Where are we going? Are we imploding?

[Baz]

We've already done a lot - been to the moon and back.

Sent spacecraft elsewhere..

Invented a LOT of technical devices...phone, radio, computer, MRI device, X-ray, aircraft, ships, cars and trucks, motorcycles,....

All kinds of food and clothing.

Can't say much about our political and legal process.

What next?

Where are we going?

Do we have any real goals?

Seems like we are very divisive - imploding on ourselves now?

This is why I appreciate any semblance to civilised discussion...and absolutely abhor attacks on one another.

What is next - the cure for cancer? What about our society? Do we have a cure for that?

[Jim Richards]

Space, the final frontier...

[fingpilot]

I happened to turn my I-Pod loose the other day (play anything it wants).

Imagine, By John Lennon came on. Had not really heard it for years.

I'd like to think we could all find a way to get along, nuclear border disputes and all.

[cockerpunk]

when large parts of your civilization do not believe in reality, you get what we are getting now.

the rest of us are gain knowledge through research, improving lives, exploring and discovering the universe etc etc, and those backwards poeple want to drag us back into a religious dark age with anti-intellectualism, anti-science, sexism, and just your regular xenophobia.

"We’ve arranged a society based on science and technology, in which nobody understands anything about science and technology. And this combustible mixture of ignorance and power, sooner or later, is going to blow up in our faces. Who is running the science and technology in a democracy if the people don’t know anything about it?"

"This planet is run by crazy people. Remember what they have to do to get where they are. Their perspective is so narrow, so...brief. A few years. In the best of them a few decades. They care only about the time they are in power. "

i always loved carl sagan's philosophy .... mostly it was "all this **** you are argue about, politics, economics ... none of this **** matters. the universe .... the universe matters"

[techweenie]

IMO, US is at a tipping point, with those who believe in science and logic down to approximately 50% of the population.

[Willem Fick]

I have a very depressing view on this:

Every civilization in the history of mankind has peaked and shortly thereafter disappeared, often taking their scientific discoveries and knowledge with them. Ours will be the same. Often the peak of a civilization's growth is signaled by barbarians of some form of another taking over, either by force or by assimilation.

I suspect western civilization as we know it has reached that very peak (perhaps somewhere a while back already), and our political correctness, our accommodating and embracing nature is leading to our values being overrun and a gradual moral/economic/ethical decline.

[fastfredracing]

To reply to your video, with another, .....

[aigel]

We sure are doomed with the negativity displayed in this thread so far. Who is posting? A bunch of frustrated mid aged and old farts???

IMHO we are in very exciting times, in my lifetime I expect serious progress in energy, water and automation. Automation specifically in traffic. The self driving car will come in just in time for me to take on retirement road-trips, beer in hand.

G

[Jim Richards]

I like your optimism, aigel, but your self-driving car is better than you think. It will let you head on down the road with a beer in both hands.

[lukeh]

To many people will be the downfall. It is going to eventually cause all kinds of problems that we won't be able to recover from and that will lead to some kind of massive change.

[motion]

Originally Posted by aigel

We sure are doomed with the negativity displayed in this thread so far. Who is posting? A bunch of frustrated mid aged and old farts???

IMHO we are in very exciting times, in my lifetime I expect serious progress in energy, water and automation. Automation specifically in traffic. The self driving car will come in just in time for me to take on retirement road-trips, beer in hand.

G

+1

I love the times we are living in. Only thing missing is the fountain of youth

[motion]

Originally Posted by lukeh

To many people will be the downfall. It is going to eventually cause all kinds of problems that we won't be able to recover from and that will lead to some kind of massive change.

The entire population of the world can fit into the state of Texas, with average, large city population density. The problem is not too many people... the problem is too many stupid people.

[techweenie]

Originally Posted by motion

the entire population of the world can fit into the state of texas, with average, large city population density. The problem is not too many people... The problem is too many stupid people.

bingo

[kach22i]

Originally Posted by Baz

What is next ........?

New battles over dwindling natural resources.

New ways of generating power/energy, and new levels of conserving energy.

Hopes of keeping warm/cool and having enough fresh water will occupy our time left as a species.

[genrex]

The population keeps growing, and already the demand for natural resources is too much. 40 years ago you could smell the orange groves in the San Fernando Valley; now they are all gone, replaced by tracts of houses and strip malls. We have huge landfills of toxic garbage that will soon reach their limit and have to be "capped" to hopefully prevent the escape of cancer-causing dioxins and etc. Already people are having trouble finding clean drinking water. If we can't agree that this is a problem, then we can't agree on anything. The rich get richer and the poor have more children. As Molly Ivins used to say, "And so it goes..."

_

[wdfifteen]

We have a society based on science and technology which we created and which none of us fully understands. For thousands of years the natural world surrounded us, we didn't understand it so we established religions to help us deal with the vicissitudes of the world around us. But God didn't create cell phones, lasers, the internet, computers, etc. Now we are surrounded by a different world that wasn't created by God, nobody understands it, and we don't have God to blame when it goes wrong. It's no wonder there is so much stress, fear, and anxiety. We are feeling the foot of pride hovering over us.

[pwd72s]

[cockerpunk]

Originally Posted by genrex

The population keeps growing, and already the demand for natural resources is too much. 40 years ago you could smell the orange groves in the San Fernando Valley; now they are all gone, replaced by tracts of houses and strip malls. We have huge landfills of toxic garbage that will soon reach their limit and have to be "capped" to hopefully prevent the escape of cancer-causing dioxins and etc. Already people are having trouble finding clean drinking water. If we can't agree that this is a problem, then we can't agree on anything. The rich get richer and the poor have more children. As Molly Ivins used to say, "And so it goes..."

_

population growth would not be a problem if we did not hamper our progress with religion, dogma, and xenophobia.

"Our problems are man-made, therefore they may be solved by man. And man can be as big as he wants. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings." - JFK

[onewhippedpuppy]

Very interesting and ironic comments thus far on this thread. That somehow religion and ignorance are implicitly linked, and simultaneously the downfall of society. But oh by the way, we are in a moral downward spiral. Technology is our savior, but engineers tend to be religious. And Christian religion typically puts an emphasis on traditional moral values. OH THE HUMANITY!

[BlueSkyJaunte]

I too was listening to my iPod this morning. A very appropriate lyric came through the speakers:

Originally Posted by my ipod

You can't be something you're not.
Be yourself - by yourself.
Stay away from me.