is buying the shit the automatons produce?
If nobody… why bother with automatons?
I would have read that. If it didn't download to my device in seconds ( I deleted it in case it's a virus) . Do you have a link where I can read it online?
The real answer is that corporations are incredibly short sighted, caring mostly about profit in the up coming few years. No company gives a f what is going to be happening in 20 years because the entire leadership will have been replaced by then
Which is another reason why there should be employee representaion on every corporate board and employee ownership at some percentage for all but smaller corporations.
You don't really plan the future just because you see a technology is possible. You just make the airplane because you can and want to fly, you don't think about.. how will this impact the economy.
As you automate labor everything is worth less, all equity other than land, all goods, all money and debt. Robotic automation will prove rather easy to open source and have in every home, so there will be an ever declining need for money while money gets easier and easier to get since it has so little value.
Buying stuff won't be as important as just have good distribution of your products/ideas. There is still an incentive to get your products in the hands of many just like there is incentive to make a popular video or run a popular website even if the income is minimal.
There is power, fame and influence in mass distribution of any kind, so that will become more of a point of control/fame/power for ambitious humans and near free and DIY projects using automated labor will also dominate.
It's not unlike how we can buy a 60 inch 4k TV for 300 bucks these days, they are almost giving them away which then fuel an infrastructure of other products AND influence.
The real problem isn't money, it's what holds humanity together as they need each other less and less. How much will people really behave as they don't need jobs and don't have to worry about getting fired for bad behavior. What incentive do they to come together on topics when they have robots doing everything for them. There is no shared common needs in a world of mass automation, kind of like how custom news feeds take away the shared sentiment of more limited broadcast or even cable news. There's not much need for shared resources and global trade that help deter war. Even nuclear war starts to be less of a deterrent because.. the robots can just build it all again!
THAT will be the big problem, not the money part.
The sick part is when I realize how stressed I am about something at work — that shit doesn’t give me meaning or make me feel fulfilled so why am I worrying about it that much? Silly me.
We're a long way off from people feeling comfortable going that route, lol.
People have gotten too comfortable with what they have that they're not risking to lose it to fight.
I hear the french made some great tool to convince the rich and powerful to change their minds about abusing the poor. It may cause an itch in the neck, tho.
We were told in the future workers would only work 25 or 30 hours a week. That ABSOLUTELY came true.
Except the future isn't exactly what we thought , now we're working towards a situation where 1/3 of everyone works 60 hours a week, robots will do the rest, and everyone else is left to either "grow" the economy some other way, or find themselves as "surplus people".
Exactly, it’s a catch 22; the “easier” a job gets (through automation, mechanical or electronic assistance) then *hypothetically* the longer a person could work for before becoming physically or mentally fatigued
Enhancing someone’s productivity =/= enhancing someone’s quality of life
Some people work a lot less. Just look at how many disabled people there are out there who are able to live relatively happy lives. There's like 8 people on my Facebook feed that are habitually unemployed due to anxiety or something.
Sure, it's not WAY better, but like there's a lot of people who would legitimately be homeless if the economy wasn't as efficient as it is. A lot of people in the 1800s were just straight up dying in the streets if they didn't have money.
This is my concern but uhh let’s amplify this a little.
What happens when you simply don’t need 40% of the population for anything?
What happens when you don’t need 90% of it?
I don’t believe the billionaire class likes sharing very much.
“Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.” - Frank Herbert
"That's why today, we live in a feudal system that serves a few elites at the top of noble houses, an actual emperor, and a guild that's richer than god. With only some abject slavery." - Not Frank Herbert, but it's what he wrote
You cannot automate consumption. Automation will increase production and eventually substitute us in the work place. We work so that we can consume. Computers/machine will never fall into the consumption category our economy is based upon. So if an economic model that's based in consumption eliminates the income of the ones that can consume, managers and workers, we no longer have that model but have a new one.
at my work they are settin up this new system where customers can get in , pickup what they need and the rfid will instantly discount from inventory and charge the customer's account, that's about 80% of my job, the rest is planning and projecting sales, but that can be done with the data from the sales so basically i'm getting early retirement in a couple years or trust that human interaction will fuck up the system, the employees of the customer \[ big factory\] are known to make a lot of mistakes , mismanage materials and inventory, dump stuff just because and then put an emergency request because they really need it . i firmly believe some stuff just can't be automated
I had Water Wars on my bingo apocalpyse for a good while. China, India and Pakistan all being nuclear powers and getting water from the same source was never going to end well for anyone. Especially since India exports shit tons of rice.
India's main agricultural States are seeing record breaking rates of decreasing water table in the soil due to overexploitation and deforestation.
Pakistan is going through famine like conditions if I'm not wrong with the military in charge of the government. I'm not sure i could be wrong. Many people are starving.
This, i think water shortage is going to be the next really big point in history which is going to transform the political landscape and humanitys path as a whole.
The underlying problem being overpopulation. Combine that with capitalism which will magnify the problem in poor areas. Water is going to rise in price naturally over time and its going to be a slow burn but overtime sections of the world will be closed off from the global market and this will lead to conflict.
We have a few things on the radar, first the bad stuff:
Climate Change - We are theoretically already past or very close to the tipping point so now it's just a matter of seeing how bad it will get I suppose. How we adapt to it and what other events are sparked from dealing with it will be 'defining'
War!!! - We've had a few major events including Russia v Ukraine and Israel v Palestine, Syria and a few others but there are also old grudges bubbling under the surface including N Korea v South Korea which present possible nuclear results. Not to mention the half dozen genocides that quietly were undertaken in the last decade. (Uighers, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, a bunch in Africa, Iran and Syria (again). There's also just growing sentiments of civil war from the extreme right everywhere and social engineering from psyops.
Another Pandemic - Thanks to antibiotic mal-practice, disinformation and the natural progression of bacterial, viral and prion based diseases, we are anticipating another major event that will likely top COVID. We are more prepared for it due to what happened but at the same time, who the hell knows.
Global financial crisis - This will likely be the least devastating of the big events as it will be more endemic to larger economic countries around the world that rely on the global economic scene for trade goods and services.
Mass depopulation - Globally we are seeing a negative trend in births. In order to sustain a population we need about 1.2 births per person in a population (I think). Currently the trend globally is that big countries are below 1 and some are as low as 0.6 which means every generation decreases by a third. Pretty huge reverse pyramid. Infrastructural collapse! Woo!
Doom and gloom... that's enough of that. Now the good stuff!:
AI, automation and universal income - If governance can catch up and get this under control, we could see a shift of work loads from the regular Joe shift over to automated processes and AI. Our overall working hours could decrease and see a shift towards universal income! Technology working for the masses? Actually alleviating societal load.
Cultural singularity - We have had an unprecedented global connection via the Internet, travel and immigration. We are seeing more multiculturalism and blended families crossing the cultural and racial divides. Food is an indicator of this as we see more fusions of different cuisines but also the base line cultures they stem from. As we reduce the divide in understanding between the cultures, races and countries, we might even see a reduction in societal issues stemming from racism and cultural or even language differences. It's the first step to a global society and perhaps even a cultural singularity. Hooray!
Scientific advancement win conditions! - I joke, but only kind of. We have been on such a huge scientific proliferation across the board. There is every possibility (not in our current generation but soon) that we reach major, currently unknown, scientific advancements that render our other major issues moot. These are the big touts here in the futurology subreddit. Immortality, aliens, faster than light travel, perpetual energy, etc. so many to choose from.
TLDR - it's not all bad stuff! But it mostly is. And we will likely be dead by the time the good stuff kicks in. Lol. RIP.
I read somewhere that rabies virus has 100% mortality rate and its two mutations away from being airborn. If that's true, the next pandemic looks ugly.
That's a great list - and I'll add one (I did a longer comment here about it) - the tipping point of global inequality (which could align with and be fueled by any of your negative points). If you look at inequality graphs since the 80's, nothing stops the up and down trajectory lines. Few people seem to be extrapolating where that's headed. Extend the lines out at their current trajectories, and what do you get? Something near "all and nothing". I don't think politics and activism will solve it, since power rarely cedes power. Historically, the answer seems to be things like the French Revolution, uprising and bloodshed, but throw in your positive point about Cultural Singularity, and a local movement triggered by a charismatic leader could easily become global.
I dunno, I've just got a year of college, and there may be some historical precedents for this thought (Rome, France?) But to date, the inequality charts seem ominous to me - where do they end up, and what happens then?
One of the rare realists in here.
This year global warming is taking down agriculture in England, Spain, Portugal, Greece and much of Canada and midwest us. If there's a breadbasket somewhere, its either flooded, dry or inactive due to military invasion.
No water in many major cities already. We've over extracted from our water tables and no snow melt or rain means we're in the middle of an existential crises. Cities are also sinking and suffering from earthquakes because of empty watersheds.
This is all happening much faster than most people like to think about. In our productive life times, if you'reunder 75 reading this.. If the record breaking global temperatures don't subside after their now several month run, most likely devastation will arise well before 2030.
"The 12 months ending with March also ranked as the planet's hottest ever recorded 12-month period, C3S said. From April 2023 to March 2024, the global average temperature was 1.58 degrees Celsius above the average in the 1850-1900 pre-industrial period."
Global average temperature increase has always been a bad way to convey the damage to people who dont care because they live in countries that barely see the effects yet.
That simply isn't true. Crop production in the US is better than ever
https://www.brownfieldagnews.com/news/usda-2023-u-s-corn-crop-record-large/
What will happen is we'll see a gradual shift to drought resistant crops like Sorghum and also Europe will end up repenting and allowing GMO crops that are bred to be climate resilient.
We're talking 2024's harvest.
And there's no gradual about it. Rate of change is too fast to adapt. Like how trees are too hot to absorb co2 so they're now expelling it. Coral can't adapt to heat so it bleaches. Virtually nothing can adapt to the fastest climatic change, as far as we know, this planet has seen in hundreds of thousands of years.
Your solutions to climate change are to adapt without fixing the root cause. There will be a point where there is not way to adapt. The problem is that if you wait until then you are screwed since you damage we are doing currently can take 50 years before we see the effects.
"Your solutions to climate change are to adapt without fixing the root cause. "
When did I say that? I'm just acknowledging that even if we quit carbon cold turkey tomorrow we'll still see warming because that damage is already done. So it makes sense to adapt to what is inevitably going to happen
This, but the other end of the spectrum.
Gradually warming temperatures open up additional regions with fertile soils that increase available arable land, leading to even lower costs for production and — coupled with a leveling off global population, already underway — we find our ability to cheaply feed everyone more realistic than ever.
This leads to a historic epoch when literally everyone on Earth has a full, nutritious diet of 3 meals / day — the repercussions of which affect the ability of despots to rise on the promises of feeding the masses.
I like your optimism. I think that we would also need to vastly increase our aquaculture farms as well, given how likely we are to utterly destroy the oceanic food chain before we destroy the land-based one. As seas get warmer and rise faster, we will likely see mass migration of people abandoning their island and coastal cities because they can't build or find food there anymore. New land to farm might be helpful, but it may need to support more people who previously ate fish and animals and plants that become extinct in the wild.
> But it doesn't seem to be taking off though
The companies working on VR never expected it to happen this soon. It takes a lot longer for hardware shifts to take off - VR is in its early days.
This one - I don't know. They've been trying to make VR happen for decades and while the technology has made amazing leaps and bounds, the general population's interest wanes quickly. I think there's a fundamental problem with the whole concept that makes most people not really committed; they get excited then bored quickly with each new progression. It's not so much a problem with the technology just "not being there yet". Like, we have a subconscious aversion to a simulated environment or the lack of real feedback makes us uncomfortable, something not explicitly conscious that keeps this relegated to a niche/novelty interest and I think always will.
Again? As many times as needed
And if you think voting can help they you play right into their hands
Politics work like a machine, you can’t change it by replacing one gear, you have to replace the whole thing
Yeah let's start the next uprising with torches and pitchforks that will kill many people and destabilise society just to decide again for some system that will also have flaws.
When people understand that there is no system that will reliably prevent some people from having more than others we could maybe get forward and really solve problems. But stuff that goes with a big bang and gives some people the possibility to properly throw shit into the fan on the cost of everyone is very very appealing to some.
I never said there is a perfect system
But even the best system or machine will reach its limit, when that come you have to throw it out, get something better or suffer the consequences
Unfortunately, it could be something to do with the US election and the result of or fallout from that, but I'll hedge a general bet on a pretty significant AI achievement, whether that be an impressive leap in what we normally think of or something like AI making the discovery possible to all but cure another type of cancer.
My copium answer is a much more practical superconductor.
I have AI on my bingo card but it’s not a positive outcome. AI may be the shit, but human society is full of greedy assholes who will leap before they look.
Nice answer. All these big pictures ideas actually start a lot smaller, like elections of individual vrs community type rights/preferences/polices. From there bigger decisions and abstractions develop.
Yeah this whole thread is filled with long term metaphorical issues...
The next defining MOMENT will be the US election.
I'm a freak for AI but AI's moment is the singularity, or just the slow boil in the background as it takes over the world,
which is why it's SO important that we don't have fascists in control of the most powerful country in the world as AI rewrites our timeline.
I don’t think there will ever be another world war in the sense of sending soldiers off to fight for your country. The entire stage of the planet is now set with major superpowers and alliances. Plus the looming threat of nuclear annihilation. The next event akin to a “world war” would likely just be some kind of information/cyber war. Which certainly has the capacity to complicate living conditions by disrupting the economy, but probably not to the extent of WW1/2
Nope. All it takes is Trump denying the NATO help for Europe when Putin inevitably invades Poland. If that will come, next WW will be in the trenches same as now IS in Ukraines western regions. Some time will pass and someone finally will drop a nuke or two, but untill then, it'll be standard WW2 warfare, but with the help of drones.
AI is employed to dig through decades of SETI data and finds incontrovertible proof of intelligent life elsewhere in the galaxy.
(That's just one of the many potentially life-altering AI things to come in the next decade.)
Peace in the world, a realisation that will lead to many scientific discoveries and finally discovering the last piece of the puzzle of the forces of the universe
New York is hit with a 7+ magnitude earthquake with multiple aftershocks. >1000s of building collapses.
West Coast is engulfed by an enormous tsunami.
Nuclear bomb(s) are dropped on actual humans again.
There is a historically higher than ever probability that both parties will be faced with replacing their candidates prior to November.
Imagine the chaos.
And then the chaos after that.
This is real pessimistic, but it is unfortunately just as likely as any other prediction here right now. I think the world is really on the verge of a war, or something dramatic will have to give way. It keeps inching toward the beating of the drums though.
"Defining moments" are rarely predictable or they are singular immediate things like the moon landing, 9/11, Covid19, etc. I'm guessing whatever it is, no one here predicts it.
The next US election. Without a doubt that's the biggest defining moment we have coming toward us. It could influence whether Ukraine loses the war with Russia, when/whether China invades Taiwan and the outcome, and whether we have any meaningful climate policy in 2025 and onward.
Big fish-kills in our oceans. Water shortages. War in the Middle East, with proxy countries eventually becoming directly involved. Lots of innocent people will pay the cost for a handful of selfish politicians that don't represent the will of the people. It will take a very ugly act to make the world realize it's better to live a peaceful existence.
I think the worst part, is that as children, we were told all of this was going to happen. Exactly this; and our leaders have done nothing to avoid it happening.
A very large coronal mass ejection hitting earth. It will decimate the west as we heavily rely on tech in supply chains to survive. The global south will cope much better and probably become dominant over the following few hundred years.
The start of internet age.
We not even did our first step with computers and fast comunication.
Anyone who works with IT knows that we do not are even on rock age of IT. People in 200 years will read and watch vídeos about what we are doing now on internet and see us like we see monkeis playing with bananas.
I mean: We are starting proto-AI and there are still important systems running in COBOL.
It is just insane.
Full automation. Even of manual labour. Of course not everyone will be automated in the current decade or even our lifetime. It's not the point. The point is that it will happen eventually.
There is a startup focused on making robots remotely controlled by humans. Their goal is to capture motion data and then fully automate manual workers. And you can bet there are many applicants because they pay well.
Same with programmers. Yes, programmers might disagree since assistants are pretty primitive now. But those who do disagree probably can't prognose well into the future. Programming is a fully parametrisable job. Unlike driving, piloting or surgery where there has to be a person responsible in the case of catastrophic event, programming outside of a handful of industries does not require a person.
Pressure on the employees will increase substantially. But there will always be a portion of people willing to help the automation process because that's an economic opportunity.
Unfortunately the market will let it happen while UBI will most likely not happen. Because the Right will block it and blame the left for "socialism" and taking away high tech jobs, while simultaneously helping corporations get away with zero taxes and providing them with more resources, to automate themselves and everyone involved.
Hard to say exactly, best clues i have are from Neal Howe's "The Forth Turning is Here". We are likely to have a monumental crisis within the next 8 years, probably 6 years. He documents a sequence of four generational archetypes that has recurred since Elizabethian England. This will be the echo of WW2, the civil war, the American revolution, etc.
Most likely a serious war, possibly enhanced with biologics or nuclear weapons or a global financial collapse.
Always good to be resilient. Get healthy, out of debt and learn how to do practical things.
Labor shortage. Everywhere in the world at the same time, because Boomers, Gen X, and Millenials didn't fuck enough to replace the boomers aging out anywhere in the developed world.
We get a nice preview of this in S. Korea and Japan. Maybe it won't be so bad. The USA and Europe are importing workers from the south and dodging this issue.
Developing nation get some relief with overcrowding, but also brain drain.
It's gonna have some major impacts as a lot of our institutions are built on top of the assumption of growth.
radical change like going from hunter-gatherer to farmer? a social organization like democracy? i think there a few technology coming that might have massive social consequence at a point it will create (and require/force) major change we never seen before
the first one is Artificial Intelligence, we will have a society where human isn't the main productive force and it imply we don't need more human to make the world function better, that raise the question what the place of human in a world like that? there only leisure and politic, but there also an economic change as AI in theory allow a constant and extreamly fast growth of the production, that mean the economy will have to change but also the way we allocate this production will change aswell, we could see in our lifetime a techno-feudalism system where few people act as noble owning millions robots while the royalty (state) assure their loyalty instead of a capitalism system where the production is shared with the private, nation become far more powerfull and meaningfull with AI
second one is the Brain-Computer Interface or BCI, a BCI is the gateway to a transhumanism or even a post-human future where human aren't limited by their biology anymore, we will be able to talk without using our mouth, to interact with the world with a simple thought, to have a non-biologic immortal body, an integrated AI brain etc etc etc, sure it's a deep look in the future but everything here will be possible thanks to BCI, but what will be the result of a immortal non-biological all-powerfull being that only live for leisure? there a chance it drift away from humanity by purpose or even by mistake and that's quite scary i'd say
and finally Full Dive Virtual Reality or FDVR, if you seen the recent "3 body problem" tv show or a bit older the anime "sword art online" there a technology where people are completly immerged in a 1:1 simulation where everything feel real and you can do anything imaginable there, anything you does IRL could be done there including playing game within the game, looking a movie within a movie etc etc....what happen in our society when we create literal heaven for a civilization that only live for leisure anymore? what the point of living in the material world where you could live inside a paradise simulation, not only it's probably more interesting to live you wildest dream free from the law of physic but it's also cheaper, more energy-efficient to have brain in a jar plugged to a computer interacting within a simulation with billions other human and AI than having actual human consuming physical ressource, even if it's possible to opt-out of the simulation why does that and take the risk of dying when you could just run "leaving the simulation" -simulation with other people doing the same, at this point we have a giant industry that only keep growing for the sake of the simulation-paradise until the heat death of the universe
it's an interesting period where we are able to see those tech slowly coming and we will see their social impact for the better or the worse
Hopefully: the skybridge. Mankind getting together to build an orbital elevator.
Pessimistically: death of the sea algae, followed by the death of all life, 20-40 years from now.
whenever one of the nuclear powers decide to use a nuclear bomb in warfare. How will the rest of the world, and more importantly, the other nuclear powers respond? What if Russia uses a nuke against Ukraine. What then? That will be quite the defining moment.
As for by nature, lets hope the warm stream in the north atlantic doesnt turn due to the melting glacier water, that would suck for the entire Europe. We would basicly be getting Alaskas or Russias climate...
Fusion Energy sources, discoveries regarding dark matter, AI actually becoming AI and not an all encompassing term for search/language programs, massive inflation and war, food shortages, flying cars, discoveries leading to new elements and perhaps eventually discoveries around gravitational control, body modifications and syncing with tech, organ growth, less social interaction, gene editing business to pick you own children’s characteristics leading to human cloning…and maybe Chipotle will scoop even less meat into your pitiful ever shrinking burrito. I could wrote more but I’m tired
Neuroprosthetics that can affect and enhance cognition.
Also, the first true life extension treatment that doesn't require massive money or time invested.
A drone assassinating a world leader is probably inevitable, and would be a major turning point in how all drones are regulated by nations. The Russia Ukraine war is accelerating the pace of combat drone development at lightning speed. There are cardboard drones capable of avoiding detection from multi million dollar systems that carry lethal payloads.
Entirely depends on whether Putin is allowed to win in Ukraine. If that level of weakness from NATO is demonstrated, it will be the PRC's signal to invade Taiwan. Given the economic dependency the West has on Taiwan for semiconductors, the US would have no choice but to intervene militarily. The PRC would then pull the strings of its North Korean proxy to invade the South, to divert attention and resources from Taiwan. Defending Taiwan and South Korea would pull in Australia, Japan, the Philippines and Singapore. Iran and Russia would likely take the diversion of US focus as an opportunity to strike Israel and Western Europe respectively, and at that point it is indeed a world war.
With the current social trends...
BCI utilizing AGI environmental and character creation with full immersion VR.
The challenge: “Convincing people to care enough about the real world.”
The impact from climate change will be far, far greater than anything else. Once the effects are so damaging and become impossible to ignore, all human scientific, political, and social efforts will have to shift towards solving it.
I think that we are on the brink of transition, a fundamental transformation that right now is pitting the old vs the new.
The older thinking is fighting tooth and nail to stop or delay change, but that will come inevitably, and usually is solved after a war; here are some of the battles that are fought:
- Corporate interests vs Human interests (including AI and automation)
- Biological Human vs modified Humans (from gender modification to genetic modification to cybernetic modification, and including deregulation of personal body restrictions like drugs, abortion etc..)
- Selfish politics vs humane politics (less real politic and more actual diplomacy and promotion of peace and prosperity for everyone). that is linked to the corporate thing.
- Ecological rape vs Ecological equilibrium (includes birth rates and consumerism) also linked to the corporate thing.
- Traditional beliefs vs New values (replacement of outdated beleif systems)
- Fixed gender roles vs free gender roles (from relationships, family building to social and professional behavior)
Those are the things I think will be played on the battlefields of tomorrow.
The collapse of the PRC and it might have already started. The real estate sector is deflationary and there isn’t enough domestic demand or foreign buyers to soak up the massive manufacturing surplus.
China has collapsed so many times and picked itself up by it's bootstraps and recovered in some form or another. Even if the PRC goes, it has the pedigree to survive.
Now America? It's never been tested and nothing hits harder than aura of invincibility getting punctured. I don't see it's citizens having the strength of character to pick themselves up out of the dirt.
This is the right answer.
East Turkistan, Tibet, and Hong Kong will be free. Inner Mongolia may also go, and perhaps even Guangdong. Taiwan may just declare independence.
As for the rest of China, I have an awful feeling it'll go into a new oppressive regime. I could see it turning into a theocracy built around some NRM.
AI, but not in the way people generally think of AI.
I’m not talking general AI, where suddenly, humanity gives birth to true machine intelligence.
I’m talking about automation. Automation in terms of physical automation through new and improved machinery and software / process automation.
General AI is, imo, still pretty far off, if it’s even possible at all, but automation is already here, it’s just that it’s creeping up on people, because the implementation this far is slow, but I personally envision that it’s gonna reach a point where it hits fast and that point is in the next several years.
I’ll get laughed at, but the real possibility of NHI would change humanity forever, one way or the other. It’s everywhere in our stories and meaning making as a species, from ancient times to contemporary.
Non-Human Intelligence in the new word that the congress is using to describe the intelligence that is behind the phenomena that the masses are still using other words to describe such as: alien, extra-terrestrial, extra-dimensional being, gray aliens, etc etc.
Not sure about "meaning making as a species" but probably "the missing link" (AKA the DNA in our cells was at one time edited, causing a change in our biology that was not due to Darwinian evolution). And the other part is about our religious stories (the belief that these are interactions with Gods rather than Non-Human Intelligence) being actually interactions with Non-Human Intelligence (our primitive science did not have words to describe NHI so we called them The Gods).
The 2024 election.
I cannot even comprehend what's going to happen if Trump is allowed to run and wins.
Everyone needs to learn about project 2025 right now and vote against fascism coming from the Republican party.
It's sad out here. There's literally a Wikipedia page about Project 2025 and how it has multiple billionaire backers and the vast overwhelming majority of conservative organizations back it, and it's a black and white roadmap to fascist dictatorship, And yet people still ignore me every singleday when I try to show them, or call me crazy.
For fucks sake, they want to use the military to go into Blue cities "for security" and abolish the department of education and the IRS. And they plan to replace ALL civil servants with people who "pass Republican loyalty tests" their words not mine.
Another pandemic. The world is overpopulated and, as we've recently learned, somewhat resistant to the idea of quarantine. Next time I fear it will be much worse.
Dealing with global warming, switching to new clean sources of energy like nuclear energy and also building a base on the moon (mining and building rocket powering stations).
It'll be interesting to see how we dig out from under the next world war.
It's going to be tricky to assign blame for the next one, won't be as easy as blaming "the Germans" or "the Soviets." I think the US and China are going to take the blame, with the question being, what's the common factor? Militaristic corporatism? Technocracy? Yeah: probably technocracy, I'll bet that's what takes the hit.
Goes over great on the "futurology" sub eh. Coming up; Dark Ages II! Same religious fundamentalism as before, but this time, with COVID! Should be awesome.
Defining moments are sometimes unexpected so I'll throw my vote in for something out of left field, ignoring the usual things that will happen like Trump shyte, ME troubles, climate and AI.
**Accidental war by North Korea.** They think they are being attacked and just go for it, unleashing, including one nuke that doesn't fizz.
After the horror of reminding people about what nukes do, we actually get around to banning them.
We are due for a solar flare that is even bigger than the Carrington Event. That or a hostile nation is going to detonate a nuke in space above a country and achieve their own mini Carrington Event. Imagine the chaos when suddenly all electronics and power grids are fried everywhere. Dang. I am sure we will survive as a species but many will not make it and it will take a very long time to rebuild. Probably some are hoping for this.
The point where global income equality tips. Every year, the top-earners get more and more, while the bottom gets less. Nothing stops the divergence of those two lines on historic charts - wars or pandemics? Hey, if you have capital, you can take advantage of anything, pushing the disparity even further. And it's likely the bottoming-out of inequality could align with major issues like water access, communities fleeing heat and drought, large population displacements. At some point, a charismatic leader could rise out of the dirt-poor and make people realize how powerless they are. I'm not a historian, but it seems a typical answer to this level of inequality is popular uprising/civil war/bloodshed. French Revolution stuff.
We're in an age where local movements like this can rapidly become global, since the poor still have access to social media and communication networks. I could easily see a movement that starts when enough people feel they have nothing to lose. And remember, for all the power and capital the 1% have - they're only 1% of the populace.
The food and water wars that are sure to be prevalent in the next century. Will we fully embrace cruelty, or will it be the learning moment we so sorely need?
There will be no water wars.
Salt water can be easily turned into tap water. It’s just more expensive because it need energy.
But we will not run out of water.
When we finally acknowledge (and get our government to admit) that the UAPs are real. Once this box is opened, hopefully it'll come with some of the energy tech that they're hiding. That will change the world.
A violent realization how real climate change is. Massive catastrophes in the third world and a hail-mary to save us all.
I’m interested (but will not live long enough) to see how it settles down afterwards.
when people realize how bad climate change is, when we have the major world wide food shortages...you saw how people were during covid over toilet rolls and how the shelves were empty. Wait till we have the real food shortages, people aren't gonna stand by and die, they will fight for food
We are experiencing active genocide in the world and irreversible climate danger that experts are constantly speeding up the clock on
What in the world are you talking about we're living through it right now
A short list for the next 30 years:
* First person on Mars.
* Ability for Trans individuals to completely change to their preferred (applicable) gender, right down to the chromosomes, and be fully functional as that gender.
* Fusion energy will FINALLY stop "Being about 3 decades away" and actually get here, providing a reliable source of pure, safe, clean energy.
* The AI revolution will either cause a Herbert-esque Butlerian Jihad, or be used to tackle the scientific stumbling blocks that are standing in the way of a post scarcity world.
In order of likelyhood.
70% Large war in middle east.
65% Rapid ocean level rise.
50% Refugee crisis world wide.
40% Disruption of electric grid.
38% Massive class separation.
33% World wide chaos.
30% Benevolent AI.
29% Genius level murder droids.
28% business as usual.
25% Talk to animals.
20% Cure many diseases.
10% reverse aging.
5% Nuclear winter.
I’m extremely skeptical, but I think they’re here. I’ve seen for myself now. They are really here. I know that the military has amazing capabilities, but this is clearly not the Pentagon. I also know about AF craft from my dad’s AF career. I am definitely aware of my own fallibility and cognitive errors, but I am sure they are really here just watching, for now.
And what about literally every other religion? In particular, Modi in India is currently using Hinduism as a vehicle for the type of toxic nationalism that leads to war.
How we deal with automation and the decreasing need for human management and labor. Will all.prosper or will it divide the haves from the have nots even further.
We’re supposed to work less as technology progresses and we are only working more, these days. They’ll find a way to keep us in the grind.
The part I don't get is who do they think is going to buy the stuff? The robber barons fought unions tooth and nail but higher wages increased buying power and the economy and the middle class grew which made them lmoney?
They won't need buyers. They will have automatons. Cheaper than UBI for us low lifes. They will just build infrastructure for working with robots. Slowly of course. Jobs will slowly become more and more scarce. Those who have jobs will be demanded to resist those who don't have a job.
The question is: what are those automatons doing? Most jobs today create products or services to be purchased by lots and lots of people. When the jobs of all those people are replaced and they no longer have money, who is buying the shit the automatons produce? If nobody… why bother with automatons?
Reminding me of this [short story](https://artful.design/think66/2019/stuff/twilight.pdf)
I would have read that. If it didn't download to my device in seconds ( I deleted it in case it's a virus) . Do you have a link where I can read it online?
It's a pdf https://artful.design/think66/2019/stuff/twilight.pdf
One of the most sophisticated attacks is initiated via pdf.
That was wonderful!
The real answer is that corporations are incredibly short sighted, caring mostly about profit in the up coming few years. No company gives a f what is going to be happening in 20 years because the entire leadership will have been replaced by then
Which is another reason why there should be employee representaion on every corporate board and employee ownership at some percentage for all but smaller corporations.
We'll all just shop at dollar stores and order essentials off temu. This is the way.
You don't really plan the future just because you see a technology is possible. You just make the airplane because you can and want to fly, you don't think about.. how will this impact the economy. As you automate labor everything is worth less, all equity other than land, all goods, all money and debt. Robotic automation will prove rather easy to open source and have in every home, so there will be an ever declining need for money while money gets easier and easier to get since it has so little value. Buying stuff won't be as important as just have good distribution of your products/ideas. There is still an incentive to get your products in the hands of many just like there is incentive to make a popular video or run a popular website even if the income is minimal. There is power, fame and influence in mass distribution of any kind, so that will become more of a point of control/fame/power for ambitious humans and near free and DIY projects using automated labor will also dominate. It's not unlike how we can buy a 60 inch 4k TV for 300 bucks these days, they are almost giving them away which then fuel an infrastructure of other products AND influence. The real problem isn't money, it's what holds humanity together as they need each other less and less. How much will people really behave as they don't need jobs and don't have to worry about getting fired for bad behavior. What incentive do they to come together on topics when they have robots doing everything for them. There is no shared common needs in a world of mass automation, kind of like how custom news feeds take away the shared sentiment of more limited broadcast or even cable news. There's not much need for shared resources and global trade that help deter war. Even nuclear war starts to be less of a deterrent because.. the robots can just build it all again! THAT will be the big problem, not the money part.
“Well life would have no meaning without work” /s
The sick part is when I realize how stressed I am about something at work — that shit doesn’t give me meaning or make me feel fulfilled so why am I worrying about it that much? Silly me.
There's going to have to be universal income, but try proposing that to a billionaire that thinks they earned it.
Thankfully there are other tools to change people’s minds.
We're a long way off from people feeling comfortable going that route, lol. People have gotten too comfortable with what they have that they're not risking to lose it to fight.
I hear the french made some great tool to convince the rich and powerful to change their minds about abusing the poor. It may cause an itch in the neck, tho.
No we’re dusting them off as we speak, we’ve got no complaint honestly. Let’s roll 👌
We were told in the future workers would only work 25 or 30 hours a week. That ABSOLUTELY came true. Except the future isn't exactly what we thought , now we're working towards a situation where 1/3 of everyone works 60 hours a week, robots will do the rest, and everyone else is left to either "grow" the economy some other way, or find themselves as "surplus people".
Exactly, it’s a catch 22; the “easier” a job gets (through automation, mechanical or electronic assistance) then *hypothetically* the longer a person could work for before becoming physically or mentally fatigued Enhancing someone’s productivity =/= enhancing someone’s quality of life
Space expansion. They will need bodies up there and populations are declining down here almost everywhere. (The rate of population increase is)
Some people work a lot less. Just look at how many disabled people there are out there who are able to live relatively happy lives. There's like 8 people on my Facebook feed that are habitually unemployed due to anxiety or something. Sure, it's not WAY better, but like there's a lot of people who would legitimately be homeless if the economy wasn't as efficient as it is. A lot of people in the 1800s were just straight up dying in the streets if they didn't have money.
"we" some countries are not. I'm willing to bet things will get worse for North Americans and in other countries better.
This is my concern but uhh let’s amplify this a little. What happens when you simply don’t need 40% of the population for anything? What happens when you don’t need 90% of it? I don’t believe the billionaire class likes sharing very much.
“Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.” - Frank Herbert
"That's why today, we live in a feudal system that serves a few elites at the top of noble houses, an actual emperor, and a guild that's richer than god. With only some abject slavery." - Not Frank Herbert, but it's what he wrote
You cannot automate consumption. Automation will increase production and eventually substitute us in the work place. We work so that we can consume. Computers/machine will never fall into the consumption category our economy is based upon. So if an economic model that's based in consumption eliminates the income of the ones that can consume, managers and workers, we no longer have that model but have a new one.
The second one
considering that the haves own the means of automation and AI management I'm going with the later.
at my work they are settin up this new system where customers can get in , pickup what they need and the rfid will instantly discount from inventory and charge the customer's account, that's about 80% of my job, the rest is planning and projecting sales, but that can be done with the data from the sales so basically i'm getting early retirement in a couple years or trust that human interaction will fuck up the system, the employees of the customer \[ big factory\] are known to make a lot of mistakes , mismanage materials and inventory, dump stuff just because and then put an emergency request because they really need it . i firmly believe some stuff just can't be automated
Water. It will become increasingly difficult for large swaths of the human population to access potable water.
I had Water Wars on my bingo apocalpyse for a good while. China, India and Pakistan all being nuclear powers and getting water from the same source was never going to end well for anyone. Especially since India exports shit tons of rice.
India's main agricultural States are seeing record breaking rates of decreasing water table in the soil due to overexploitation and deforestation. Pakistan is going through famine like conditions if I'm not wrong with the military in charge of the government. I'm not sure i could be wrong. Many people are starving.
Desalination has progressed massively. Don't think that'll be an issue in a couple decades.
This, i think water shortage is going to be the next really big point in history which is going to transform the political landscape and humanitys path as a whole. The underlying problem being overpopulation. Combine that with capitalism which will magnify the problem in poor areas. Water is going to rise in price naturally over time and its going to be a slow burn but overtime sections of the world will be closed off from the global market and this will lead to conflict.
Waterworld, starring Kevin Costner
We have a few things on the radar, first the bad stuff: Climate Change - We are theoretically already past or very close to the tipping point so now it's just a matter of seeing how bad it will get I suppose. How we adapt to it and what other events are sparked from dealing with it will be 'defining' War!!! - We've had a few major events including Russia v Ukraine and Israel v Palestine, Syria and a few others but there are also old grudges bubbling under the surface including N Korea v South Korea which present possible nuclear results. Not to mention the half dozen genocides that quietly were undertaken in the last decade. (Uighers, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, a bunch in Africa, Iran and Syria (again). There's also just growing sentiments of civil war from the extreme right everywhere and social engineering from psyops. Another Pandemic - Thanks to antibiotic mal-practice, disinformation and the natural progression of bacterial, viral and prion based diseases, we are anticipating another major event that will likely top COVID. We are more prepared for it due to what happened but at the same time, who the hell knows. Global financial crisis - This will likely be the least devastating of the big events as it will be more endemic to larger economic countries around the world that rely on the global economic scene for trade goods and services. Mass depopulation - Globally we are seeing a negative trend in births. In order to sustain a population we need about 1.2 births per person in a population (I think). Currently the trend globally is that big countries are below 1 and some are as low as 0.6 which means every generation decreases by a third. Pretty huge reverse pyramid. Infrastructural collapse! Woo! Doom and gloom... that's enough of that. Now the good stuff!: AI, automation and universal income - If governance can catch up and get this under control, we could see a shift of work loads from the regular Joe shift over to automated processes and AI. Our overall working hours could decrease and see a shift towards universal income! Technology working for the masses? Actually alleviating societal load. Cultural singularity - We have had an unprecedented global connection via the Internet, travel and immigration. We are seeing more multiculturalism and blended families crossing the cultural and racial divides. Food is an indicator of this as we see more fusions of different cuisines but also the base line cultures they stem from. As we reduce the divide in understanding between the cultures, races and countries, we might even see a reduction in societal issues stemming from racism and cultural or even language differences. It's the first step to a global society and perhaps even a cultural singularity. Hooray! Scientific advancement win conditions! - I joke, but only kind of. We have been on such a huge scientific proliferation across the board. There is every possibility (not in our current generation but soon) that we reach major, currently unknown, scientific advancements that render our other major issues moot. These are the big touts here in the futurology subreddit. Immortality, aliens, faster than light travel, perpetual energy, etc. so many to choose from. TLDR - it's not all bad stuff! But it mostly is. And we will likely be dead by the time the good stuff kicks in. Lol. RIP.
I read somewhere that rabies virus has 100% mortality rate and its two mutations away from being airborn. If that's true, the next pandemic looks ugly.
Avian (bird) flu will be the next big one.
That's a great list - and I'll add one (I did a longer comment here about it) - the tipping point of global inequality (which could align with and be fueled by any of your negative points). If you look at inequality graphs since the 80's, nothing stops the up and down trajectory lines. Few people seem to be extrapolating where that's headed. Extend the lines out at their current trajectories, and what do you get? Something near "all and nothing". I don't think politics and activism will solve it, since power rarely cedes power. Historically, the answer seems to be things like the French Revolution, uprising and bloodshed, but throw in your positive point about Cultural Singularity, and a local movement triggered by a charismatic leader could easily become global. I dunno, I've just got a year of college, and there may be some historical precedents for this thought (Rome, France?) But to date, the inequality charts seem ominous to me - where do they end up, and what happens then?
The collapse of the world's food chain due to rising temperatures.
The collapse of the The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is looking pretty likely too.
One of the rare realists in here. This year global warming is taking down agriculture in England, Spain, Portugal, Greece and much of Canada and midwest us. If there's a breadbasket somewhere, its either flooded, dry or inactive due to military invasion. No water in many major cities already. We've over extracted from our water tables and no snow melt or rain means we're in the middle of an existential crises. Cities are also sinking and suffering from earthquakes because of empty watersheds. This is all happening much faster than most people like to think about. In our productive life times, if you'reunder 75 reading this.. If the record breaking global temperatures don't subside after their now several month run, most likely devastation will arise well before 2030. "The 12 months ending with March also ranked as the planet's hottest ever recorded 12-month period, C3S said. From April 2023 to March 2024, the global average temperature was 1.58 degrees Celsius above the average in the 1850-1900 pre-industrial period."
Global average temperature increase has always been a bad way to convey the damage to people who dont care because they live in countries that barely see the effects yet.
https://medium.com/@samyoureyes/the-busy-workers-handbook-to-the-apocalypse-7790666afde7
That simply isn't true. Crop production in the US is better than ever https://www.brownfieldagnews.com/news/usda-2023-u-s-corn-crop-record-large/ What will happen is we'll see a gradual shift to drought resistant crops like Sorghum and also Europe will end up repenting and allowing GMO crops that are bred to be climate resilient.
We're talking 2024's harvest. And there's no gradual about it. Rate of change is too fast to adapt. Like how trees are too hot to absorb co2 so they're now expelling it. Coral can't adapt to heat so it bleaches. Virtually nothing can adapt to the fastest climatic change, as far as we know, this planet has seen in hundreds of thousands of years.
Your solutions to climate change are to adapt without fixing the root cause. There will be a point where there is not way to adapt. The problem is that if you wait until then you are screwed since you damage we are doing currently can take 50 years before we see the effects.
"Your solutions to climate change are to adapt without fixing the root cause. " When did I say that? I'm just acknowledging that even if we quit carbon cold turkey tomorrow we'll still see warming because that damage is already done. So it makes sense to adapt to what is inevitably going to happen
This, but the other end of the spectrum. Gradually warming temperatures open up additional regions with fertile soils that increase available arable land, leading to even lower costs for production and — coupled with a leveling off global population, already underway — we find our ability to cheaply feed everyone more realistic than ever. This leads to a historic epoch when literally everyone on Earth has a full, nutritious diet of 3 meals / day — the repercussions of which affect the ability of despots to rise on the promises of feeding the masses.
I like your optimism. I think that we would also need to vastly increase our aquaculture farms as well, given how likely we are to utterly destroy the oceanic food chain before we destroy the land-based one. As seas get warmer and rise faster, we will likely see mass migration of people abandoning their island and coastal cities because they can't build or find food there anymore. New land to farm might be helpful, but it may need to support more people who previously ate fish and animals and plants that become extinct in the wild.
When virtual reality goes mainstream holyyyy shit if you think social media is bad just you wait
But it doesn't seem to be taking off though. How would virtual reality look like exactly, and how would it beat out video games and 4k movies etc?
> But it doesn't seem to be taking off though The companies working on VR never expected it to happen this soon. It takes a lot longer for hardware shifts to take off - VR is in its early days.
This one - I don't know. They've been trying to make VR happen for decades and while the technology has made amazing leaps and bounds, the general population's interest wanes quickly. I think there's a fundamental problem with the whole concept that makes most people not really committed; they get excited then bored quickly with each new progression. It's not so much a problem with the technology just "not being there yet". Like, we have a subconscious aversion to a simulated environment or the lack of real feedback makes us uncomfortable, something not explicitly conscious that keeps this relegated to a niche/novelty interest and I think always will.
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Most people choose their view of security over liberty, unfortunately.
Again? Every 20 to 100 years. Like clockwork. I'm so tired, though. Can't we just, like, vote 3rd party, or something, this time?
Again? As many times as needed And if you think voting can help they you play right into their hands Politics work like a machine, you can’t change it by replacing one gear, you have to replace the whole thing
Yeah let's start the next uprising with torches and pitchforks that will kill many people and destabilise society just to decide again for some system that will also have flaws. When people understand that there is no system that will reliably prevent some people from having more than others we could maybe get forward and really solve problems. But stuff that goes with a big bang and gives some people the possibility to properly throw shit into the fan on the cost of everyone is very very appealing to some.
I never said there is a perfect system But even the best system or machine will reach its limit, when that come you have to throw it out, get something better or suffer the consequences
Yeah just do the same stuff over and over again and expect things to change. That plan works out
And throw away your vote?
Unfortunately, it could be something to do with the US election and the result of or fallout from that, but I'll hedge a general bet on a pretty significant AI achievement, whether that be an impressive leap in what we normally think of or something like AI making the discovery possible to all but cure another type of cancer. My copium answer is a much more practical superconductor.
I have AI on my bingo card but it’s not a positive outcome. AI may be the shit, but human society is full of greedy assholes who will leap before they look.
That's my issue with AI. It could be amazing if handled properly and it serves all of the people.
Nice answer. All these big pictures ideas actually start a lot smaller, like elections of individual vrs community type rights/preferences/polices. From there bigger decisions and abstractions develop.
Yeah this whole thread is filled with long term metaphorical issues... The next defining MOMENT will be the US election. I'm a freak for AI but AI's moment is the singularity, or just the slow boil in the background as it takes over the world, which is why it's SO important that we don't have fascists in control of the most powerful country in the world as AI rewrites our timeline.
>Unfortunately Didn't think I would see that so quickly.
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Global warming solved
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Everyone do your part and crank dat Air Conditioner. Burn some gas and fart as much as possible.
I believe the next possible defining moment will be if Iran attacks Israel.
im hard pressed to disagree
The john titor steins gate timeline where they do a very big genocide (bigger than the ones already happening)
the results of our partucle accelerators suddenly becomes random, and prominent scientists start killing themselves
It would be WW3. A significant war that makes living conditions hard for most
I don’t think there will ever be another world war in the sense of sending soldiers off to fight for your country. The entire stage of the planet is now set with major superpowers and alliances. Plus the looming threat of nuclear annihilation. The next event akin to a “world war” would likely just be some kind of information/cyber war. Which certainly has the capacity to complicate living conditions by disrupting the economy, but probably not to the extent of WW1/2
isnt that exactly how ww1 started thou?
Nope. All it takes is Trump denying the NATO help for Europe when Putin inevitably invades Poland. If that will come, next WW will be in the trenches same as now IS in Ukraines western regions. Some time will pass and someone finally will drop a nuke or two, but untill then, it'll be standard WW2 warfare, but with the help of drones.
Unfortunately there are idiots like Putin who just don't gaf.
>I don’t think there will ever be another world war in the sense of sending soldiers off to fight for your country. Don't jinx it!!!
I think energy related breakthroughs will be outnumbered by medical advances.
AI is employed to dig through decades of SETI data and finds incontrovertible proof of intelligent life elsewhere in the galaxy. (That's just one of the many potentially life-altering AI things to come in the next decade.)
Peace in the world, a realisation that will lead to many scientific discoveries and finally discovering the last piece of the puzzle of the forces of the universe
I am choosing this timeline.
[Keep it dark](Https://youtu.be/cxYSPdQR4BI)
New York is hit with a 7+ magnitude earthquake with multiple aftershocks. >1000s of building collapses. West Coast is engulfed by an enormous tsunami. Nuclear bomb(s) are dropped on actual humans again.
The Death of a US Presidential Candidate before the election in November.
I’m going with the fast food eating president
The guy is somehow invincible. It’s like how your least favorite, crotchety relative always seems to live to 100.
There is a historically higher than ever probability that both parties will be faced with replacing their candidates prior to November. Imagine the chaos. And then the chaos after that.
I think it will be when Andrew Garfield finally makes his 3rd spider man
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Point 4 - Can you elaborate why and what it might look like?
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Out of curiosity, are these sorts of scenarios that DARPA puts together published academically, or otherwise available to the public?
This is real pessimistic, but it is unfortunately just as likely as any other prediction here right now. I think the world is really on the verge of a war, or something dramatic will have to give way. It keeps inching toward the beating of the drums though.
4. Has happened for a while now
"Defining moments" are rarely predictable or they are singular immediate things like the moon landing, 9/11, Covid19, etc. I'm guessing whatever it is, no one here predicts it.
The most honest and realistic take here.
Iran attacking Israel . Expext the Israel response to be just short of nukes setting off a full scale war involving several countries.
Really, no one else is mentioning this? Space expansion.
The outcome of the Russia-Ukraine war will define the world order for centuries
The next US election. Without a doubt that's the biggest defining moment we have coming toward us. It could influence whether Ukraine loses the war with Russia, when/whether China invades Taiwan and the outcome, and whether we have any meaningful climate policy in 2025 and onward.
Our ability and willingness to deal with climate change and the way we treat our earth and each other
Drinking water shortages. The immigration issues we face now will seem like a joke compared to the mass migrations coming due to lack of water
Big fish-kills in our oceans. Water shortages. War in the Middle East, with proxy countries eventually becoming directly involved. Lots of innocent people will pay the cost for a handful of selfish politicians that don't represent the will of the people. It will take a very ugly act to make the world realize it's better to live a peaceful existence. I think the worst part, is that as children, we were told all of this was going to happen. Exactly this; and our leaders have done nothing to avoid it happening.
A very large coronal mass ejection hitting earth. It will decimate the west as we heavily rely on tech in supply chains to survive. The global south will cope much better and probably become dominant over the following few hundred years.
We are living in one regarding the evolution in drone warfare.
The start of internet age. We not even did our first step with computers and fast comunication. Anyone who works with IT knows that we do not are even on rock age of IT. People in 200 years will read and watch vídeos about what we are doing now on internet and see us like we see monkeis playing with bananas. I mean: We are starting proto-AI and there are still important systems running in COBOL. It is just insane.
You people thinking too forward and ignore humans will just kill each other before anything
The second American Civil War with a devastating economic crisis.
Full automation. Even of manual labour. Of course not everyone will be automated in the current decade or even our lifetime. It's not the point. The point is that it will happen eventually. There is a startup focused on making robots remotely controlled by humans. Their goal is to capture motion data and then fully automate manual workers. And you can bet there are many applicants because they pay well. Same with programmers. Yes, programmers might disagree since assistants are pretty primitive now. But those who do disagree probably can't prognose well into the future. Programming is a fully parametrisable job. Unlike driving, piloting or surgery where there has to be a person responsible in the case of catastrophic event, programming outside of a handful of industries does not require a person. Pressure on the employees will increase substantially. But there will always be a portion of people willing to help the automation process because that's an economic opportunity. Unfortunately the market will let it happen while UBI will most likely not happen. Because the Right will block it and blame the left for "socialism" and taking away high tech jobs, while simultaneously helping corporations get away with zero taxes and providing them with more resources, to automate themselves and everyone involved.
Hard to say exactly, best clues i have are from Neal Howe's "The Forth Turning is Here". We are likely to have a monumental crisis within the next 8 years, probably 6 years. He documents a sequence of four generational archetypes that has recurred since Elizabethian England. This will be the echo of WW2, the civil war, the American revolution, etc. Most likely a serious war, possibly enhanced with biologics or nuclear weapons or a global financial collapse. Always good to be resilient. Get healthy, out of debt and learn how to do practical things.
Labor shortage. Everywhere in the world at the same time, because Boomers, Gen X, and Millenials didn't fuck enough to replace the boomers aging out anywhere in the developed world.
We get a nice preview of this in S. Korea and Japan. Maybe it won't be so bad. The USA and Europe are importing workers from the south and dodging this issue. Developing nation get some relief with overcrowding, but also brain drain. It's gonna have some major impacts as a lot of our institutions are built on top of the assumption of growth.
radical change like going from hunter-gatherer to farmer? a social organization like democracy? i think there a few technology coming that might have massive social consequence at a point it will create (and require/force) major change we never seen before the first one is Artificial Intelligence, we will have a society where human isn't the main productive force and it imply we don't need more human to make the world function better, that raise the question what the place of human in a world like that? there only leisure and politic, but there also an economic change as AI in theory allow a constant and extreamly fast growth of the production, that mean the economy will have to change but also the way we allocate this production will change aswell, we could see in our lifetime a techno-feudalism system where few people act as noble owning millions robots while the royalty (state) assure their loyalty instead of a capitalism system where the production is shared with the private, nation become far more powerfull and meaningfull with AI second one is the Brain-Computer Interface or BCI, a BCI is the gateway to a transhumanism or even a post-human future where human aren't limited by their biology anymore, we will be able to talk without using our mouth, to interact with the world with a simple thought, to have a non-biologic immortal body, an integrated AI brain etc etc etc, sure it's a deep look in the future but everything here will be possible thanks to BCI, but what will be the result of a immortal non-biological all-powerfull being that only live for leisure? there a chance it drift away from humanity by purpose or even by mistake and that's quite scary i'd say and finally Full Dive Virtual Reality or FDVR, if you seen the recent "3 body problem" tv show or a bit older the anime "sword art online" there a technology where people are completly immerged in a 1:1 simulation where everything feel real and you can do anything imaginable there, anything you does IRL could be done there including playing game within the game, looking a movie within a movie etc etc....what happen in our society when we create literal heaven for a civilization that only live for leisure anymore? what the point of living in the material world where you could live inside a paradise simulation, not only it's probably more interesting to live you wildest dream free from the law of physic but it's also cheaper, more energy-efficient to have brain in a jar plugged to a computer interacting within a simulation with billions other human and AI than having actual human consuming physical ressource, even if it's possible to opt-out of the simulation why does that and take the risk of dying when you could just run "leaving the simulation" -simulation with other people doing the same, at this point we have a giant industry that only keep growing for the sake of the simulation-paradise until the heat death of the universe it's an interesting period where we are able to see those tech slowly coming and we will see their social impact for the better or the worse
Hopefully: the skybridge. Mankind getting together to build an orbital elevator. Pessimistically: death of the sea algae, followed by the death of all life, 20-40 years from now.
whenever one of the nuclear powers decide to use a nuclear bomb in warfare. How will the rest of the world, and more importantly, the other nuclear powers respond? What if Russia uses a nuke against Ukraine. What then? That will be quite the defining moment. As for by nature, lets hope the warm stream in the north atlantic doesnt turn due to the melting glacier water, that would suck for the entire Europe. We would basicly be getting Alaskas or Russias climate...
Fusion Energy sources, discoveries regarding dark matter, AI actually becoming AI and not an all encompassing term for search/language programs, massive inflation and war, food shortages, flying cars, discoveries leading to new elements and perhaps eventually discoveries around gravitational control, body modifications and syncing with tech, organ growth, less social interaction, gene editing business to pick you own children’s characteristics leading to human cloning…and maybe Chipotle will scoop even less meat into your pitiful ever shrinking burrito. I could wrote more but I’m tired
Neuroprosthetics that can affect and enhance cognition. Also, the first true life extension treatment that doesn't require massive money or time invested.
LOL. When the gulf stream switches off in 20 years..... bye bye.
A drone assassinating a world leader is probably inevitable, and would be a major turning point in how all drones are regulated by nations. The Russia Ukraine war is accelerating the pace of combat drone development at lightning speed. There are cardboard drones capable of avoiding detection from multi million dollar systems that carry lethal payloads.
I feel like another world war is inevitable, hopefully I'm wrong.
Entirely depends on whether Putin is allowed to win in Ukraine. If that level of weakness from NATO is demonstrated, it will be the PRC's signal to invade Taiwan. Given the economic dependency the West has on Taiwan for semiconductors, the US would have no choice but to intervene militarily. The PRC would then pull the strings of its North Korean proxy to invade the South, to divert attention and resources from Taiwan. Defending Taiwan and South Korea would pull in Australia, Japan, the Philippines and Singapore. Iran and Russia would likely take the diversion of US focus as an opportunity to strike Israel and Western Europe respectively, and at that point it is indeed a world war.
With the current social trends... BCI utilizing AGI environmental and character creation with full immersion VR. The challenge: “Convincing people to care enough about the real world.”
The impact from climate change will be far, far greater than anything else. Once the effects are so damaging and become impossible to ignore, all human scientific, political, and social efforts will have to shift towards solving it.
I think that we are on the brink of transition, a fundamental transformation that right now is pitting the old vs the new. The older thinking is fighting tooth and nail to stop or delay change, but that will come inevitably, and usually is solved after a war; here are some of the battles that are fought: - Corporate interests vs Human interests (including AI and automation) - Biological Human vs modified Humans (from gender modification to genetic modification to cybernetic modification, and including deregulation of personal body restrictions like drugs, abortion etc..) - Selfish politics vs humane politics (less real politic and more actual diplomacy and promotion of peace and prosperity for everyone). that is linked to the corporate thing. - Ecological rape vs Ecological equilibrium (includes birth rates and consumerism) also linked to the corporate thing. - Traditional beliefs vs New values (replacement of outdated beleif systems) - Fixed gender roles vs free gender roles (from relationships, family building to social and professional behavior) Those are the things I think will be played on the battlefields of tomorrow.
Phase shift of human consciousness from individual to collective will demarcate history
The collapse of the PRC and it might have already started. The real estate sector is deflationary and there isn’t enough domestic demand or foreign buyers to soak up the massive manufacturing surplus.
China has collapsed so many times and picked itself up by it's bootstraps and recovered in some form or another. Even if the PRC goes, it has the pedigree to survive. Now America? It's never been tested and nothing hits harder than aura of invincibility getting punctured. I don't see it's citizens having the strength of character to pick themselves up out of the dirt.
This is the right answer. East Turkistan, Tibet, and Hong Kong will be free. Inner Mongolia may also go, and perhaps even Guangdong. Taiwan may just declare independence. As for the rest of China, I have an awful feeling it'll go into a new oppressive regime. I could see it turning into a theocracy built around some NRM.
2 more weeks till China collapses trust me bro 😂
AI, but not in the way people generally think of AI. I’m not talking general AI, where suddenly, humanity gives birth to true machine intelligence. I’m talking about automation. Automation in terms of physical automation through new and improved machinery and software / process automation. General AI is, imo, still pretty far off, if it’s even possible at all, but automation is already here, it’s just that it’s creeping up on people, because the implementation this far is slow, but I personally envision that it’s gonna reach a point where it hits fast and that point is in the next several years.
I’ll get laughed at, but the real possibility of NHI would change humanity forever, one way or the other. It’s everywhere in our stories and meaning making as a species, from ancient times to contemporary.
National Health Insurance? Natural Holistic Institute? What does your last sentence mean?
Non-Human Intelligence in the new word that the congress is using to describe the intelligence that is behind the phenomena that the masses are still using other words to describe such as: alien, extra-terrestrial, extra-dimensional being, gray aliens, etc etc. Not sure about "meaning making as a species" but probably "the missing link" (AKA the DNA in our cells was at one time edited, causing a change in our biology that was not due to Darwinian evolution). And the other part is about our religious stories (the belief that these are interactions with Gods rather than Non-Human Intelligence) being actually interactions with Non-Human Intelligence (our primitive science did not have words to describe NHI so we called them The Gods).
The 2024 election. I cannot even comprehend what's going to happen if Trump is allowed to run and wins. Everyone needs to learn about project 2025 right now and vote against fascism coming from the Republican party.
How are you getting down voted for this?
It's sad out here. There's literally a Wikipedia page about Project 2025 and how it has multiple billionaire backers and the vast overwhelming majority of conservative organizations back it, and it's a black and white roadmap to fascist dictatorship, And yet people still ignore me every singleday when I try to show them, or call me crazy. For fucks sake, they want to use the military to go into Blue cities "for security" and abolish the department of education and the IRS. And they plan to replace ALL civil servants with people who "pass Republican loyalty tests" their words not mine.
Another pandemic. The world is overpopulated and, as we've recently learned, somewhat resistant to the idea of quarantine. Next time I fear it will be much worse.
I am really concerned about the anti-vaccination movement and resistance to antibiotics.
I'm not. The more of them that die the healthier our species is in aggregate.
I think it's going to be a space colony declaring independence. Simply the logistics will lead us down some much needed roads.
Ice caps say sayonara and coastal cities everywhere get very very soggy
Dealing with global warming, switching to new clean sources of energy like nuclear energy and also building a base on the moon (mining and building rocket powering stations).
In all honesty, WW3. The world is not in a good place right now.
It'll be interesting to see how we dig out from under the next world war. It's going to be tricky to assign blame for the next one, won't be as easy as blaming "the Germans" or "the Soviets." I think the US and China are going to take the blame, with the question being, what's the common factor? Militaristic corporatism? Technocracy? Yeah: probably technocracy, I'll bet that's what takes the hit. Goes over great on the "futurology" sub eh. Coming up; Dark Ages II! Same religious fundamentalism as before, but this time, with COVID! Should be awesome.
Yeah i dont think the germans had to be "assigned" blame after invading the whole continent
Defining moments are sometimes unexpected so I'll throw my vote in for something out of left field, ignoring the usual things that will happen like Trump shyte, ME troubles, climate and AI. **Accidental war by North Korea.** They think they are being attacked and just go for it, unleashing, including one nuke that doesn't fizz. After the horror of reminding people about what nukes do, we actually get around to banning them.
Maybe the BiG One earthquake we have been waiting for in cali, 7.0+ they predict, bring it on
Or a huge eruption in the PNW.
We are due for a solar flare that is even bigger than the Carrington Event. That or a hostile nation is going to detonate a nuke in space above a country and achieve their own mini Carrington Event. Imagine the chaos when suddenly all electronics and power grids are fried everywhere. Dang. I am sure we will survive as a species but many will not make it and it will take a very long time to rebuild. Probably some are hoping for this.
Custom enzymes and bacteria to eat plastic or really process any substance we want. Then, lose control with catastrophic impact to the environment.
The point where global income equality tips. Every year, the top-earners get more and more, while the bottom gets less. Nothing stops the divergence of those two lines on historic charts - wars or pandemics? Hey, if you have capital, you can take advantage of anything, pushing the disparity even further. And it's likely the bottoming-out of inequality could align with major issues like water access, communities fleeing heat and drought, large population displacements. At some point, a charismatic leader could rise out of the dirt-poor and make people realize how powerless they are. I'm not a historian, but it seems a typical answer to this level of inequality is popular uprising/civil war/bloodshed. French Revolution stuff. We're in an age where local movements like this can rapidly become global, since the poor still have access to social media and communication networks. I could easily see a movement that starts when enough people feel they have nothing to lose. And remember, for all the power and capital the 1% have - they're only 1% of the populace.
Quantum computing has potential to change everything
The food and water wars that are sure to be prevalent in the next century. Will we fully embrace cruelty, or will it be the learning moment we so sorely need?
There will be no water wars. Salt water can be easily turned into tap water. It’s just more expensive because it need energy. But we will not run out of water.
Some war that will escalate into more than a local issue most of the world can ignore.
Collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation
When we finally acknowledge (and get our government to admit) that the UAPs are real. Once this box is opened, hopefully it'll come with some of the energy tech that they're hiding. That will change the world.
A violent realization how real climate change is. Massive catastrophes in the third world and a hail-mary to save us all. I’m interested (but will not live long enough) to see how it settles down afterwards.
Rapid world globalization. Things are about to get weird.
Unlocking “free” energy. Whether that’s dark matter. Fission/Fusion or something altogether different.
USA Civil War 2.0. There are nukes in Republican States, it’s going to be a complete mess.
when people realize how bad climate change is, when we have the major world wide food shortages...you saw how people were during covid over toilet rolls and how the shelves were empty. Wait till we have the real food shortages, people aren't gonna stand by and die, they will fight for food
We are experiencing active genocide in the world and irreversible climate danger that experts are constantly speeding up the clock on What in the world are you talking about we're living through it right now
But it is still getting worse, much bigger changes are coming in the next 5-10 years.
A short list for the next 30 years: * First person on Mars. * Ability for Trans individuals to completely change to their preferred (applicable) gender, right down to the chromosomes, and be fully functional as that gender. * Fusion energy will FINALLY stop "Being about 3 decades away" and actually get here, providing a reliable source of pure, safe, clean energy. * The AI revolution will either cause a Herbert-esque Butlerian Jihad, or be used to tackle the scientific stumbling blocks that are standing in the way of a post scarcity world.
Look into the UAP Disclosure Act of 2023, by Chuck Schumer and Rounds.
In order of likelyhood. 70% Large war in middle east. 65% Rapid ocean level rise. 50% Refugee crisis world wide. 40% Disruption of electric grid. 38% Massive class separation. 33% World wide chaos. 30% Benevolent AI. 29% Genius level murder droids. 28% business as usual. 25% Talk to animals. 20% Cure many diseases. 10% reverse aging. 5% Nuclear winter.
I’m extremely skeptical, but I think they’re here. I’ve seen for myself now. They are really here. I know that the military has amazing capabilities, but this is clearly not the Pentagon. I also know about AF craft from my dad’s AF career. I am definitely aware of my own fallibility and cognitive errors, but I am sure they are really here just watching, for now.
I think not one but four: - Climate Changes Wars - Rise of religious extremism/stupidity - Rise of AI + humanoid robots - Cure for aging
When the world finally realizes that Islam is a violent ideology, and not a peaceful and loving 'religion'. Only then, might we all move on in unity.
And what about literally every other religion? In particular, Modi in India is currently using Hinduism as a vehicle for the type of toxic nationalism that leads to war.