Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: wdolson

It's human negative bias. We spent thousands of years in an environment where there were many things that could kill us at every turn. Learning to look out for potential hazards actually did pay off. So we worry about what might befall us in the future.

For people in the industrialized world, we've never been safer. Though the US and some other industrialized countries have been in small wars (relative to past wars) for the last decade, there are fewer wars in the world than there used to be. Despite some horrific crimes splashed on the news, the violent crime rate has been dropping for the last 15 years. The economy is bad, health care in the US is still overly expensive, and a lot of other ills. However, life expectancy in the developed world has never been higher and the diseases that killed most of our great grand parents (and for some our grand parents or parents) have gone from constant threats to rare, or we have come up with ways to mitigate them.

Despite things getting better in general, we still find all the flaws. I could easily name a bunch of negative things about the world that went through my head writing this that I didn't mention. The negative bias to find the flaws is active in all of us.

Doomsday scenarios are part of that negative bias. We have this niggling feeling that if things are going OK, they must be a sabre toothed tiger around here somewhere and we're its next meal. Because sabre toothed tigers are extinct (and we're not!), we scare ourselves with the dangers that could conceivably happen.

Bill

Don´t get me wrong, I am not buying any of that Sci-Fi day-after-tomorrow-crap. It is rubbish, and the problem is that its exactly this rubbish which
- in one variant or the other - is sold the loudest.

Doomsday scenarios sell better, thats why every publicity-eager wannabe expert likes to discuss them.
But doomsday scenarios are the extreme variant of less frightening but much more likely sociopolitical collapse scenarios.

In our generation the global behaviour of humanity as a whole is one of increasingly massed exploitation of rapidly decreasing non-renewable ressources - trying to
satisfy the needs of an ever increasing percentage of total population. With the new global players China and India only in their teens from a living standard perspective,
and countries with delicate regions of immense ecological importance - like Brazil- following suit, the short to mid-term outlook for a toning down of this global spiral is exactly zero.

This very likely will not lead to a Doomsday scenario ending humanity as a whole. But I rate the chances of this leading to a partial or complete collapse of the current world order,
a globally felt economical crisis, famine in regions where the word is not yet known, wars fought over increasingly rare ressources, and a notable overall decrease of human population
as a result, pretty high.

I do not need to have a negative bias for that prediction, just deduce from current events and tendencies.

My personal bet is that the percentage of world population able to hold our current western hemisphere living standard will be only a tiny fraction in 2-3 generations.
This is why I will try to teach my child not to take the current omnipresent luxury for granted, which is pretty tough in our society based on consumption.

If this turns out to be incorrect then I am extremely happy to have been proven wrong. But those who say humanity is not very close to a very hard to stop downward
spiral is looking in the wrong direction IMHO.

The Japanese will hit Pearl Harbour again, just for laughs.

No.. that will not be the end.. We will be eliminated as an obstruction to the Pan-Galactic Super Highway.

@RevRick ahh... but that still won't be the end.. the mice wouldn't like that.

ORIGINAL: RevRick

No.. that will not be the end.. We will be eliminated as an obstruction to the Pan-Galactic Super Highway.

+1[:D][:D]

Borg-like humans will first appear in the Tour de France.

Haven't yet watched the documentary, but I wanted to comment.
Some civilization ending scenarios are not just sci-fi apocalyptic prophecies, they are quite plausible in theory.
A transition from Type 0 to Type 1 Civilization in the Kardashev Scale is considered the hardest evolutionary step for a civilization and it's the most likely to generate a self-destruction event. The most probable ones are a nanotechnology catastrophe and an all-out nuclear war. Since we are Type 0, I wouldn't dismiss the possibility of self-destruction in the next century.

P.S. The book "Prey" by the late Michael Crichton deals with nanotechnology going wrong...for anyone interested [:)]

ORIGINAL: WO Katsuki


so they basically believe in the terminator movies?

well my house got foreclosed a couple years ago, i'm more worried about the guys who ruined our economy and sent us to iraq..

jesse ventura for president [:)]

+1

We have exceeded the carrying capacity of this planet given the currently
available technology. So far the avoidance of nuclear war and profligate
use of non-renewable resources coupled with technological improvements
have kept us just ahead of the collapse part of the curve. If we can find
a solution to the resource problem and continue to advance technologies
to feed the multitude until population is stable and avoid nuclear war
and nanotech disaster and it doesn't get too hot too fast we are okay.
Otherwise it looks grim so we might as well develop and propagate a philosophy
that ignores the negatives and then we will be happy until it is too late.
Because why get all upset about danger when big business and free market
economies and Jesus will save us? I hope they hurry instead of just
doing the same stuff over and over again and scientists gotta stop foreseeing
all the dangers and concentrate on good stuff.

Read "One Second After" or "Light's Out" for frighteningly plausible EMP-caused societal collapse.

Read "Patriots" for a possible variant on an Economic collapse.

ORIGINAL: RevRick

No.. that will not be the end.. We will be eliminated as an obstruction to the Pan-Galactic Super Highway.

Thanks for nothing. I laughed while reading this in bed and got a stern look from the Missus. [:D]

ORIGINAL: Grunt

Borg-like humans will first appear in the Tour de France.

This subject was explored in a frightening TimeWatch documentary from several years ago entitled 'The Cyborg Cometh'

A truly frightening ( possible ) evolutionary path for humans.

ORIGINAL: Lcp Purcell

Extreme Weather Linked to Global Warming, Nobel Prize-Winning Scientist Says

(You are not allowed to post links for 7 days from the date of your tenth post.) !??!???!


The funny thing is because global warming has been allowed to advance unchecked everyone will be calling for a one world government in 10-20 years. Is this a sad coincidence or an evil plot, well your guess is as good as mine.

Most Brits I know don't want to be governed from Europe, being governed by a world government has got no chance.[:'(]

I could explain much of that, seen many of those doctrines, I didn't watch the videos, but I have heard and even posted about many errors in those doctrines.

The issue is I need money
And if they could control me, they would not have created situations that make acquisitions of material resources more difficult to attempt to limit people that do not 'do what they are told'. It is material issues that are mostly used to try and control people in society. Then they discuss the other issues so you don't discuss economic situations.

There is a difference from being controlled,
and doing everything you are told to do.

The thing is, if they can get you to think you are controlled, you will do what someone else says you have to do.

99% of controlling someone is to get them to think they are controlled. There are also some doctrines that say people can effect the world they are in, and if you think you can be controlled, then that would be the effects you would create.


It is also possible some people are controlled, and some might even like that way of living, that is a free will choice also.


Although...
"I have seen attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion,
I have seen sea beams glitter in the darkness off of ten house of gait" - Blade Runner

So there is always that to think on. [:)]

Don't worry, be happy [:)]
if this guy's predictions are true,

http://www.livescience.com/1951-forecas ... -2050.html

by 2050 we will all (or those that are still kicking around), be happily married or in a "relationship" with a tailored-made Romba/ nurse/ companion/sex-robots

I am looking forward to my golden years [;)]

ORIGINAL: wdolson

This has been a common Science Fiction theme for 50 years. The book/movie 2001 were written in 1968 and had a self aware computer. Despite dramatic advances in computing beyond even what Stanley Kubric and Arther Clarke saw back then, we do not have self aware computers 11 years after the date of that movie.

Bill

Well my PC sometimes doing stange things, sometimes it work, sometimes not, sometimes i think pc simply doesnt like me.

2shellshock :
For end of human race - yes it will come and will be caused by humans. And yes, it will be due to overpopulation, but not by nummer of ppl itself, but by war which will start from need keep resources for own population.

ORIGINAL: Lcp Purcell

Extreme Weather Linked to Global Warming, Nobel Prize-Winning Scientist Says

(You are not allowed to post links for 7 days from the date of your tenth post.) !??!???!


The funny thing is because global warming has been allowed to advance unchecked everyone will be calling for a one world government in 10-20 years. Is this a sad coincidence or an evil plot, well your guess is as good as mine.

1. global warming caused by human is one of biggest BS in this century.
2. calling for one global goverment is done only by these which are directly intered in creating it for own profit.

ORIGINAL: Lcp Purcell
The USA no longer leads in green house gas emissions, so to address the problem it will take a one world government. ( which of course is a dreadful idea)

wow, we dont like your goverment ways, we will thown you down and setup goverment to your liking. Wow, very nice idea.
Wait, but this is what US do to est of world post 2001. Who will put down goverment of US down ?

ORIGINAL: Chris H

ORIGINAL: Lcp Purcell

Extreme Weather Linked to Global Warming, Nobel Prize-Winning Scientist Says

(You are not allowed to post links for 7 days from the date of your tenth post.) !??!???!


The funny thing is because global warming has been allowed to advance unchecked everyone will be calling for a one world government in 10-20 years. Is this a sad coincidence or an evil plot, well your guess is as good as mine.

Most Brits I know don't want to be governed from Europe, being governed by a world government has got no chance.[:'(]

Yeah, Brits will only like one world ruler only if all will drive on left side and goverment will be monarchy.

ORIGINAL: Cribtop

They better let us keep playing AE!

Yeah, but the AI will regularly kick our asses. [:D]