Ice Hockey Players
22-06-2004, 08:05
This thread is for predictions about the semi-distant future - say, before the turn of the next millennium. What will the world look like in 996 years (not 1000, since it's 2004.) How accurate will the TV show "Futurama" be? Will humanity even still exist, and if so, will they live on Earth? I'll throw out what I think will happen over the course of the millennium, keeping in mind that a lot can happen.
HUMANITY: Contrary to what the scaremongers over at Exit Mundi would have you think, humanity isn't going anywhere. It's survived plenty of frightening propositions through its innovation and ingenuity. Unfortunately, for every problem it solves, it usually creates one as well, so people will be at a constant struggle with their own problems. We will solve the eventual "baby bust", but we will turn humans into commodities at the same time. My prediction is that the population of the world will actually increase over the next millennium.
SPACE EXPLORATION: Oh, sure, we will explore space. There will always be talk of living on the moon and on Mars, but it's difficult to say how practical it will be. The first people to live on the moon and Mars will be researchers with NASA, much like the researchers at McMurdo Station in Antarctica. Eventually, people will move to the moon and Mars, but this migration will be much like the migration to the Americas from Europe in that communication between Earth and these other worlds will be slow and difficult, especially at first. It is difficult to predict if the first colonies in space will be on the moon or in man-made satellites orbiting Earth.
POLITICS: At this time, states are both integrating and disintegrating. International bodies are a trend, and independence movements are another trend in other parts of the world. If you look closely, though, the independence movements are in the "have-not" portions of the globe - the Middle East, Chechnya, etc. Quebec is the only region pushing its own independence that isn't physically fighting for it. Once modernization sets in, state integration will become the trend, and governments will become more centralized until eventually, a world government takes over. The world government will work as a sort of confederation, with a system of large, strong states and some smaller states that are generally single-group states. Quebec will be one of these, as will Israel. Some other single-group states that may come about are Iran (Shi'ite Muslims), Liberia (black nationalists), and nations for specific ideologies of other sorts. This world government will look to establish these states as a means of collecting the less desirables (militant nationalists, fundamentalists, Communists, etc.) and keeping them out of the strong states, thereby making them less of a bother from within. The problem is that they may become a foreign policy crisis.
BUSINESS: Right now, corporate interests largely rule government, especially in the U.S. This won't change unless people such as environmentalists, social activists, educators, consumer advocates, etc. start beating them at their own game and forcing businesses to play by their rules. By using corporate tactics, these people will find that many of their own become corrupted with corporatism, however, and there is a divide within the social justice movement between corporatists and humanists. By now, the damage is done, however, and real pro-people change begins to happen. Humanists get lazy, however, and corporations try to regain their edge; once they begin to succeed, however, a new generation of humanists stops this trend in its tracks. Over the next thousand years, people will wise up to this, or at least some will, and when they do, and when they can make a difference, they will.
LIFE SPAN: Over the second millennium, life span increased from 20-something to 70-something. That rate of increase won't happen again, but the rest of the world will start catching up to the modern world, and people will start living much longer. The average life span may push 100, and people will live to 150 regularly. Diseases will come and go, and outbreaks of various flus will put a dent in population figures, but humans will not be wiped out by diseases.
WAR: Let's get one thing straight - nuclear weapons do exist, and a few people are dumb enough to use them. Fortunately, those people have no nuclear weapons, and no one's going to give them any. That doesn't mean there won't be a nuclear strike, however. I predict that there will be an H-bomb used somewhere in the world in the next millennium - that or a neutron bomb. However, the attacked nation will retaliate with more conventional tactics, avoiding a nuclear strike, knowing it isn't necessary. That is, if the nukes are used as a first strike or intermediate weapon; they could be used as a final blow much like they were in World War II. Also, as long as emption rules peace conferences, world wars will come in pairs. The peace from World War III will generate World War IV. Only awareness of that error will prevent World War V. The world government will come out of one of the World Wars after several failed institutions similar to the UN.
SOCIAL ISSUES: Homosexuals will be allowed to marry in the early to mid 21st century on a mass scale; before that, it will be largely on a localized scale. The next social group to gain acceptance will be transsexuals, and toward the middle to the end of the 21st century, gender reassignment and legal modification will be recognized on a large scale. Polygamists nd polyandrists, as well as those who desire group marriages, will be recognized. Either that or government will get out of marriage entirely; I don't know. Discrimination will take other forms, obviously, and civil rights advocates will try to find other ways around them. Many issues will boil down to economic class issues, however, and it will take a massive government motion to bring these to a halt. And remember, something intense, like bringing corporations to their knees, will be what it takes to get this in motion.
RELIGION: Society will be more secularized, at least in most of the world. A few religion-dominated states will remain, but the largest states will have separation of church and state as a founding principle. People will be less observant of religion, churches will be fewer and farther between, and religious holidays will be more like those things you see on a calendar that you give a second and a half's attention to and proceed to ignore than actual religious observances for most. A few holidays - Christmas, for example - will survive, however, because of corporate and cultural influence. New Year's Day will take its place as the largest holiday, however.
ALIENS: Don't be ridiculous. Contact with extraterrestrials will be slow and extremely difficult, if possible at all. They won't come by wormholes or faster-than-light transport. Sure, they exist, but reaching Earth will be difficult. The only aliens that would possibly reach Earth are a race that was set adrift in a ship or wayward planet that just happened to come near Earth, and too much could go wrong for them to survive.
HUMANITY: Contrary to what the scaremongers over at Exit Mundi would have you think, humanity isn't going anywhere. It's survived plenty of frightening propositions through its innovation and ingenuity. Unfortunately, for every problem it solves, it usually creates one as well, so people will be at a constant struggle with their own problems. We will solve the eventual "baby bust", but we will turn humans into commodities at the same time. My prediction is that the population of the world will actually increase over the next millennium.
SPACE EXPLORATION: Oh, sure, we will explore space. There will always be talk of living on the moon and on Mars, but it's difficult to say how practical it will be. The first people to live on the moon and Mars will be researchers with NASA, much like the researchers at McMurdo Station in Antarctica. Eventually, people will move to the moon and Mars, but this migration will be much like the migration to the Americas from Europe in that communication between Earth and these other worlds will be slow and difficult, especially at first. It is difficult to predict if the first colonies in space will be on the moon or in man-made satellites orbiting Earth.
POLITICS: At this time, states are both integrating and disintegrating. International bodies are a trend, and independence movements are another trend in other parts of the world. If you look closely, though, the independence movements are in the "have-not" portions of the globe - the Middle East, Chechnya, etc. Quebec is the only region pushing its own independence that isn't physically fighting for it. Once modernization sets in, state integration will become the trend, and governments will become more centralized until eventually, a world government takes over. The world government will work as a sort of confederation, with a system of large, strong states and some smaller states that are generally single-group states. Quebec will be one of these, as will Israel. Some other single-group states that may come about are Iran (Shi'ite Muslims), Liberia (black nationalists), and nations for specific ideologies of other sorts. This world government will look to establish these states as a means of collecting the less desirables (militant nationalists, fundamentalists, Communists, etc.) and keeping them out of the strong states, thereby making them less of a bother from within. The problem is that they may become a foreign policy crisis.
BUSINESS: Right now, corporate interests largely rule government, especially in the U.S. This won't change unless people such as environmentalists, social activists, educators, consumer advocates, etc. start beating them at their own game and forcing businesses to play by their rules. By using corporate tactics, these people will find that many of their own become corrupted with corporatism, however, and there is a divide within the social justice movement between corporatists and humanists. By now, the damage is done, however, and real pro-people change begins to happen. Humanists get lazy, however, and corporations try to regain their edge; once they begin to succeed, however, a new generation of humanists stops this trend in its tracks. Over the next thousand years, people will wise up to this, or at least some will, and when they do, and when they can make a difference, they will.
LIFE SPAN: Over the second millennium, life span increased from 20-something to 70-something. That rate of increase won't happen again, but the rest of the world will start catching up to the modern world, and people will start living much longer. The average life span may push 100, and people will live to 150 regularly. Diseases will come and go, and outbreaks of various flus will put a dent in population figures, but humans will not be wiped out by diseases.
WAR: Let's get one thing straight - nuclear weapons do exist, and a few people are dumb enough to use them. Fortunately, those people have no nuclear weapons, and no one's going to give them any. That doesn't mean there won't be a nuclear strike, however. I predict that there will be an H-bomb used somewhere in the world in the next millennium - that or a neutron bomb. However, the attacked nation will retaliate with more conventional tactics, avoiding a nuclear strike, knowing it isn't necessary. That is, if the nukes are used as a first strike or intermediate weapon; they could be used as a final blow much like they were in World War II. Also, as long as emption rules peace conferences, world wars will come in pairs. The peace from World War III will generate World War IV. Only awareness of that error will prevent World War V. The world government will come out of one of the World Wars after several failed institutions similar to the UN.
SOCIAL ISSUES: Homosexuals will be allowed to marry in the early to mid 21st century on a mass scale; before that, it will be largely on a localized scale. The next social group to gain acceptance will be transsexuals, and toward the middle to the end of the 21st century, gender reassignment and legal modification will be recognized on a large scale. Polygamists nd polyandrists, as well as those who desire group marriages, will be recognized. Either that or government will get out of marriage entirely; I don't know. Discrimination will take other forms, obviously, and civil rights advocates will try to find other ways around them. Many issues will boil down to economic class issues, however, and it will take a massive government motion to bring these to a halt. And remember, something intense, like bringing corporations to their knees, will be what it takes to get this in motion.
RELIGION: Society will be more secularized, at least in most of the world. A few religion-dominated states will remain, but the largest states will have separation of church and state as a founding principle. People will be less observant of religion, churches will be fewer and farther between, and religious holidays will be more like those things you see on a calendar that you give a second and a half's attention to and proceed to ignore than actual religious observances for most. A few holidays - Christmas, for example - will survive, however, because of corporate and cultural influence. New Year's Day will take its place as the largest holiday, however.
ALIENS: Don't be ridiculous. Contact with extraterrestrials will be slow and extremely difficult, if possible at all. They won't come by wormholes or faster-than-light transport. Sure, they exist, but reaching Earth will be difficult. The only aliens that would possibly reach Earth are a race that was set adrift in a ship or wayward planet that just happened to come near Earth, and too much could go wrong for them to survive.