I would like to offer a thought experiment, one that tries hopefully to find some unity through viewing our chaotic present through the lens of history and what is our true desires as a nation and a people. Let’s imagine what the world will look like in 100 years. I know it can be a daunting task considering our present circumstances but just play along. We have always been a forward-looking country. We have led the world into the 21st century through our inventions, technology, science, medicine, and even entertainment. We have many models of what the future might be as depicted by some of our greatest authors. Our system of laws and attitudes help change what the future will be, but what do you imagine the ideal future world to be? Would it start looking more like a Star Trek type world? A quasi-militaristic state where all of our needs are provided for so we can focus on discovery and invention? Or, as others have noted many times (including myself) that it could be more of an authoritarian regime similar to Orwell’s 1984? Or maybe, closer to the corporate driven states as depicted in the Alien franchise? Maybe it could be more of an apocalyptic scenario as in the Mad Max movies, where we revert back to Darwinian survival? We all have some vague idea of what a utopian future might look like and are more than keenly aware of how easily a utopian dream could turn into dystopia. So what does our current political and economic climate mean to what sort of future we create for our progeny? Does the extended outlook call for more democracy, or less? Capitalism or socialism? Currency or bitcoin?
I guess it depends on how much you want to nitpick on your definitions, but I would guess some version of authoritarianism. In a historical sense, our sort of representative government is a hothouse flower, needing special conditions to develop, but the default is some sort of authoritarianism, so we'll likely have that.
Thanks for responding. So, just to be clear, you think today's environment will evolve into authoritarianism in 100 years? Or is that regardless of today's conditions?
No. Actually I'm sad about it, but I'm trying to accept the limitations of humanity based on history. Meanwhile, you've started the thread and poll, and have contributed nothing to the topic. Where do you stand?
I've read a few science fiction / fantasy stories over the years. William Gibson's prediction of a giant sprawl is an example that fits none of the selections you've offered. However, I'm going with Authoritarian Capitalism - with China being the dominate superpower, assuming the US doesn't nuke the planet first.
@Lucifer People are so obsessed with 1984 they often forget another major dystopia : Brave new world, a world where everyone is so distracted they don't care of the affairs of the world. I can't really answer, but I suppose that the world would be vastly more different. I tend to adhere to the "big collapse" hypothesis : Basically, that for many reasons, we can't avoid a major economic collapse in the next years. An end to the economic relationship as we know it. It's often supposed to happen before 2050, and some people wonder if it doesn't has started. Like the dismantling of the (western) roman empire was rather a slow process. I suppose then, that the world after that would be much much more poor, with maybe a drastic reduction of manking number. I suppose that in 2120, the re building process would have already started. I'm afraid however that the years 2040 to 2080 would be horrible. I would suppose that things would start to go better after the 80's. Something quite likely is that the world could be much more rural. I would suppose that could be compared to the end of the USSR but on a much larger scale. From a cultural point of view, I would suppose that it would be both more progressive and traditionnal : for instance a better acceptation of homosexuality but in the same time people becoming back more severe on outside marriage sexual relationships. I'm sure of something, is that the future world would be hard to imagine, as I suppose there would be some major modification of the way of thinking of people as the economy would degrade further. We're near a horizon of events, which make any prediction quite hard to do.
I believe humanity as a whole benefits when it works together, so my aspirational projection is for a socialistic egalitarian system of governance where each individual is allowed to explore their talents to find the optimal satisfying role which contributes to society as a whole. In my opinion, all the other models would eventually lead to unnecessary conflict, waste, and tragedy. I do feel based on the current trend right now in this country we may be heading towards authoritarianism which is why there is so much unrest.
Gibson's sprawl, IIRC, was more closer to a corporate anarchy, at least it is what I gathered from his book, Mona Lisa Overdrive, and I believe Johnny Mnemonic was along the same lines too.
Unfortunately I do not have a clear recollection of any of Gibson's books. They are all to me a smeared out kinda Blade Runner / Matrix kinda worlds with the protagonists and antagonists lost in the somewhat mind-bending concepts.... Corporate anarchy though, yeah, that was certainly a component.
I do not feel that any authoritarian period will last long, so I picked socialist / egalitarian as my 100 year projection.
He envisioned a future where the breakdown of governments created a vacuum that was filled by mega-corporations. Not too far fetched considering the power of Google and FB.
I'm guessing that to you that embodies, if not utopia, than an improvement. Let me break down quickly why I don't see that. Most people of the leftward persuasion tend to "the Arc of the Moral Universe Is Long, But It Bends Toward Justice" view of human history. Things naturally get better. I think human civilization and justice, is fragile, like a garden. Unless tended and given the correct ingredients, it goes to weeds.
I agree with that statement. Where we may differ is in who should be the gardener. I think if you give everyone equal access to the knowledge and tools necessary, that all of us can tend to the garden rather than relying on a select few or just one.
At the grand scale of your poll question, I don't see the socio-political structures of world in 100 years being all that much different as they are today, just as they're not much different to how they were in the 1920s. Obviously a whole load of details will be different and all sorts of major events could act as sudden shifts but in general terms things don't change anything like as much as we often imagine or expect them to. That's why we're not living in the wonderful science-fiction "World of Tomorrow" that was commonly predicted only a few decades ago.
I beg to differ. Back in 1920, here in the United States, we passed women's suffrage, followed also by prohibition. On the world stage, the world was rebuilding after WWI and dividing up the Middle East, which set the stage for the events we have been living through for the past 50 years. Barring any wild unforeseen natural events, the world we create today is the foundation for tomorrow. There is an aspirational goal, and a realistic one based upon the conditions that seem to be shaping today. The 50's did produce a lot of hopeful sci-fi, but some of our more memorable writers were able to peer into the dark recesses of our collective minds and make some fairly accurate predictions.
In real terms, people have had access to that knowledge for a long time. I don't see things getting better. You have to have a mindset and culture that supports those concepts, and I don't think we have that.
And today we still have debates about women's rights like the "Me Too" movement along with major conflict over racial equality and ongoing debates about drug policy. The international conflicts that fed and evolved from the World Wars are still ongoing, with political divisions around Russia and China and pretty much constant conflict in the Middle East. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Yes, the small subtle predictions were much more likely to come to fruition than the grand promises of massive change (be it for the best or worst). When you raise the socio-political structures depicted in fiction like Star Trek, Orwell's 1984 or Mad Max, you're not making realistic predictions for the immediate future.
In the case of the West, we had it when we embraced enlightenment ideals. We are in a post enlightenment stage so whatever comes next won't likely embrace concepts like representative government, and freedom of speech or conscious. You don't "get back" to a previous save point like a video game. Culture will evolve as it evolves. I'm sure whatever comes next I won't like however.
That is why the only constant we can rely on IS change itself. These fictional narratives pave the way for the future. They inspire countless scientists, biologists, and engineers to make those futures become real. Our cell phones are a direct result of the communicator from Star Trek. Communication satellites were first inspired by a young Arthur C. Clarke. Designing the future becomes more complicated when you enter the realm of social change. Look at how rapidly and radically the Internet changed our lives. Certainly no one can predict with any accuracy what will happen to change the fabric of civilization in the next 100 years, but our hopes and dreams are the seed to bring it to fruition.
Here is a link to one of my all time favorite novella length scifi stories, "Swarm": http://wtf.tw/ref/sterling_crystal_express.pdf This story seems pretty cool to me for several reasons, hubris, the relative value of intelligence, and the creepy multi-species interstellar adsorption by the Swarm of vast civilizations is pretty sweet. It's kinda like maybe the Swarm is China and Captain-Doctor Simon Afriel is played by Jack Welch. Maybe a bit of a stretch. It's a fun story though. All of Bruce Sterling's stuff is pretty great, imo....
