Are You Optimistic/Pessimistic About the Future...


We haven't managed very well at all. We were warned in 1970 that if we didn't stop chopping down the rain forests that within 5 years we would enter a period of climate regime change. To stop cutting down rain forests was more realistic than reducing emissions. How has that worked out over the 50 years.
Environmentally it has been an utter disaster. I said we have trashed the planet in my first post. I think Climate Change argument is a red herring. The environmental disaster has already happened. However, the quality of life for the vast majority of people on earth is ridiculously high in comparison to 50 years ago.
 
Environmentally it has been an utter disaster. I said we have trashed the planet in my first post. I think Climate Change argument is a red herring. The environmental disaster has already happened. However, the quality of life for the vast majority of people on earth is ridiculously high in comparison to 50 years ago.
The environmental disaster has hardly started.
 
Valid arguments on both sides. I’m somewhere in the middle.

Virtually impossible to think that people on a football message board would fully understand the issues enough to be so emphatic either way though.
 
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The environmental disaster has hardly started.
Virtually all flora and fauna has been wiped out everywhere. If that is not an environmental disaster then we certainly have different perspectives.

If we can get through the next couple of centuries we might get a reasonably soft landing and start rewilding a lot of the world.

Either way, neither of us will see what happens and I have enough books and clothes to get me through to death, so I'm content.
Valid arguments on both sides. I’m somewhere in the middle.

Virtually impossible to think that people on a football message board would fully understand the issues enough to be so emphatic either way though.

You can be optimistic and wrong :lol:

However, the facts are there for how human lives have been transformed for billions.
 
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Of the world, human race?

Quite a few challenges...

Global warming and sea levels rising - natural earths cycle or perpetuated by man made input, which even it is humans can definitely do better and slow the pace
A growing population placing ever increasing pressure on natural resources that are being destroyed at alarming rates - an ever growing population isn’t necessarily increasing the pressure on natural resources if natural resources were being used for actual living and not greed and comfort, point easily solved by reducing consumerism vastly
Species going extinct at alarming rates
the capacity to wipe ourselves out - as above, species going extinct because of humans greed destroying habitat for the sake of a new dining room table or a new kitchen every few years
Fears around AI - pretty mute in my opinion, if AI decided to quote out humans then I’d say it’s working very well and is making the right choice, bit shit of you like living though….but like how the species we make extinct must feel about us

To counter that...
We're aware of the challenges is a good start - as individuals we’re doing far too little to influence big business, we need to learn to go without the comforts we perceive essential
Technology and science could help bring solutions - true, they could but we’re in an era here technology and science is used for profit rather than social and environmental good for the sake of it
We're showing more and more interest in the wellbeing of the natural world - showing an interest isn’t enough, not by a long shot, we’ve got to fundamentally change the way we view our existence and our place in the planet and face up to our individual responsibilities
Global birth rates are declining - good
We're becoming more compassionate as a species - think we’ve always been (generally) compassionate, we see it more because of social media but that compassion in meaningless without action

So you feeling optimistic or pessimistic?

I think it could go either way but personally I'm optimistic about the future.
Replied to your points in bold above.

To sum up, my personal future I’m optimistic about, the future of humanity….very pessimistic. We’ve become far too reliant on stuff that is pointless, generates profit for others and/or poisons us through our food chain. A minority of human beings on this planet are absolute f***ing wankers of the highest order.
 
Virtually all flora and fauna has been wiped out everywhere. If that is not an environmental disaster then we certainly have different perspectives.

If we can get through the next couple of centuries we might get a reasonably soft landing and start rewilding a lot of the world.

Either way, neither of us will see what happens and I have enough books and clothes to get me through to death, so I'm content.

It's all relative. It is a disaster but still only the beginning. Glacial melt could be total by 2050 (probably before) and 70% of the fresh water supply for humans comes from that melt. Arctic and Antarctic melt that is on land will reduce reflectivity so the land will warm and accelerate that melt in surrounding areas. The dynamic of temperature and its effect on change of state from ice to water and then its effect on change of state from water to ice means it will be virtually impossible to turn back as 0 degrees is just the nominal temperature as there is actually a difference between +4 Celsius and -4 Celsius required. Sea levels will rise. Increased precipitation will wash away more topsoil. Prime agricultural land will be lost possibly forever.

We can collect all the historical data we like but human society is not progressing in a linear path to some ideal as Marx predicted. Dialectical materialism (conflict theory) can only hold in the short and medium term. A social structure emerges (a thesis) followed by its antithesis. Conflict arises but the result is not a victory of one over the other but a synthesis and a new thesis until another antithesis arises. Sound analysis of conflict theory but only over the short and medium term. Change is more cyclic because that is what we are like as human beings. We keep repeating the same mistakes of history. I would challenge anyone to prove to me that dialectical materialism is correct. If it was then Fascism/Nazism would have been confined to the rubbish bin of history and they have not.

So people can try to appease their own fears all they want just like some grasp for a god or soul because their mind fears emptiness but what has happened so far in the past is irrelevant when trying to decide on the future and that future is bleak. The trouble is appeasement simply gives us a false sense of security and stops us acting as is needed. Enjoy it while you can but let's not pretend all is hunky dory in the Garden of Eden.
 
Virtually all flora and fauna has been wiped out everywhere. If that is not an environmental disaster then we certainly have different perspectives.

If we can get through the next couple of centuries we might get a reasonably soft landing and start rewilding a lot of the world.

Either way, neither of us will see what happens and I have enough books and clothes to get me through to death, so I'm content.


You can be optimistic and wrong :lol:

However, the facts are there for how human lives have been transformed for billions.
We agree on this, the damage is done, its how we manage the damage moving forward that now counts.

Lives have been transformed Tech advance does that, just think what it must have been like when electric became main stream, just as mind blowing as what we are seeing with the computer, but we lose on the way too, we are becoming more and more detached from the world we live in, kids are scary dumb when it comes to some common sense subjects, we are losing simple skills because we are now a throw away culture and in its wake we have born a second class of people who survive in our rubbish, reclaiming what they can from our unrecycled crap. I bet those kids dont feel lucky, getting ill rummaging around tips for metals, the black smoke of plastic burning all around them, but its a job thats growing and the only job for these people.

But back to poverty and the question are we better off now, its so complex, I agree we have more spending power than before, but how much of that is linked to debt, spending what we dont have? I think the wealthier are better off now, its never been easier for them.
Also how do you measure the poverty line, the world bank has it as $1.90 a day and under is extreme poverty in the world, now I could not live on $1.90 per day, so how do we judge it, 2 billion people are classed as in poverty, thats an improvement from the past, but how do you quantifies it, I mean you maybe were cash poor in the past, but were growing your own food, had some land and were healthily and now the same population is cash richer, but having to buy everything and lost the health and land, look at minorities around the world, to see that effect in action.

So where is the line, look at USA to see it in action, wealth beyond your dreams next to people with nothing at all, poor education and no health care, how many people would be in poverty if we used a real metric from the western world, what if we decided poverty was $50 dollars a day, we would suddenly see a hell of a lot more people classed as in poverty

Poverty again according to the world bank is growing in many regions, just look at the UK, 6th richest country on the planet and we are seeing energy poverty on scale unlike it for a very long time.

Now people will say you have to account for local prices, thats true to a point, someone earning $1.90 a day is not going to be able to compete for resources world wide and thats the issue and we see it in the depths of the slums and here in the UK, a wealthy person can always outcompete a power person for resources, its what has led the world to be so unfair.

Its why I use the gap between haves and have nots to judge how the world is doing, thats a gap thats growing all the time and why I feel we aren't as better off than say 50 years ago, look at housing to see that concept in action.
It's all relative. It is a disaster but still only the beginning. Glacial melt could be total by 2050 (probably before) and 70% of the fresh water supply for humans comes from that melt. Arctic and Antarctic melt that is on land will reduce reflectivity so the land will warm and accelerate that melt in surrounding areas. The dynamic of temperature and its effect on change of state from ice to water and then its effect on change of state from water to ice means it will be virtually impossible to turn back as 0 degrees is just the nominal temperature as there is actually a difference between +4 Celsius and -4 Celsius required. Sea levels will rise. Increased precipitation will wash away more topsoil. Prime agricultural land will be lost possibly forever.

We can collect all the historical data we like but human society is not progressing in a linear path to some ideal as Marx predicted. Dialectical materialism (conflict theory) can only hold in the short and medium term. A social structure emerges (a thesis) followed by its antithesis. Conflict arises but the result is not a victory of one over the other but a synthesis and a new thesis until another antithesis arises. Sound analysis of conflict theory but only over the short and medium term. Change is more cyclic because that is what we are like as human beings. We keep repeating the same mistakes of history. I would challenge anyone to prove to me that dialectical materialism is correct. If it was then Fascism/Nazism would have been confined to the rubbish bin of history and they have not.

So people can try to appease their own fears all they want just like some grasp for a god or soul because their mind fears emptiness but what has happened so far in the past is irrelevant when trying to decide on the future and that future is bleak. The trouble is appeasement simply gives us a false sense of security and stops us acting as is needed. Enjoy it while you can but let's not pretend all is hunky dory in the Garden of Eden.

The damage is done now, we will see further effects down the line, we cant stop this train now, its well and truly left the station, all we can do is try and limit the effects, its going to get a lot worse before it will get better, something not talked about enough is soil health, this is a major problem, we are now growing food without soil and we are being told this is a good thing, well its not, its much more important to fix the soil and not ignore the issue.
 
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It's all relative. It is a disaster but still only the beginning. Glacial melt could be total by 2050 (probably before) and 70% of the fresh water supply for humans comes from that melt. Arctic and Antarctic melt that is on land will reduce reflectivity so the land will warm and accelerate that melt in surrounding areas. The dynamic of temperature and its effect on change of state from ice to water and then its effect on change of state from water to ice means it will be virtually impossible to turn back as 0 degrees is just the nominal temperature as there is actually a difference between +4 Celsius and -4 Celsius required. Sea levels will rise. Increased precipitation will wash away more topsoil. Prime agricultural land will be lost possibly forever.

We can collect all the historical data we like but human society is not progressing in a linear path to some ideal as Marx predicted. Dialectical materialism (conflict theory) can only hold in the short and medium term. A social structure emerges (a thesis) followed by its antithesis. Conflict arises but the result is not a victory of one over the other but a synthesis and a new thesis until another antithesis arises. Sound analysis of conflict theory but only over the short and medium term. Change is more cyclic because that is what we are like as human beings. We keep repeating the same mistakes of history. I would challenge anyone to prove to me that dialectical materialism is correct. If it was then Fascism/Nazism would have been confined to the rubbish bin of history and they have not.

So people can try to appease their own fears all they want just like some grasp for a god or soul because their mind fears emptiness but what has happened so far in the past is irrelevant when trying to decide on the future and that future is bleak. The trouble is appeasement simply gives us a false sense of security and stops us acting as is needed. Enjoy it while you can but let's not pretend all is hunky dory in the Garden of Eden.
It is all relative but most of the world's large fauna have been wiped from the face of the earth. Most of the diversity of fauna has disappeared. That is an utter disaster in my opinion.

So in 27 years 70% of the fresh water supply will have disappeared? Are you sure?

I agree Marx was wrong.

I have no fears for the future at all. Not on a personal basis anyway.
 
It is all relative but most of the world's large fauna have been wiped from the face of the earth. Most of the diversity of fauna has disappeared. That is an utter disaster in my opinion.

So in 27 years 70% of the fresh water supply will have disappeared? Are you sure?

I agree Marx was wrong.

I have no fears for the future at all. Not on a personal basis anyway.
In the best case scenario if temperature rise is limited to 1.5 degrees then 70% of the glaciers in the Alps will be gone by 2050. Of course a more realistic temperature rise may be 2.7 degrees which is the current scenario. In Europe the Danube flows through 10 countries. Remember in the Himalayas 2 billion depend on its fresh water supply so any variation will be critical.

I don't have much fear on a personal basis. I'll be dead before it gets worse.
 
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Replied to your points in bold above.

To sum up, my personal future I’m optimistic about, the future of humanity….very pessimistic. We’ve become far too reliant on stuff that is pointless, generates profit for others and/or poisons us through our food chain. A minority of human beings on this planet are absolute f***ing wankers of the highest order.
It's around 7.2% Unfortunately chaos drives evolution and that percentage will always be a constant, but relative to the behaviour of the majority 92.8 percent of us who wish to live in peace.

Example: If the majority of us lived in peace, the minority would be the ones that park badly...contrast creates and drives all life.
 
Consider the Rhine which is the second longest river in Europe after the Danube (which flows from the Black Forest to the Black Sea):

The river begins in the Swiss canton of Graubünden in the south-eastern Swiss Alps. It forms part of the Swiss-Liechtenstein, Swiss-Austrian, and Swiss-German borders. After that the Rhine defines much of the Franco-German border, after which it flows in a mostly northerly direction through the German Rhineland. Finally in Germany the Rhine turns into a predominantly westerly direction and flows into the Netherlands where it eventually empties into the North Sea.

Current calculations of the CHR and EUWID attest massive decrease or even drying out of the river within the next 30–80 years caused by the climate crisis.



I see water issues being a serious area of conflict in Europe.
God knows how that would be handled if the EU broke up as many on here have wished.
 
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Technology and science have a big hand in f***ing everything up.
They can make every better and also everything worse but that's basically the same for every time period and change of culture in our known history.

Were still blighted by disease but technology has made huge advancements that means people live longer and healthier overall. Even in poorer countries.

For example back in medieval times it is predicted around 1 in 3 women would die giving birth. That's an absolutely phenomenal death rate for something as natural as childbirth. Still lots die today but nowhere near 1 in 3.

However another comparison would be that back then it is estimated that the world population was around half a billion people and today is 8 billion so the solving od one major problem has helped effect another major problem become something in itself.

The high population then contributes to other issues such as climate change, lack of resources, higher crime, more likelihood of pandemics (especially worldwide ones due to enablement of travel), higher poverty etc.

These problems will likely end up seeing a decline in population, who knows how much damage we do to ourselves in the time it takes the population to balance out.

A lot of these things tend to end up balancing themselves out eventually. Like the Mongols killed an estimated 11% of the planets population. If you attribute the black death to them (which started with them and was spread through biological warfare) that would take that number significantly higher (estimated up to 50% of Europe died).

However the ramifications of both were that it had a massive positive effect on the environment as lots of land mass that was inhabited by humans went back to nature, more trees, plants etc made more carbon in the environment.

There's loads of examples of this scattered all through history matterless of the technology of the time. Life tends to work things out the way it's meant to eventually.
 
In the best case scenario if temperature rise is limited to 1.5 degrees then 70% of the glaciers in the Alps will be gone by 2050. Of course a more realistic temperature rise may be 2.7 degrees which is the current scenario. In Europe the Danube flows through 10 countries. Remember in the Himalayas 2 billion depend on its fresh water supply so any variation will be critical.

I don't have much fear on a personal basis. I'll be dead before it gets worse.
Is that 70% of fresh water supply? Seems a tad alarmist.
 
Pretty optimistic about life, I come across as miserable as hell in real life but that's just me. About the future of earth I think it will be sorted, as bad as this sounds once the rich countries are truly affected then solutions will be found, currently as bad as this sounds we (and those who can change things) can send a few million and forget about floods in Asia, once New York or London is seriously in danger then problems will be used.

There isn't a time in history I'd swap for now, id live to have nights out in the 60s, see bands from the 80s and late 90s but the stories that my dad's told me about the poverty he grew up in compared to what I've had I'd never swap.

The options now are endless, I know it probably doesn't seem great for anyone but leaving school now you have the world at your feet, yes money is needed and it's hard but it's possible, my dad 40 years ago had no option, id take this over that.

Not saying it couldn't be better though, but it does seem to get better with each generation.
 
Is that 70% of fresh water supply? Seems a tad alarmist.
Probably not but that is based on a scenario of 1.5 degrees rise rather than the current 2.7 degrees. Predictions are the Rhine could run dry altogether within the next 30-80 years, so by the end of the century at the latest depending on whether we limit temp rise to 1.5 which is extremely unlikely. So it's bye bye the Rhine one way or another. Doubt if the Danube will be much safer. Even if you consider it alarmist, it is a real event that will happen and we don't have anywhere near 200 years to avert disaster. It's deluded to think that because we left the EU that we will be exempt from the effect of so many countries in conflict over water.
Pretty optimistic about life, I come across as miserable as hell in real life but that's just me. About the future of earth I think it will be sorted, as bad as this sounds once the rich countries are truly affected then solutions will be found, currently as bad as this sounds we (and those who can change things) can send a few million and forget about floods in Asia, once New York or London is seriously in danger then problems will be used.

There isn't a time in history I'd swap for now, id live to have nights out in the 60s, see bands from the 80s and late 90s but the stories that my dad's told me about the poverty he grew up in compared to what I've had I'd never swap.

The options now are endless, I know it probably doesn't seem great for anyone but leaving school now you have the world at your feet, yes money is needed and it's hard but it's possible, my dad 40 years ago had no option, id take this over that.

Not saying it couldn't be better though, but it does seem to get better with each generation.
Once London is in danger from sea level rise what practical solution is there. It would be too late and the only solution would be to evacuate the entire South East, the most densely populated region of the UK. Where could they go?
 
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In the best case scenario if temperature rise is limited to 1.5 degrees then 70% of the glaciers in the Alps will be gone by 2050. Of course a more realistic temperature rise may be 2.7 degrees which is the current scenario. In Europe the Danube flows through 10 countries. Remember in the Himalayas 2 billion depend on its fresh water supply so any variation will be critical.

I don't have much fear on a personal basis. I'll be dead before it gets worse.
Glaciers have came and went throughout history. Itll likely kill a lot of people and cause mass migrations once again but we've done it as a species many times over.
 
Glaciers have came and went throughout history. Itll likely kill a lot of people and cause mass migrations once again but we've done it as a species many times over.
However, the current population is higher than ever before so there will be perhaps hundreds of millions of people on the move. That will have a knock on effect and put immense pressure on countries already under threat themselves.
 
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However, the current population is higher than ever before so there will be perhaps hundreds of millions of people on the move. That will have a knock on effect and put immense pressure on countries already under threat themselves.
This is true but likelihood is by that time the population will have significantly dwindled down due to a multitude of reasons.
 
Probably not but that is based on a scenario of 1.5 degrees rise rather than the current 2.7 degrees. Predictions are the Rhine could run dry altogether within the next 30-80 years, so by the end of the century at the latest depending on whether we limit temp rise to 1.5 which is extremely unlikely. So it's bye bye the Rhine one way or another. Doubt if the Danube will be much safer. Even if you consider it alarmist, it is a real event that will happen and we don't have anywhere near 200 years to avert disaster. It's deluded to think that because we left the EU that we will be exempt from the effect of so many countries in conflict over water.

Once London is in danger from sea level rise what practical solution is there. It would be too late and the only solution would be to evacuate the entire South East, the most densely populated region of the UK. Where could they go?
I don't know the solutions, wish I did as I'd be a very rich man, but London isn't in real danger of being washed away in 20 years like many islands in the Pacific and Indian ocean. As a human race I just believe the solutions will be found, scientists will be working on it and money will be thrown at it once its needed by the west, covid vaccine shows that, we have deseases around the world killing hundreds of thousands but vaccines are taking years, once the west are under attack its found within months. I know they are different issues but the same solutions will be found, or atleast I hope. I don't see the point in looking for the negative tbh, but that's just my opinion.

Population movement will be huge though, parts of the world are extremely sparsely populated, obviously people don't want to move there right now but in years to come if nothing changes (environmentally) then people will move there and start new cities. This has all happened before.
 
This is true but likelihood is by that time the population will have significantly dwindled down due to a multitude of reasons.
Well possibly but around 2 billion are dependent of fresh water from glacial melt in the Himalayas alone. That's a quarter of the entire population of the planet.
I don't know the solutions, wish I did as I'd be a very rich man, but London isn't in real danger of being washed away in 20 years like many islands in the Pacific and Indian ocean. As a human race I just believe the solutions will be found, scientists will be working on it and money will be thrown at it once its needed by the west, covid vaccine shows that, we have deseases around the world killing hundreds of thousands but vaccines are taking years, once the west are under attack its found within months. I know they are different issues but the same solutions will be found, or atleast I hope. I don't see the point in looking for the negative tbh, but that's just my opinion.

Population movement will be huge though, parts of the world are extremely sparsely populated, obviously people don't want to move there right now but in years to come if nothing changes (environmentally) then people will move there and start new cities. This has all happened before.
I see your point but there is a difference between developing a vaccine in a lab and the engineering solution needed to counter sea level rise. Just a few inches rise creates a much greater effect due to storm surge and current sea defences would be totally inadequate. So far the solution appears to be to simply abandon some places. If London did come under threat then the entire Thames Valley would be in danger.
In fact all of East Anglia would be in danger and most of west Lancashire.
 
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