7 Optimistic Scenarios for the Future of Our Planet
Visions
of the future depicted by science fiction writers and futurists usually include
atomic explosion, killer robots on tracks and cannibal nomads riding on
motorcycles. And this is justified, since we do not take adequate care of our
environment, new technologies are not
always good of mankind and people of the world are at war with each
other without the robots present.
But we
cannot be too sure that the history of human civilization will end in such a
grim way. Finding ways to avoid premonitions of popular sci-fi stories and
apocalyptic dystopia may help us envision distant future that may look much
brighter. Below we examine seven most
optimistic scenarios for the development of humankind.
1.
Status quo
This is
perhaps the most boring, but the most likely scenario of the future.
In
books with such “hopeful” titles as “Our Final Hour” and others, British
astrophysicist Martin Rees, Swedish philosopher Nick Bostrom and English
theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking claim that humanity does not stand a chance to survive even before the start of next
century. Maintaining the current level of our civilization (which simply
constitutes our ultimate survival) can by itself be considered a positive
result. Chances are that we have already reached the highest point in our
development.
In
1992, American political economist Francis
Fukuyama has written a book entitled “The End of History and the Last
Man“. He hypothesized that the political, technological and economic model
of the early 90s is the last frontier in the history of mankind. The new
millennium proved Fukuyama’s fallacy.
A more
realistic scenario of maintaining the status quo was proposed by the former
head of the research department of Sun Microsystems Bill Joy. In 2000 he published an essay in Wired magazine titled “Why
the future doesn’t need us“. The article claimed that the most advanced technologies of the XXI
century such as robotics, genetic engineering and nanotechnology are dangerous
to humans as biological species. Joy called for a conscious abstinence
from dangerous technologies similar to the model of nuclear disarmament.
Neo-Luddite position according to Joy is the most relevant strategy against
dystopia and the extinction of mankind. The sooner we stop developing dangerous
technologies for ourselves, the longer and happier our future will be.
2.
Blooming Green Earth
In most
of sci-fi scenarios, Earth appears to be depicted as a planet-metropolis
encased in steel and concrete. This is the worst nightmare for
environmentalists when we exists in the future where technology completely
replaces Earth’s biosphere.
But there
is another option. A future in which nature
is far more lush and picturesque than we can ever imagine. New
philosophies of environmentalism and
trans-humanism advocate
the development of technologies that will help restore the environment.
Nano- and biotechnologies will be utilized for cleaning up landfills and
industrial waste disposal sites. And in the distant future it will become
possible to terraform Earth back to its pristine state.
The
earliest manifestation of this sort of philosophy is a report by the American
science fiction writer Bruce Sterling
dated October 14, 1998 and published in San Francisco. The founder of cyberpunk
has come up with the idea of “Emerald design“. It combined the ideas of eco-design, technological progress and
cosmopolitanism. Simply put, Sterling argued that in order to combat
environmental problems, humanity must use
the most advanced technologies and work together.
In 2008, Bruce Sterling officially terminated the “Emerald
design” movement to pave the way for more advanced Internet-based ideology
called “Bright green environmentalism“.
In the
distant future, our planet can become more ecologically diversified than it has
ever been. Humans would have to be
genetically modified so that they would not interfere with the overall
harmony of natural environment. All of the energy needs for humanity will be
completely satisfied, we will become the type one civilization according to the
Kardashev scale.
Some
environmentalists act to promote editing the Earth’s ecosystems, to eliminate
predators so that herbivores would not suffer. We will be able to control the weather. And we will
finally be able to resist natural
disasters such as asteroids, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Who
would want to trade a planet like this for some distant planets in space?
3.
Under the supervision of machines
It is
quite likely that the takeover by
technological singularity will lead to extinction of humans as species. The
next generation of artificial intelligence (which may appear as early as in
thirty years) can become so unfathomable to our understanding that we will not
be able to coexist on the same planet. Destruction of mankind by machines may
occur intentionally, accidentally or even by our own fault.
But machine superpower can lead to the opposite
result. The possibility that artificial intelligence can be the key to
utopia for humanity has brought to life the movement called trans-humanism.
Trans-humanists
(and especially their singularian ideology) generally agrees with Cayferom from “The Matrix“. The
mankind will feel much more comfortable and safer inside a friendly system built by AI. If
designers and programmers will start working on the development of friendly
artificial intelligence now, new
Asimov-type generation of machines may eventually appear, which, in
principle, may be incapable of harming humans. They will become our protectors and patrons. We will
let them care about the Earth, while we will peacefully roam virtual jungles
inhabited by mechanical animals.
4.
Space
Sooner
or later we will have to leave Earth
and start to colonize other solar systems. This will ensure our
survival (it is not a good idea to keep all your eggs in one basket) since
humanity has always had an inherent desire to move forward. After reaching beyond geographical boundaries and biological
limitations (we cannot fly and very bad swimmers), we have secured
further development of our civilization. This led to technological, social,
political and economic changes in society.
Even
with the current, very modest achievements in space exploration, we ended up
with satellite technologies and important discoveries in the field of natural
science. And what about the high-resolution picture from the Mars surface?… If
we can manage to be able to travel
interstellar distances, be it multi-generations vessels,
self-replicating von Neumann spacecrafts or physically intangible bubble of
artificial intelligence, this will become a significant breakthrough. Perhaps
it will be an achievement not only for mankind, but also for all living beings
in our galaxy.
Presently,
we exist in the galaxy devoid of
visible traces of any activity of alien beings. This allowed American
theoretical physicist Enrico Fermi
rightfully ask: “Well, where are all those other civilizations“? So if
we do start to travel between stars and planets, then we may become the first
and only civilization capable of such distant space travel.
5.
Virtual Reality
Technological
singularity may lead to a situation when
all of us will be loaded into the memory of supercomputers. This can be done without abandoning the
space travel.
But
supercomputers must be very large. Such as the matrioshka-type brain concept “invented” by the late American
trans-humanist Robert Bradbury.
This space mega-structure consists of several Dyson spheres. Each sphere has a
nano-computer of a molecular-scale size. All these spheres are built around the
star and get the energy for computation of energy exchange occurring between the star and the interstellar space.
This will allow the computer to simulate reality, which is not inferior, but
even better in its level of resolution compared to the world around us.
According
to Bradbury’s ideas, a single matrioshka brain can perform 1042 operations per
second. Professor of mechanical engineering at MIT Seth Lloyd proposed a draft
of a quantum system, which can perform 5×1050 logical operations per second
with the bit resolution of 1031 bits. Compared to the worlds that can be
generated by this system, our old analogue-based universe may seem slow, boring
and primitive.
6.
Eternal Rest
Most of
the world’s religions invented utopias beyond the grave. And
how else could they encourage their followers to behave appropriately in the
real world? Religion is the expression of human ideas about the ideal level of existence.
Nowadays, few people would seriously believe in existence of heaven or
afterlife. But this does not mean that we should abandon the idea of creating heaven on Earth using technology.
British
philosopher David Pearce calls
this the principle of “hedonic
imperative“. He and other trans-humanists-abolitionists call for creation of heaven on earth by means of advanced
biotechnology. Using psychopharmacology and genetic engineering we can
rid mankind of pain and provide comfortable existence as well as to come up
with some kind of a signal system to receive notifications about the health of
the body.
More
progressive hedonism-related ideas suggest ways to increase the number of psychological, emotional and physical pleasures
human consciousness is able to experience. For those puritans raised
under strict moral and restrictive conditions, Pierce’s concept may seem
outrageous, and even immoral. But in reality, we all want just that at the level of metaphysics. We all
want as much pleasure from life as possible with as fewer problems along the
way.
7.
Cosmological Transcendence
We are
not too sure what to write about in this section. This could be a scenario with the greatest long-term
outlook beyond the limits of human imagination. We are unable to
adequately present these utopian ideas here. But it is still desirable to
experience them. Here again, there is a certain risk of falling into philosophy
and metaphysics (forget about hedonism), but some vague possibilities are still
worth considering.
American
futurist John Smart suggested
that the most complex systems in the
universe use less and less space,
time, matter and energy to enter the next level of their evolution. This
applies to galaxies, stars, planets, environmental and technological systems.
Human civilization is no exception. Ultimately, our destiny is to leave this universe and put our collective
consciousness in a completely different dimension. For example, inside
one of black holes.
Robert Lanza, professor of the Institute of
Regenerative Medicine at Wake Forest University proposes a different theory. Lanza
suggests that our universe is in its
early stages of development and that during more advanced stages of
development, intelligent life can begin managing the universe. As a
result, the very nature of the universe will undergo changes, it will become biocentric, and biological life will
be in charge of creating the surrounding reality and time.
Here,
we may easily get into the possibility
of time travel and exploiting the effects of quantum cohesiveness. So
little we know about the structure of the universe at this point, that in the
future mankind can be faced with opportunities, which we cannot possibly
imagine today.
From Learning Mind @ http://www.learning-mind.com/7-optimistic-scenarios-for-the-future-of-our-planet/
For more information about transhumanist concepts see http://nexusilluminati.blogspot.com/search/label/transhumanism
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