Nostradamus? Not Likely!
My wonderful wife and I like to engage in some fairly robust debate. This often occurs over a bottle of wine. We usually start out discussing a recent news event and the implications it might have. Where we wind up is, well, difficult to predict. This ‘shit talk’ is one of the cornerstones of our relationship.
Of late though my wife has challenged me to put some of my predictions down on paper. In this way, we can have a good laugh at them in thirty years’ time. One of us will get to say ‘I told you so’. What could possibly go wrong?
The piece will outline five ‘predictions’ which I think will occur sometime between 2050 and 2070. I hope that the future generations who might read this will be kind as I am not French, have no scrying device and my predictions are not organised into quatrains.
Prediction One - A universal basic income will become the norm for western countries
A universal basic income (UBI) is a basic level of income, which every citizen within a state receives at regular intervals on a permanent basis. There are many reasons why this is a good idea. The best of them is that the welfare states currently maintained are expensive and wasteful. The structural changes such a scheme would usher in to the world economic system would also greatly reduce global wealth inequality. I plan to talk more about UBI in more detail this year.
Prediction Two – Driverless cars will be the norm
This one really is inevitable. Driverless cars will be safer. They will free up the time we spend travelling each day to do other pursuits. They will be better for the environment. They will be cheaper. The fact that so many still doubt the fact that driverless cars are the way forward is testament to people’s fear of change, even when that change is hugely beneficial to them.
Prediction Three – We will be able to upload our consciousness
I wrote a piece on this last year. To fulfil this prediction we need to emulate the human brain with artificial components. This is a possibility that often terrifies people. Failing a nuclear induced Armageddon we will at some point in the future be able to emulate a human brain. We know it’s possible, because I wouldn’t be typing this if it was impossible. The only variable is time. How will it take us to discover the secrets of what makes our brain operate in the way it does. I’m suggesting around forty years.
Prediction Four – The primary cause of global warming is not fossil fuels
This one is sure to put me firmly in the lunatic fringe. I’m good with that and there is a growing body of people who share my view (1). Most of these dissenters argue that the sun has a greater impact on global temperature than fossil fuel emissions. There is compelling evidence that the dissenters have it right (2). The contortions of those supporting the fossil fuels theory go into when trying to deny what is becoming increasingly obvious is truly amusing.
The fact that those supporting the fossil fuels theory are so dismissive of any criticism is one of the markers that something is dreadfully wrong here. It’s simply not scientific to say things like ‘the debate is over’.
Humans need to feel like we are in control. We are not. We are very good at deluding ourselves into thinking we can control that which we cannot. Religion is perhaps the best example of this. Over time, the evidence will show how thoroughly we have deluded ourselves over climate.
Prediction Five – They will look back and call the period between 1990 and 2020 the ‘PC’ age
All societies mock those that have come before them. Much as we mock the cultural traditions of the 60’s those in the 2070’s will find elements of our culture befuddling. I suspect the thing we’ll be mocked most widely for is that which I would loosely describe as the ‘politically correct’ movement.
This movement is responsible for identity politics. It’s responsible for free speech crushing ‘safe spaces’. It’s responsible for the scientifically ridiculous idea that we are all absolutely equal. It is utterly oblivious to the fact that people are in fact different. It’s ok to be different. It’s ok to not be equal.
We don’t have to have equal outcomes in every single area of society. We need to embrace our differences. Celebrate our differences. I’d argue that celebrating those differences is the hallmark of a truly tolerant society as opposed to the dangerously authoritarian one we are at risk of becoming.
Concluding thoughts
I’m sure some will see this as some kind of wish list. That’s not unfair. Most of these kinds of prediction lists are at least to some degree a reflection of what the writer would like to see. Few people, with the possible exception of the doomsday cultist, make predictions that they don’t want to see come to pass. In any case it’s been an interesting exercise. I hope I’m still out here blurbeling away when 2050 rolls around.