Errr. I think by 2400 we’ve got every chance of living in the ruins of a past grand human civilization.
Trillion is nice sci fi. 10,000 years in the future with any recognizable civilization is even more of a stretch.
Trillion is nice sci fi. 10,000 years in the future with any recognizable civilization is even more of a stretch.
10,000 years in the future is the premise of Frank Herbert‘s Dune.
The novel (or rather the series) depicts a mankind that on one hand in some ways has evolved way beyond humanity’s current capabilities.
On the other hand, society has devolved into a feudal state.
Some technologies are shunned and outlawed for their destructive potential, most notably nuclear weapons and “thinking machines” (there’s some room for interpretation if this just means AI or computers in general), which have been replaced by “mentats” (basically human computers).
There have been massive wars/killings, massive famines, massive epidemics.
We're in what may well be a local maxima, or perhaps an overall maxima. There are a lot of challenges to face that we need to unify to fight, like water poverty, food security, avoiding escalation of conflict - and not much sign of greater unification (quite the opposite AFAICT).
IMO we can turn it around, but we're going to have to have a sudden outbreak of altruism.
Two out of three of those problems are getting easier with technology (renewable energy for desalination and smart agriculture). If we leave this maxima, it will be because we permitted nuclear proliferation. Even that isn’t inescapable, however.
No water = no food. Where millions perhaps billions of people are on the move, societies will break down. Look what is happening on the European and US borders and the hysteria it generates when the migration is but a trickle of what is to come.
Yes humanity and technology is moving forward at record speeds, but at what cost to the world majority? To the environment.
I think by 2400 is a rather optimistic figure, it is likely to be much sooner
You can't reach into people's brains and change their temperament (yet! say the optimists) but I don't think we should want to. And not allpessimism/skepticism is based on temperament, though certainly some is.
You guys need to clarify what "a collapse" is. Not eating as much meat? Do you really think that we would not be able to power our computers or not be able to produce rice/wheat on any industrial scale?
The amount of FUD spread without any foundation for it is maddening.
I imagine that's what people said before the Dark Ages too. It's not as if empires and civilizations haven't ever fallen before.
It is a reasonable low-probability high-risk concern, given (unordered):
* Depleting fossil fuel reserves: most obvious risk; dominant fuel source for transportation and agriculture, dominant energy source for industries, dominant material in many consumer goods.
* Climate change: threatens some regions' agricultural and ocean productivity, pressuring human migration, spreading diseases.
* Exhausted oceans: oceanic deadzones are spreading, loss of fishing as a food source is a serious risk for parts of Asia, which will put additional pressures on agriculture and motivate economic migration.
* Over-use of antibiotics and vaccines: risk of super-bacteria/virus plagues, mostly in agriculture and 3rd world nations.
* Depletion of aquifers: imminent risk amplified by climate change. America's food production is heavily reliant on effectively non-renewable aquifers, depletion or poisoning through fracking are serious risks.
* Globalized economy/supply chains: coupling economies improves efficiency but introduces the risk of cascade failures.
No one of these problems are an existential risk by themselves... but they are all interrelated and poorly understood, which impacts our ability to effectively preempt wide-spread impact.
Humanity will recover should the worst happen, but I think it's better to avoid the set back in the first place.