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Akrid
I was reading through some old comic books and came acrossed one called "Robin 3000" and I thought to myself "what a strange time period" Nobody ever talks about Y3k. I seriously wonder if the human race will even make it that long.

Lets say we get cryo-froze and we wake up a thousand years from now like futuramma. What do you think the world will be like? With the way I see things going now in the world I think we would step out of the chamber and choke and die in a world devoid of a life sustaining enviroment.
thranduill
I think none of the above situations: I feel very optimistic for what concerns the future of mankind.
It is true that the actual situation is very difficult and dangerous for all of us,but
I see even now that a part of us ( increasing every day), has the dream of a more pacific , healthy world. Many people are starting thinking to the earth as a whole
organism, and what happens here and now will be in some way reflected everywhere.
In my idea this changement will begin at the end of this century ( in history from the idea of a changement to its relisation it takes about 100 years).
It will be a technological world without pollution and we will use for energy the sun, or the cosmic rays, or something like that.
The differences beetwen poor and rich countries will start to decrease and we
will start the changement from ourselves ( in my opinion there is not other way:
to stop a criminal you can kill him or make him more self conscious trough education and a different style of life).
We will start to understand again that the earth does not pertain to us, and that we pertain to it and to the universe.
The right of property will became a right of usufruct: nobody will be the owner of earth, water, air and fire. Such a things you cannot pay as you are made from it...
A dream? May be. What is life without a dream?
La vida es sueno, life is nothing but a dream.....
Switch
When I think that far into the future I tend to think up all the most insane technological advances and then triple it. Someone in the 1700s couldn't have comprehended the technology that would exist just 300 years later. I almost dread to think what we'll think up in the next 1000 years as things are developing. tongue.gif

Although I'm not sure we'll last that long... not because of technology but for other reasons that aren't allowed to be discussed here. ^^;
Chaosmaker
Asteriod hits the earth. Nobody survives except me myself and Irene. an Ice age occurs. eventually a green land comes and alot of people worshipping me grin.gif grin.gif grin.gif


Honestly i don't know what will become of us. Maybe Utopia maybe Hell maybe a Intergalactic Gas Station tongue.gif
Darnoc
I am very pessimistic concerning the survival of the human race. Humans have proven to be unable to learn from their past mistakes. The problem is that the more time advances, the more means we have to repeat does mistakes. So, if we think ahead, following the pattern of humanity, I don't believe Earth or the human race will exist in the year 3000.
ATHORIEL
I hope that in some way my essence will be store and I come back in Y3K as a Bender robot. Smokin, drinkin and cussin!!! grin.gif
ninja_lord666
To explain my answer to this (More urban everywhere, billions more people), I will disprove the others.

Green, filled with nature and happyness, hardly any people: Unless the entire human race suffers a non-nuclear genocide, this will never happen. Humans have taken complete control of this planet and won't give it up without a fight.

Same as now, more people: With our current population growth, it will be impossible for us to NOT become urbanised. Also, with our current development of technology, we will without a doubt, have colonies on other planets by 3000.

A Machine planet, so many people our lifes are worthless: This is obviously inspired by movies like The Matrix and Terminator. This is also impossible seeing as how machines cannot have feelings unless we program them in, and world domination is a feeling. We wouldn't be stupid enough to tell our robots that they think that they should rule the world.

Post nuclear wasteland, nobody left: As long as we remember Hiroshima, this will *probably* never happen...just don't elect me as president, lol! tongue.gif

Totally differant, new super race in control, humans only a myth: Impossible by 3000. Maybe in the year 3000000. Evolution takes place in GLOBAL time scale. It took about nine (I think) million years for humans to evolve into our current form, Homo sapien sapien, and we have only been around for several thousand years--not long enough for evolution to tweak our genes again.

Taken over by aliens, Earth become a gallatic gas station: Not likely, While I don't disbelieve in life on other planets, the chances for life are so slim, that it probably only happened four or five times in the ENTIRE universe, and the chances that another planet with life is within the Milkyway galaxy is near impossible.

Apocalypse, Earth ruined to ashes, demons etc.:I can't discuss this for the rules forbid it, but all I will say is that there is NO scientific proof backing up MOST (not all) of what's in the bible.

Utopia, science brings immortality and perfection to all man: By definition, a utpoia is a perfect paradise free from evil and corruption. For this I will reffer you to Malchik here.

Ants get big, consume all, ant world: Not as far-fetched as it seems. If evolution tweaks ant genes enough, it could happen, but again you have the problem of global time scale not being one thousand years.

All-in-all, only the third answer, More urban everywhere, billions more people, is at all possible.

EDIT: woops, I forgot to check the date. sorry for thread necromancy. I promise I'll try hardder next time.
Povuholo
QUOTE(Switch @ Aug 10 2005, 01:50 PM) [snapback]118826[/snapback]

Although I'm not sure we'll last that long... not because of technology but for other reasons that aren't allowed to be discussed here. ^^;

What? God will be making an appearance and destroy mankind?

If we're still alive, well... The earth is filled with nuclear waste, the fossil fuels are running out so... Green energy? Fusion power? A different technology?

By 3000, we'll probably know everything about the brain. And shoot a few micro computers in it at birth, making us superintelligent. I don't know tongue.gif

Edit: Didn't notice above post was thread necromancy, but I think we can keep this thing alive.
Abramul
An environmental/natural resource crash of one sort or another seems plausible. However, it would take nothing short of the complete destruction of the ecosystem to eliminate humankind, and even that might not be effective.
elpiggo
I don't think we'll collonise other planets, unless this happens. Space takes too much time to cross and you can't go faster than the speed of light. It would take the time between now and the year 3000 to reach a star a thousand light years away, which is nothing in the void of space. However, we could use the 'domes' theory, and completely simulate the temperature, gravity, air levels (an alternative to oxygen?), and more.

I think if we don't collonise another planet the world will become a urbanated to the brink of extinction (Corusant just doesn't work).
Abramul
An Ecumenopolis would work, however:
QUOTE
A world undergoing this level of hyper-development would presumably either have its food imported from other planets, or grown in vast orbital or subterranean hydroponics facilities. A civilization capable of building an ecumenopolis is almost by definition at least ranked as Type I on the Kardashev scale.
(Wikipedia)

As for colonies: the first non-Earth colony will either be on the moon, or Earth-orbit. I'd guess a moon colony is more likely, especially if a robotic 'seed' mission is viable. (Sending small robots, which refine materials and build bigger robots, which then build a base.)

First orbital colony would likely be an asteroid moved into a stable orbit, and hollowed out. This has a number of advantages, in particular that it wouldn't be necessary to ship large amounts of material from the surface, and it would be an excellent construction yard.
Tiberiu911
The rate humankind grows, I voted for Urbanised and over populated. There will come a point where Earth alone will not be able to feed its growing population, so colonies will probally start appearing, I doubt on other planets, but things like Abramul mentioned in the above post seem plausible (Earth orbit, Moon, etc).

Ironic thing, a war kills people, but with the death of those people, the population will diminuish, hence allowing others to live mellow.gif . In 1000 years, we should see a couple large-scale wars that might keep the overgrowing population to a halt, hence going against the over populated choice.

QUOTE
By 3000, we'll probably know everything about the brain. And shoot a few micro computers in it at birth, making us superintelligent. I don't know


Yeah, medecine advances quite fast. Human kind might turn into cyborgs.

An interesting thing I noticed, is that we can't predict the future (yet ph34r.gif ). I was looking through some old books a long time ago, and I found this book that dated from the 70's or so. There was a page in it which showed what the year 2000 was going to look like. In the illustration, there where flying cars, men in space suits and large scale technological buildings everywhere.

Who knows, year 3000 might not be so different as it is now, though we are talking about a millenia jump and not 30 years.
KzinistZerg
I think it's impossible to predict. Look where we weer at 0 AD, 500 AD, 1000 AD, 1500 AD, 1800 AD, 1900 AD and even in 1950, even, hell, in the 80s and 70s. Everything changes too quick and there's too many possibilities. I think we'll end up with cities but probably more environmentally friendly technology, and more people. Or civilization will explode.
rob_b
Actually, things started to change quickly in the past 60-70 yrs. Men have gone to the moon, the spacesuit thing is kind of a given (NASA is wanting to send men to Mars now!), our buildings would look futuristic to a simpleton from the Nifty Fifties, but the flying car part is just plain insane. In 1000 yrs, perhaps we might see anti-gravity boosters installed on vehicles, but in 1000 yrs, things could change. It's very dangerous to even think about that. Hell, I don't even care to think about what I'm gonna do tomorrow for Pete's sake!
Povuholo
Okay so now we've heard all kinds of things about the environment, health and technology...

But how about computer technology?

How do you think games would look like in the year 3000? Textures of higher quality than real life objects? tongue.gif Being able to feel everything and move the character in an action game with your body, and pointing at locations and give instructions through talking in RTS games?
ninja_lord666
QUOTE(Povuholo @ Mar 16 2007, 12:59 PM) [snapback]229395[/snapback]

Okay so now we've heard all kinds of things about the environment, health and technology...

But how about computer technology?

How do you think games would look like in the year 3000? Textures of higher quality than real life objects? tongue.gif Being able to feel everything and move the character in an action game with your body, and pointing at locations and give instructions through talking in RTS games?


I think games would be reality! there would be special domes (the future will have dome buildings) where optical illusion (of course very realistic looking tongue.gif ) would be the buildings, rocks, trees, items, monsters, NPCs, etc. and you could play the game with your real body (inguries would obviously be fake).
...THAT would be a great game, lol.
Tiberiu911
What about a special pill (spelling?) you take before you go to sleep which is the video game. You play in your own imagination, in your dreams, while sleeping! Buy a new pill and play another video game the next night! Play online with your friends and do whatever you can do in real life in the comfort of your bed. Woohooz!

Though personally, I think the term Video Game will dissapear from human vocabularry, to be remplaced with something else. Games will evolve, you won't see the same things in 1000 years.
ninja_lord666
QUOTE(Tiberiu911 @ Mar 16 2007, 07:50 PM) [snapback]229558[/snapback]

Though personally, I think the term Video Game will dissapear from human vocabularry, to be remplaced with something else. Games will evolve, you won't see the same things in 1000 years.


I agree, I don't think video game will be an accurate term if we are playing games with holographs and in our dreams...personally, I believe English will be an extict language. Something easier and more phonetic (ironic that the word phonetic isn't phoneticaly spelled) will arise, or maybe we will be able to speak through telepathic waves...although that would kind of fall under the "evolution" area and is thus is impossible by 3000 (see my previous post on page 1)...
Abramul
QUOTE(ninja_lord666 @ Mar 17 2007, 02:03 AM) [snapback]229563[/snapback]

...or maybe we will be able to speak through telepathic waves...although that would kind of fall under the "evolution" area and is thus is impossible by 3000 (see my previous post on page 1)...

What's infeasible about 'telepathic' implants?

Of course, this raises the question of "What is telepathy?", but that's sufficiently broad that it would best be left to a separate thread.
ninja_lord666
QUOTE(Abramul @ Mar 16 2007, 08:51 PM) [snapback]229575[/snapback]

What's infeasible about 'telepathic' implants?

Of course, this raises the question of "What is telepathy?", but that's sufficiently broad that it would best be left to a separate thread.


You're right, I didn't even think about implants blush.gif How silly of me. Yeah, by then we would have mastered not only machinery, but also human biology. We would have robotic cyborgs ohmy.gif Also, we would most likely know everything about the human genome and most likely be able to biologicaly change ourselves. Suffice to say, we wouldn't be entirely human anymore... sad.gif
boom_ninja
Hmm, I think that the world will form into one large nation and global terrorists will take out important figures and such becomes the down come of the entire world blah blah blah /idea tongue.gif

Oh, and anti-matter bombs will wipe out the world (yes, scientits are ACTUALLY thinking of it ph34r.gif )
Abramul
QUOTE(boom_ninja @ Mar 25 2007, 06:06 PM) [snapback]233389[/snapback]

Hmm, I think that the world will form into one large nation and global terrorists will take out important figures and such becomes the down come of the entire world blah blah blah /idea tongue.gif

Oh, and anti-matter bombs will wipe out the world (yes, scientits are ACTUALLY thinking of it ph34r.gif )

If you're thinking that terrorists would be the ones deploying antimatter bombs, the production of insignificant quantities of antimatter requires large investments of time, money, and materials. Nuclear weaponry is far more feasible for small organizations.

Please, do your research.
Paul Emil
I'd like to see Nanotechnology on a massive scale (well, not actually see per se, coz I'll either be dead or living as a brain floating inna tank tongue.gif ). Perhaps the tech could be used for extending human lifespans into the 1000s of years, which would be useful when it comes to space exploration.
Marxist ßastard
QUOTE(Paul Emil @ May 18 2007, 04:08 AM) [snapback]256745[/snapback]
...nanotechnology on a massive scale...

In other words, technology.
Ginji
QUOTE(Marxist ßastard @ May 18 2007, 08:09 PM) [snapback]256906[/snapback]

QUOTE(Paul Emil @ May 18 2007, 04:08 AM) [snapback]256745[/snapback]
...nanotechnology on a massive scale...

In other words, technology.

LOL laugh.gif

But, I think he means Nanotechnology on a global scale
cyronarxes
sad.gif I would never ever want nanotechnology to occur. I mean yes, the reward would be bountyfull but think of the result if an error occurred. Here is a thought. Say they inject nanobots into people to rebuild lost cells and help fight off disease's. The nanobots also repair damaged genes and demolecularize cancer cells. However an error occurs and the nanobots begin demolecularizing healthy cells. eventually you have nanobots which are in everyone damaging thier genes and creating havok.This is an actual theory known as the mud theory (I might be spelling it wrong). Also if robots rebelled against humans, humans would have a chance to fight back if we were completly biotic. however when you put the enemy in you, the nanobots can in affect do whatever they want to you and you can do nothing about it. they could even control your body if they wanted to. All in all, i do not fancy nanobots because to much interdependence leads to dependence and dependence on another entity is not good.
Peregrine
QUOTE(cyronarxes @ May 19 2007, 05:15 PM) [snapback]257464[/snapback]

sad.gif I would never ever want nanotechnology to occur. I mean yes, the reward would be bountyfull but think of the result if an error occurred. Here is a thought. Say they inject nanobots into people to rebuild lost cells and help fight off disease's. The nanobots also repair damaged genes and demolecularize cancer cells. However an error occurs and the nanobots begin demolecularizing healthy cells. eventually you have nanobots which are in everyone damaging thier genes and creating havok.This is an actual theory known as the mud theory (I might be spelling it wrong). Also if robots rebelled against humans, humans would have a chance to fight back if we were completly biotic. however when you put the enemy in you, the nanobots can in affect do whatever they want to you and you can do nothing about it. they could even control your body if they wanted to. All in all, i do not fancy nanobots because to much interdependence leads to dependence and dependence on another entity is not good.



That's actually a pretty over-stated risk. For one thing, self-replicating nanomachines like you're thinking of just don't work. Even ignoring the limits of our technology, I strongly suspect we're talking about fundamental laws of physics getting in the way. Not that nanotechnology is a useless concept (and it already exists, like it or not), but the scifi versions are just that, fiction.

Of course so are any ideas of "technology rebelling against humans". Even if somehow we manage to create true artificial intelligence, proper programming limitations and built-in self-destruct orders will end the revolution very quickly. The highly unlikely chain of events that could produce any kind of rebellion is once again, pure science fiction.

QUOTE(Abramul @ Mar 25 2007, 04:41 PM) [snapback]233435[/snapback]

QUOTE(boom_ninja @ Mar 25 2007, 06:06 PM) [snapback]233389[/snapback]

Hmm, I think that the world will form into one large nation and global terrorists will take out important figures and such becomes the down come of the entire world blah blah blah /idea tongue.gif

Oh, and anti-matter bombs will wipe out the world (yes, scientits are ACTUALLY thinking of it ph34r.gif )

If you're thinking that terrorists would be the ones deploying antimatter bombs, the production of insignificant quantities of antimatter requires large investments of time, money, and materials. Nuclear weaponry is far more feasible for small organizations.

Please, do your research.


Really, anyone deploying antimatter bombs is kind of silly. Creating antimatter is a (pretty significant) net energy loss. Even with the most advanced technology possible, all that antimatter weapons could do is impove energy density, allowing the same amount of destruction in a smaller package (but still with the same energy investment required to make it). There's no real practical benefit, at least in the forseeable future, nuclear weapons are more than capable of destroying anything we could want destroyed.

Of course nuclear weapons aren't even that realistic for small organizations. It's much harder to design a working one than you might think, as we can see from the complete failures of Iran and North Korea. More importantly, production of one requires a ton of infrastructure that a small terrorist group isn't going to have (kind of contradicts the idea of being small and hidden).
thejake1453
QUOTE(cyronarxes @ May 20 2007, 07:15 AM) [snapback]257464[/snapback]

sad.gif I would never ever want nanotechnology to occur. I mean yes, the reward would be bountyfull but think of the result if an error occurred. Here is a thought. Say they inject nanobots into people to rebuild lost cells and help fight off disease's. The nanobots also repair damaged genes and demolecularize cancer cells. However an error occurs and the nanobots begin demolecularizing healthy cells. eventually you have nanobots which are in everyone damaging thier genes and creating havok.This is an actual theory known as the mud theory (I might be spelling it wrong). Also if robots rebelled against humans, humans would have a chance to fight back if we were completly biotic. however when you put the enemy in you, the nanobots can in affect do whatever they want to you and you can do nothing about it. they could even control your body if they wanted to. All in all, i do not fancy nanobots because to much interdependence leads to dependence and dependence on another entity is not good.


nope wont work, just put that program in that doesnt allow any robots to hurt humans in anyway. its like robot theory law or whatever.
any way robots cant rebel unless someone purposfully puts a progeam into the robots that make them rebel.
like in irobot, but that was a crap film anyway
Peregrine
QUOTE(thejake1453 @ May 21 2007, 02:05 AM) [snapback]258045[/snapback]

nope wont work, just put that program in that doesnt allow any robots to hurt humans in anyway. its like robot theory law or whatever.
any way robots cant rebel unless someone purposfully puts a progeam into the robots that make them rebel.
like in irobot, but that was a crap film anyway


Hm... now this sounds like a famliar argument. Where have I heard this before? Oh, right:

QUOTE(My post right above yours:)
Of course so are any ideas of "technology rebelling against humans". Even if somehow we manage to create true artificial intelligence, proper programming limitations and built-in self-destruct orders will end the revolution very quickly. The highly unlikely chain of events that could produce any kind of rebellion is once again, pure science fiction.




And the term you're looking for is the Three Laws of Robotics. Go read your classic science fiction and forget that abomination of a movie ever existed. But that's mostly irrelevant, you'd need to develop true artificial intelligence (and then it wouldn't really be a robot anymore) before you can work with that kind of un-specific law. But those laws aren't too realistic anyway, by the time you have artificial intelligence sophisticated enough to use them, you have artificial intelligence sophisticated enough to find the loopholes (again, read the books).

The more realistic situation is simply a hardwired override/shutdown system. Hit the kill switch and the problem robot is dealt with, no moral dillemas or vague guidelines required.
Fitzey12
Either an urban sprawl of the matrix glare.gif

But if you think about it the matrix wouldn't be far fetched at all in 1000 years if anything it would be old technology (Like Ninjas ph34r.gif ),as far as I know someone has had their hand modified (right word?) to include wires to control a lamp (true) and as soon as the human race knows enough about anatomy they could fairly easily make a computer that responds to electrical impulses sent down the spinal cord,It would probably be the only chance of survival mankind has other than finding resources on other planets,Think about it how much food do you need if you dont move at all,of course this would cause the human race to be small and sort of shriveled but that'd be he price ofsurvival,and if everyone was in one MASSIVE building with tiny chamber things the rest of the world could be used for agiculture to feed the people,and HUGE wind farms to power the "matrix" That would also eliminate the need for coal,gas,oil,diamonds etc. ,but that would create a larger problem of the people needed to maintain the "matrix" and them possibly shutting down the whole system and effectivly sending the human race back thousands of years of population growth and also possibly destroying the human race completly because of one persons greed.


And thats just ONE scenario of what the human race could be in 1000 years time
If you read all that have a cookie *holds out cookies*

Or it could be just like futurama cool.gif
Marxist ßastard
So then you're saying that in the future, we will outgrow our resources, and will have to send a significant portion of the world population, a few people at a time, to a very specific building. Those people would be promised that upon entrance to the building, they will have a better life, devoid of suffering, with their every need fulfilled. They would enter the building and be unable to affect the rest of the world for the remainder of their lives. Once inside the building, they would take up less resources so that the rest of humanity could prosper.

Of course, to limit the impact of their departure from society, it should be a priority to eliminate what would effectively be widows and orphans of people sent to the building --- thus, one would have to strive to send entire families to the building at once. In the case of larger families, we would probably have to put more distant relatives into the building at the same time, too. Naturally, close friends and love interests would be right by the side of whoever is being sent in. That's not to mention how people can have a lasting effect on their neighborhood, or even their entire nation. Obviously, the maintainers of the building would have to help to ease society's suffering by helping them forget about whoever gets sent to the building. Ideally, there should be no record at all that a person removed from society even existed --- papers would have to be burned, events denied, and people sworn to secrecy. Maybe it would be prudent to focus first on those that society would easily forget: vagrants and bottom feeders, just to name a few. There are some groups that society would just love to see gone, such as violent criminals...

This all sounds vaguely familiar, doesn't it?
Ginji
QUOTE(Fitzey12 @ Jun 2 2007, 11:05 PM) [snapback]264656[/snapback]

as far as I know someone has had their hand modified (right word?) to include wires to control a lamp (true)

Is that the same guy that put a chip in his wrist (attached to his nerve system) so that he could control robots (that were linked to the chip by a signal)?

I know that that is true.
Fitzey12
That's what i was talking about, Ginji

And Marxist, the way humans are using resources it'd be one of the only ways other than finding some resources on other planets , it wouldn't be about morals or anything else. People would have a life the same if not better than their old one due to the computers simulating real life, so no it's not what you're talking about it's NOT mass genocide, there'd be no discrimination because by then the human race would probably look like clones and wear cool jumpsuits ph34r.gif I attached a power point illustration of what it would be like

IPB Image
Peregrine
QUOTE(Fitzey12 @ Jun 3 2007, 04:41 AM) [snapback]264943[/snapback]
And Marxist, the way humans are using resources it'd be one of the only ways other than finding some resources on other planets,


Which is infinitely more practical. Creating a "matrix" is completely beyond anything we understand. Harvesting resources from other planets/asteroids is just a matter of having the determination to do it, and investing the effort needed. The technological advances needed are much simpler, and actually a realistic possibility.

QUOTE
it wouldn't be about morals or anything else. People would have a life the same if not better than their old one due to the computers simulating real life,


Just repeating the same statement over and over again doesn't make it true. The burden of proof is on YOU to prove that it is possible to create a simulation of the real world that is so convincing that the user would be happy living in it forever.

QUOTE
so no it's not what you're talking about it's NOT mass genocide, there'd be no discrimination because by then the human race would probably look like clones and wear cool jumpsuits


This is just hillarious, taking bad science fiction films as an accurate vision of the future. Why would humans look like clones? Do you even have the most basic understanding of genetics and variation?




And the "matrix" idea is just stupid beyond belief. You're claiming that all the billions of humans would have their own personal world, so detailed and convincing that they have no desire to leave it. What, you thought you could just put everyone in one MMORPG-like world? Absolutely not... lets look at the example of the poor janitor. To create an accurate and convincing copy of the world for the CEO, you need to have all the people under him, all the way down to the janitor scrubbing his toilet. So now you've doomed our poor janitor to spend the rest of his life in a computer simulation, pretending to do his job so that someone else can have a more convincing world. Not really fair, is it? So the only solution is to put everyone in their individual world, where they can live however they like.

But that's an even bigger problem. Now you're talking about artificial intelligence of unbelievable complexity. Modern AI technology is nowhere near this level, even if we limit ourselves to single-task specialists, not a general "artificial human". There have been some promising hints in the area of self-programming adaptive networks, but that's all done by trial and error. Here we run into another fatal problem... the human brain evolved over hundreds of millions of years of natural selection. To duplicate this process would likely require similar amounts of time (remember, you need the entire lifespan of the organism to properly account for the selection factor, you can't just spawn a billion generations at once). Even if it can be shortened, it is likely that even, by some miracle, we found the perfect AI framework and started evolving it right this minute, it wouldn't be anywhere near finished by the year 3000.

By the way, I realize that there is a high US population on this forum, and something like 90% of you are dumb enough to reject evolution (I know, the US sucks, I'm embarassed to live here) and will likely rush to disagree with my point about natural selection. Let me just state that evolution is the best-case scenario for the matrix fanboys. Lets say we reject all of science, and arbitrarily declare that "god did it". Now we're in an even worse position, because creating human-level intelligence (mandatory for the matrix) requires an omnipotent god. Since it is highly doubtful that humans will achieve divine status within the next 993 years, it's a safe bet that we will not be able to reproduce Genesis and simply wish our matrix into existence.
CJD
I dont hav an elaborate answer like that but i do believe it will just be more urban. I dont think we will change much in a thousand years. We will however hav flying cars, and virtual reality of that im sure.
RedPlague
QUOTE(Peregrine @ Jun 5 2007, 04:11 PM) [snapback]266387[/snapback]
By the way, I realize that there is a high US population on this forum, and something like 90% of you are dumb enough to reject evolution (I know, the US sucks, I'm embarassed to live here) and will likely rush to disagree with my point about natural selection. Let me just state that evolution is the best-case scenario for the matrix fanboys. Lets say we reject all of science, and arbitrarily declare that "god did it". Now we're in an even worse position, because creating human-level intelligence (mandatory for the matrix) requires an omnipotent god. Since it is highly doubtful that humans will achieve divine status within the next 993 years, it's a safe bet that we will not be able to reproduce Genesis and simply wish our matrix into existence.


I couldn't agree more, except that i have a hard time believing we came from primates. The whole missing link thing lends itself fairly well to reasonable doubt. Though divine intervention is significantly less plausible. Just call me a disbeliever.

CJD, we were supposed to have flying cars what, fifty years ago? Give it up. Besides most people are horrible drivers in two dimensions, do you really want them driving in three?
Peregrine
QUOTE(RedPlague @ Jun 10 2007, 01:48 AM) [snapback]268337[/snapback]
QUOTE(Peregrine @ Jun 5 2007, 04:11 PM) [snapback]266387[/snapback]
By the way, I realize that there is a high US population on this forum, and something like 90% of you are dumb enough to reject evolution (I know, the US sucks, I'm embarassed to live here) and will likely rush to disagree with my point about natural selection. Let me just state that evolution is the best-case scenario for the matrix fanboys. Lets say we reject all of science, and arbitrarily declare that "god did it". Now we're in an even worse position, because creating human-level intelligence (mandatory for the matrix) requires an omnipotent god. Since it is highly doubtful that humans will achieve divine status within the next 993 years, it's a safe bet that we will not be able to reproduce Genesis and simply wish our matrix into existence.


I couldn't agree more, except that i have a hard time believing we came from primates. The whole missing link thing lends itself fairly well to reasonable doubt. Though divine intervention is significantly less plausible. Just call me a disbeliever.


Just a note to Switch/Dark0ne: I know you can't stand the fact that I'm an atheist, but this has nothing to do with religion. RedPlague explicitly stated that he's not talking about divine intervention, and neither am I. So don't even think of deleting this post. Now then...

That's a common misconception: we didn't evolve from primates, humans and primates both evolved from a common ancestor. And the evidence is unarguable, we share an incredibly high percentage of our genes with primates. Even ignoring the fossil record, it's easy to trace back these genetic similarities and contruct an approximate evolutionary tree for pretty much any species. We know what genes we have in common, we know the approximate mutation rate, we know the structural similarities, etc. The only "doubt" comes from creationists who reject the entire concept of science and empiricism.

But the whole "missing link" thing is just a giant appeal to ignorance fallacy. Think about it for a moment... lets take two species, modern humans and the common ape/human ancestor. There's a gap, your so-called missing link. Now lets say a record of an intermediate species is found, call it Species A. The gap-ist's response would be "now there are TWO gaps!" (instead of human-ancestor, now we have ancestor-A, A-human), considering the overall theory twice as weak, not better supported. Now lets say another species, Species B is found, filling the gap between A-human. Now we have three "missing links" (ancestor-A, A-B, B-human) to deal with. I think you can see the pattern... unless we have a record of every individual organism between the ancestor and modern humans, there's always going to be a "missing link" you can point to.

And this is exactly what we should expect. Fossils only form under very specific and rare conditions, the majority of organisms simply die and are lost forever. Now consider the incredibly tiny percentage of the planet's surface we've searched for fossils. How many "missing links" are somewhere in a vast wilderness waiting to be found? How many "missing links" have been paved over to build another parking lot? How many "missing links" have been imperfectly fossilized and exist only as fragments or mis-identified random bones?

So in summary, not only does the proof for primates and humans sharing a common ancestor exist, but the only counter-argument is completely fallacious.

QUOTE
CJD, we were supposed to have flying cars what, fifty years ago? Give it up. Besides most people are horrible drivers in two dimensions, do you really want them driving in three?


/aerospace engineer mode on

Actually, we do have flying cars, they just haven't been practical (cost-effective, really) to mass-produce. The engineering problems for a car and a plane are just so different that a flying car would be far too inefficient at both flying and driving. Unless you have a very compelling reason to do it, you're better off buying a car and a plane, and driving yourself to the airport. And that reason just doesn't exist.

But the real reason for that is people insist on taking "flying car" literally, and thinking of some bizarre hybrid. In reality, the ideal "flying car" would replace roads completely, it would be nothing more than an increase in popularity of small planes. And there are only two reasons we can't do this to a high degree, in the modern age of computers and automatic pilots:

1) Our city layout generally sucks for something like this. Yes, you can cut takeoff/landing distance to pretty absurdly small levels (even without vertical takeoff, you can easily design a light plane to operate off a football-field size patch of generally flat ground). But think about how many places you drive to, and imagine putting a tiny airport next to each of them. You'll need some kind of ground transport to get you from a central hub airport to the destination (you might imagine dozens of these in a major city), but that's the bigger problem: our public transit system SUCKS. The necessary public mass-transit to support flying cars would be insanely expensive, and pretty unlikely in the forseeable future.

2) Computers are good, but not quite good enough to deal with problems. Making an autopilot that flies under ideal conditions is easy. Making an autopilot that can deal with bad weather/emergencies/etc is much harder. But this is a pretty straightforward engineering problem, it's only a matter of time before we can build a plane where you just press the "fly to the grocery store" button and the humans are just along for the ride. So poor driving skills aren't that much of a problem.

So there's no real technical reason why we couldn't make the change from driving to flying (and the extra volume for traffic in 3-dimensions is a good one in favor of it). In fact, I could probably design you one right now (well, after a couple more years of classes). The only thing standing in the way is nobody really wants to do it. If the economic/convenience factors changed for some reason and there was a real demand for them, we'd have flying cars just as soon as the companies could set up their production lines.
RedPlague
Interesting read on both counts. Though i cringe at the thought of what would be done with the refuse made from roads becoming obsolete.
Peregrine
QUOTE(RedPlague @ Jun 10 2007, 10:25 PM) [snapback]268746[/snapback]
Interesting read on both counts.


If you want to know more, I'd suggest any of Richard Dawkins' books on genetics/evolution. River Out of Eden is pretty short, and covers a lot of those issues, but the others are definitely worth reading. Whether or not you agree with his books and essays on atheism, his scientific work is both technically unarguable and well-written.

Or, if you had any specific questions, feel free to ask them... I can disprove pretty much any of the usual anti-evolution arguments. Whatever your reasons for not accepting the theory completely, it's pretty easy to address them convincingly.

QUOTE
Though i cringe at the thought of what would be done with the refuse made from roads becoming obsolete.


The answer is probably nothing. Like I said, you'll still need some kind of ground transporation, even if it's just over short distances (a mile or two). Whatever form it takes, it's likely that it would use the existing roads. And even if nobody wants them anymore (not even for walking), they'll just be left to decay. Nobody is going to bother tearing them up unless they're in the way of some future project, and even then it's a pretty simple issue. Roads aren't toxic waste or something, tear them up and it's just more bulk rubble to be disposed of along with the usual rocks and trees and stuff that get cleared out every day.
The Hippie
in my mind were screwed either way im having a lot of trouble imagining humans as a species conserving nature have you ever read the book caves of steel by isaac asimov? think that except communist (well have to be to conserve whats left methinks) i hope i die before that process starts

Edit: sweet im not the only aerospace guy
niraxA
All hail the Giant Ants! Unlikely? Very. The venerable insect overlords still have my vote anyway.
Seriously though, increased urban sprawl is probably the most likely of the given choices. But if it goes on long enough, we might end up with the wasteland/post-nuclear carnage scenario. It's all pure speculation though. For all we know, it could be like Star Trek (the whole utopia thing).
Eolath
Imagine the moon, that will be our planet only a little bit bigger biggrin.gif
Kuschel-Drow
I'm for the more urban und billions of people more thing. ^^

But what should I really expect? I mean, why make up my mind about things that will go on while I lay around in a coffin? ^^ Don't we have enough to think of in our lives? tongue.gif

And if something like rebirth really exists... Then I don't wanna come back again. Not on earth and not elsewhere. One time is definitely enough. smile.gif (A virtual world would be something else xD)
Jonlissla
QUOTE(Kuschel-Drow @ Sep 26 2007, 03:00 PM) *
And if something like rebirth really exists... Then I don't wanna come back again. Not on earth and not elsewhere. One time is definitely enough.


But think of all the movies/games we miss! rolleyes.gif

Still, would get kind of boring "respawning" all the time. happy.gif
ninja_lord666
QUOTE(Jonlissla @ Sep 26 2007, 08:52 AM) *
Still, would get kind of boring "respawning" all the time. happy.gif

Well, if you're talking about Buddhist and Hindu reincarnation, then it wouldn't get boring as you would have no memory of your previous lives.
Lord Barkmann
The Gates of Oblivion will open up and destroy us ALL unsure.gif
Sativarg
I voted for the cosmic gas station as no other choice came close.

I believe that the earth is much like a garden that has been and is being manipulated to produce. Eventually it will be time to harvest. After that the most productive of the humans will be gathered and taken as well as much of the natural resources that have been gathered into land fills, nuclear waist sights and other storage sights. If the manipulating race or races see fit they will leave the Moon in place but it will not be maintained. Without maintenance the moons functionality will degrade as well as its primary and secondary functions.

The moon as a machine:
  1. climate stabilization
    • causes cyclical tidal flows facilitating the ocean currents needed to maintain favorable global temperatures
  2. Earth core stimulation
    • causes the earths core to remain active thus maintaining a relatively stable magnetic shield.
Eventually without the moons influences the climate will become erratic and the core will become unstable. The magnetic shielding will tend to fail more and more regularly until the solar wind and cosmic radiation take their tole on the biosphere. If I am correct, the Earth will be much like Mars is today unless Earth becomes indispensable to the manipulators in a more contemporary state.
ninja_lord666
QUOTE(Sativarg @ Sep 30 2007, 03:18 PM) *

You read waaaay too much science fiction...
Sativarg
QUOTE(ninja_lord666 @ Sep 30 2007, 03:51 PM) *
QUOTE(Sativarg @ Sep 30 2007, 03:18 PM) *

You read waaaay too much science fiction...
Yea that תנ״ך was pretty far fetched. To many authors for my taste. LOL
TheRealWolfman
I predict that there will be more green, more people, but a much healthier planet, and people will live much longer, not immortal, and no one will be perfect.

At least this is what i hope it's like.
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