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I read 2001: A Space Odyssey when I was 11. That would have been 1971. The Moon shuttle, the space station, and the elctronic wizardry were okay by me. Even the

I read 2001: A Space Odyssey when I was 11. That would have been 1971. The Moon shuttle, the space station, and the elctronic wizardry were okay by me. Even the monolith, though things did turn too weird for my taste towards the end (and I still agree with my younger self here). But one fundamental premise completely toppled my suspension of disbelief: That humanity would still seriously be here by the turn of the century. Clearly, ww would by then be overwhelmed, struggling against or exterminated by ... pollution. Which is what all doomsday was about then. Some years later it was all-out nuclear war. Ask me by the beginning of the eighties, and I shall tell you confidently that I - and you - won't be around by the year 2000. As we now know, I nearly got that one right during the next few years, but today I really no longer believe it would have moved far beyond megadisaster - not into actual extermination. So, these days it's the climate, and I am old and cynical and jaded. Sick to puking level of being called a denier. Noone in his/her/its right mind can deny that climate is changing. Always has, presumably always will. And of course we influence the damned thing. Every living and species does, and we clearly to a very high extent. If we don't - collectively - like the way things are going, by all means, we ought to take steps to shift the course. We may even be in for rough times. Maybe very rough. And then again, maybe we won't. If someone can give me a plausible scenario for the year 2100 - as seen from the perpective of someone actually living there and then - I'm all ears. I have zero idea wheter that scenario in that perspective will be on the black or on the white side. I shall, however, be extremly surprised if climate will have actually killed or ruined us, downvotes be damned.

seren 8y ago
I understand your sentiment, but it boils down to : past catastrophic predictions were wrong so future catastrophic predictions are also going to be wrong. That does not reassure me one bit. Let's that the doomsday future is 100 millions people living in the Arctic circle. Maybe it is not that bad for people living in 2500, with AI, agricultural drones, floating cities. They might even have fusion and a moon base. But I cannot imagine how we can go peacefully from a few billions people living around the globe to another stable state. This is going to be a very rocky transition, and we, or our children, are going to experience it fully.
- interfixus 8y ago
  Not so much past catastrofic predictions were wrong as my past catastrofic fantasies were wrong. I see frequent commenting here on HN in the tone of the world is ending, we're all gonna die. They are no more and no less credible than my boyhood musings on 2001. My comment wasn't meant to reassure. I take it for granted (my musings again!) that this century will bring terrible upheavals, unprecedented warfare, and probably a sharp decline in world population. It won't be peaceful, it won't be pretty. It will be history, business as usual, no matter if the planet grows hotter or colder. I'm far too old for optimism.

seren 8y ago

I understand your sentiment, but it boils down to : past catastrophic predictions were wrong so future catastrophic predictions are also going to be wrong. That does not reassure me one bit. Let's that the doomsday future is 100 millions people living in the Arctic circle. Maybe it is not that bad for people living in 2500, with AI, agricultural drones, floating cities. They might even have fusion and a moon base. But I cannot imagine how we can go peacefully from a few billions people living around the globe to another stable state. This is going to be a very rocky transition, and we, or our children, are going to experience it fully.

interfixus 8y ago
Not so much past catastrofic predictions were wrong as my past catastrofic fantasies were wrong. I see frequent commenting here on HN in the tone of the world is ending, we're all gonna die. They are no more and no less credible than my boyhood musings on 2001. My comment wasn't meant to reassure. I take it for granted (my musings again!) that this century will bring terrible upheavals, unprecedented warfare, and probably a sharp decline in world population. It won't be peaceful, it won't be pretty. It will be history, business as usual, no matter if the planet grows hotter or colder. I'm far too old for optimism.